Post by EmperorMyric on May 18, 2023 11:57:10 GMT
Spice Runner Highway: Deep Space
Little had really been seen or heard from Yog Narr once the Zarathustra massacare had concluded.
The living superweapon and Commander of Mirdiff had plunged into the interdicted zone, and once the media attention had moved elsewhere it had been somewhat forgotten by the public eye. But it was monitored, and observed from afar, and it had worried military analysts the galaxy over. While the galactic nations had ripped each other apart at Aedleshaven Yog Narr had been consuming the Ancerium star, and creating titanic swarm fleets, as well as undergoing some kind of yet unknown process.
When Corona had collapsed, the Swarmfleet had stirred, punching back out and destroying those token containment forces set to challenge it, the initial reports due to censorship as to not cause panic, had said 300 vessels. How wrong it had been. The fleet had made full speed to Corona.
But it would be challenged. The Krizpakt were well known, the crown of the Golden Cross trade lanes they were the natives who had benefitted most from colonial outsourcing and their own graft, becoming prosperous and wealthy nations who traded with much of the galaxy. The Krizpakt Corps were a jewel in that crown, created as a joint military venture they were equipped with some of the most advanced warships the natives could muster along with countless support assets. The Krizpakt Corps had not been sent to Aedleshaven despite Orillias demands, but instead kept for defensive purposes, the now free Swarmfleet however was designated a priority target. The Corps had slipped anchor, on high alert anyway they had rapidly moved to intercept the foe, pride of the Native ambition they promised to end the threat before it reached Corona.
The Krizpakt Corps were wiped out to a ship.
The enemy numbers had not been 300. They had been over 5000. And the enemy capability as well as tactics had been enough to take the Corps off guard. Garbled distress calls and reports were all that returned from the fight.
Furious at the loss of the Corps and with the fleet now disrupting and blockading all forces and assets into and out of the Coronan theatre the Krizpakt turned to their strategic arsenal.
And CONA, SAGA as well as neutral elements were already in position to strike. Co-operation was swift, and a plan was concocted, an interdiction and annihilation in deep space along the Spice Lane. As the Swarmfleet was harassed and attacked by smaller forces it was rapidly ripped out of FTL. The twin Interdictors of Velká Ciská Dilettante and Cognoscente pinning the foe down with their powerful gravity wells.
With allied forces now arriving on scene and SAGA forces taking up station the second asset to hit home did so. Deep within Hrast Tvardva three massive FTL guns based on the old Capitol design of Encanda Strixx were fed inputted targeting data, loading gigantic Bomb Pumped Laser munitions the size of dreadnoughts. In a moment they had charged and simultaneously fired their projectiles, through open FTL gates. All three projectiles exited at the edge of the interdiction zone, flying in at relativistic speeds the assembled forces were greeted with a beautiful sight.
Three huge blinding flashes detonated within the Mirdiff formation, wiping out upwards of 1800 vessels in a under a second, their vapourised forms merely becoming high velocity dust. While the enemy still had massive numbers, their formation had been broken, and it was time to strike.
They had to wipe the fleet out, if even one Mirdiff bio-ship made it to Corona, the virus could exponentially mutate and become impossible to stop.
Coronan Theatre
Name Pending, RANGSI FOB
125th Strike Force (Chee-Baker)
------
“Incoming WARNO sir!”
“Patch it through,” Force Admiral Chee-Baker leaned forward, as the rest of the command bridge anticipated this incoming order.
They were gearing for action, having been stuck on the backburner while their sister Strike Force, the 101st, rushed forward to support the Fleethood’s attack on the southern AOTS-K advance. Training the Coronans had been an immensely difficult affair - bordering the impossible in fact. They will do anything, any mission, if it meant getting out of this mess.
<<[FROM HICOM] WARNO: SITUATION AS FOLLOWS. INTEL REPORTS MIRDIF FORCES BROKE OUT OF CONTAINMENT FROM ZARATHRUSTRA. EN ROUTE TO CORONA ALONG SPICE RUNNER HIGHWAY. INTERCEPT IMMEDIATELY. URGENCY CODE TANGO-LIMA-MIKE.>>
Silence befell the entire bridge as the WARNO’s holographic text crawled in the air, its blue shimmer illuminating its dark confines. Suddenly, their eagerness disappeared. Vanished. Dissipated. Like a drop of water in the scorching desert. Hell, maybe being marooned on a scorching desert was far better than this.
-----
Palm Mirdif. The scorn that ravaged the galaxy in the fires of the Boreal Jihad while the colonial powers were too busy fighting AW2. He who hated all life, and wanted to see all life burn.
And now, His minions were enroute to the Corona theatre.
The pieces of the great puzzle were coming together for Force Admiral Chee-Baker. Nightwatch reports of the reactivated Mirdif bioweapons and the spread of the AFA ‘zombie virus’. The food producing biomass of Palm Rashidiya, Palm Mirdif’s nemesis, in Burgertown that fed not only the Coronans, but also countless lives across the entire galaxy. The Coronans’ degeneracy and propensity for wallowing in their filth and garbage and retardedness might not be easily missed if they were gone, but if Yog-Narr reached them both…
---
Chee-Baker’s eyes widened at the thought. Tango-Lima-Mike indeed. To-the-Last-Man. There is no possibility of retreat - they must defeat the Mirdif fleet there and then or die denting their numbers for others to have a better chance, not just for the sake of the Republik Angkasa, but for the sake of the entire galaxy itself.
Sweat dripped from his brow, and his heart was palpitating. He was no veteran admiral, whose tactical genius tempered in experience would save the day. Like many of the new batch, he had been rapidly promoted in wake of the rapid AW3 fleet expansion that created many, many empty billets. He was no natural and he was not top of his class either. Nor does the 125th Strike Force have anything up their sleeves. No superweapon. No prototype battleship. No secret ace.
So how the hell are they going to defeat Mirdif?
When Commodore Klemmik had accompanied Felix 44 to the Coronan Theater she’d come with expectations. She’d expected the Organization’s usual brand of raiding and boarding. She’d expected Felix to pick a fight with the Army. Hell, she’d even expected that they may find themselves in some stand up fight with them.
She was prepared for all of that. She could handle all of that.
She wasn’t prepared for a deadly viral outbreak to start burning its way across the remnants of the Coronan Republic. But even once it had started it seemed so far away from the base the Organization had established. Moreover it seemed the sort of crisis that was meant to be dealt with by governments and alliances. There was nothing she could do about it any rate. Let the powers that be sort that one out…
Only they weren’t sorting it out, and before she knew it something much, much worse was on its way to Corona to turn a shit situation into an apocalyptic one.
Even then, she thought the powers that be would surely put together a response capable of handling it. But as intelligence on fleet movements started to come in it started to be increasingly apparent that the powers that be were getting ready to fumble this one.
And it was absolutely not something that could be fumbled.
Felix had been informed, and he ordered her to rendezvous with him before the two of them would proceed with the whole fleet to the interception point. Four hundred ships could make quite the difference…
Only Felix never showed. The Army was apparently very upset about the convoy he destroyed. He was struggling to withdraw. She had waited for him at the rendezvous as long as she could, hoping her Admiral would show up. But there was no sign of him, and last she heard from him he was calling on Overdrive for support.
The message was clear. If Overdrive was his support plan, it meant he wanted her to carry on without him.
There was an air of impending doom that hung around the Commodore as her fleet completed the final FTL jump. She was showing up with half the forces she was supposed to, and she would be lying if she said she felt confident about their chances. There were just too many things that could go wrong. Too many things that already had gone wrong.
She sighed, and took her medication just before the ships left slipspace. There was no telling how long the battle might last, and the last thing she needed was to get sick in the middle of it. With the fresh injection coursing through her, her flagship the Summer Solstice was first to leave slip space. A bright flash, and a ripple across realspace heralded the Claymore-Class Battleship’s arrival.
It settled on the right edge of the main force, soon joined by dozens more flashes as the rest of Klemmik’s fleet tore its way back into realspace. A hundred and eighty ships in total were soon formed up with a military efficiency and precision one didn’t often see from vessels bearing the insignia of the Black Sail Organization.
Her fleet prepared, missiles loading and priming for launch while targeting AIs crunched through data and churned out targeting solutions for the rail guns. So long as the nations present didn’t decide to light up the pirate fleet as soon as it arrived, then she’d be in this.
In for a penny. In for a fucking pound. Galaxy on the line.
“No pressure Klemmik,” She muttered to herself. “No pressure at all…”
'New Haven Staging Grounds - Name Pending - Coronan Theatre'
The ringing of the Avalon Bells meant that something was up. No convoy protection duty, no skirmishing, or pirate raids this time. The Elvorians have always been in the backstage of galactic politics, partially due to their constant pirate presence around their nation, and partially because of laziness and decadence. However, this time, they'll be playing with the giants this time.
"Rumors have come out about an approaching Mirdif Fleet. If you guys aren't as aware of the galactic situation... well, in simple terms. It's an abhorrent monster that once swept across the galaxy intending to kill all life... and if you can't tell, they're back." The gathering hall was in a quiet, planning mood, as officers rushed about to pry as much as they can out of defensive operations and to send them against Palm Mirdif. Most of the junior officers seemed almost enthusiastic, their first taste of battle. But the veterans and the historians were in a morose mood, knowing that it's now or never against this existential threat.
Admiral Mayania approached the communications officer, both of them saluting each other before delving into the details.
"Our main objective is to protect the burgerzone. Palm Mirdif and Palm Rashy are bitter rivals, if Mirdif manages to get their grubby hands on Rashy, who knows what'll happen to the galaxy after that." The comms officers ran over the details, Mayania simply watching over. The nervous sweat the admiral was in couldn't be hidden, her face was as frozen as ice. "Maya, we've been through everything together." The officer put a hand on her shoulder, snapping her out of the trance. "You're the only admiral on station, everyone else is doing convoy protection or out of the Staging ground. No pressure but... the fate of the galaxy is kinda on the line." The officer releases his grip on her shoulder. "Goodluck, goodbye."
---
Interception Zone 'Dorothy' - 20 AU to NO RETURN
The bridge of the Red Sea was as clean and royal as always, the gold and red accents had made the officers feel like they were operating within a palace instead of a warship. Though with the overwhelming odds stacked against them this battle, it felt more like a decorated tomb than a comfortable residence. Admiral Mayania and her bridge crew performed their duties like they normally did, though one couldn't discount the tense atmosphere emanating through the entire room. Maya stared out of the window, seeing her ship slow down as they exited FTL, the incoming battle ahead of them.
"Hey guys!" One of the officers on the bridge broke the agonizing silence. "If we survive, I'll buy all of y'all the most expensive beers on Auvor, I promise." A few of the crew, Maya among them, gave a nervous laugh at his attempt to drain the tension out of the room. Though as the Red Sea saw her strike fleet appear alongside her, Maya is given a harsh reminder that this might just be the end of her. Close to the Elvorian strike fleet, the Meranan Raiders and a detachment of Kayoko Royal Engineers would appear, bringing alongside them heavy kinetic support and defensive support respectively.
Several ships went full burn back into their previous formations, as a few Kayoko Guild ships tug defensive emplacements filled to the brim with cosmic ray launchers and point defense in order to provide some support. The Elvorians would be shooting and scooting as fire support. The Meranans and what little Coronan independents will try and reinforce any other fleets holding the line. The Kayokos would set up moving artillery to constantly batter the enemies. But all plans falter when met with conflict, and Maya could do nothing but to swallow her nervousness, and pray to whatever holy spirits that would listen to her pleas.
The Red Sea prepared her cosmic ray launchers, it's humming joining a choir of dozens. The Elvorians will make their stand here, not one step back.
Svarthan Operations Command - Inner Halo Independence League - Coronan Theater
Annot was not happy.
Sure, the TRL backed down quite easily and despite the damage they managed to do was not a prolonged hyper problematic obstacle like many in ICEC feared. But it seemed like one obstacle was just being replaced with another. Not only did the Poleisi attack another ICEC member seemingly out of the blue, but this ACCURSED Mirdif fleet was blocking the galaxy and threatening to turn the already problematic plague unstoppable, and with their current luck, the AotS-K, the thing everyone SHOULD be fighting in Annot's mind, would be immune to the disease or be able to cure it somehow. For the latest time he curses those stupid Annihilationists and their moronic ideals, along with everyone who cannot see the real threat in the works here and would rather play pathetic and arrogant little games for their own power.
But that matters little, and punching bulkheads will also not fix it. No, for now, the immediate threat is the approaching biofleet. If it gets here, at the very least everyone in the theater will lose, maybe even the Synopticon, but then the galaxy will fall. Something must be done and it must be done quickly. Turning on his communicator, he starts to make calls...
Mirdif interception zone, staging area Alpha.
The Svarthan fleet drops out of FTL close to the largest concentration of allied fleet elements, a location they have dubbed the "Alpha" staging area. Arrayed before them is the combined might of some of the most powerful nations in the galaxy, and some that have just now emerged. It contains members from nearly every major alliance, including ICEC now that they are here, and it is certainly a sight to behold.
The fleet the Svarthan have brought is nothing to sneeze at either, consisting of a hundred combat vessels, including the "Mandatory Downsizing", their behemoth class vessel. Standing by it are the huge battle liners, the front line of the Svarthans support heavy combat style, their myriad of powerful defenses on maximum alert and power. Swarming around them are lighter ships, ranging from destroyers and cruisers, to point defense craft and emergency recovery and repair vessels.
But the real meat of their force is behind this veritable wall. Their support network. Generator vessels to keep ships powered at all times and facilitate more rapid attacks, sensor ships bristling with every type of detection the crabs have, and ready to spot whatever tricks the enemy may throw at them. Communications ships to help relay and maintain the certainly massive amount of transmissions and communications that will be occurring. But perhaps what the Svarthan are most iconic for, is the their mobile foundries. Space borne factories ready to churn out replacement parts for any ship that needs them, and even serve as a dry dock for smaller craft if time permits. Indeed, the ships send out messages informing all allies of their presence and the fact they are available for all of them to use.
Protecting all the support elements are two massive defense platforms are towed in, near immobile bastions that are already deploying a minefield around the Svarthan support assets. Their gigantic pion guns stand by to slaughter large hostiles while point defense and lighter guns will decimate and smaller force. They also house the critical FTL cannons to deliver the supplies from the foundries to the front.
Coronan Theater
BDCC Demarcation Zone 5 ADL
FWN 7th Fleet
0731 Standard Time
It was perhaps fate, or perhaps simple coincidence, that the signal sent to Chee-Baker and the signal sent to Admiral Lewiston of the 7th Fleet were the same. Tango-Lima-Mike, to the last man. The 7th Fleet had scarcely left home moorings when word reached them of the incoming Mirdif forces, and by then, their orders had been already clear, to fight Mirdif in whatever way they were needed.
Adjusting their trajectory to intercept had eaten valuable days, but those days had been used to prepare everything they could possibly check. Weapons were prepared, shields were cycled, every system in the over five hundred warships of the 7th had been checked from stem to stern to make sure that when they finally left FTL, they would be ready for it. Admiral Lewiston was no different, performing most of the checks he was able to aboard his flagship, Battlecruiser Rigel, in person. In FTL there was no way to go to the other ships in the fleet, much less the monolithic Tempest, but he had made it known to every crewman, every marine and every pilot he could see face to face that they were all equal in this. He was proud of them. They were frightened, many of them hadn't been in the service when the Boreal Jihad had occurred, but they looked to the older hands and their commanders to steady them and prepare for the storm that was to come. Charlie Lewiston himself had only been a lieutenant then, but he remembered.
And he knew.
Standing on the cramped and utilitarian bridge of the Rigel, Admiral Lewiston rested his hand on the top of his helmet as he looked over the holotank before him. The fleet was two minutes out from FTL exit, and sensors were already telling a grim tale. The intel reports had been correct, over five thousand swarm ships of the Scorn were going to be waiting for them.
It was the sort of fleet that he would have vastly preferred to be facing with three times the force he had alongside allied forces, but he didn't have that option. Even with the superweapon strikes, the enemy fleet still outnumbered the 7th by orders of magnitude. Good thing they, that the 7th wasn't alone.
He raised a sealed cup of coffee to his lips, and took a sip.
BDCC had marked a clear line of exclusion that Mirdif was not to cross at all if practical, several hundred kilometers head of the ADL, but had given orders that if this could not be maintained, the ADL itself was to be the last stand. TLM had been sent, countersent, confirmed and marked, and he could not help but think that if it came down to it, even if they wanted to run, there was nowhere to run to. Aktionsgruppe behind them, Mirdif in front, it was the proverbial hammer and anvil. So they would make a fight of it. And if the 7th were to die today, then they would make of it a fight to remember.
"Thirty seconds, admiral," the helmsman called out.
"All vessels, man battlestations. Beat to general quarters." he ordered. lifting his helmet to his head. "Seal the bridge."
"All squadrons reporting ready green," came the reply from the tacco as the streaking field of lines and impossible colors around them came to a crashing halt, replaced by the starry void and the searing, boiling blue portals from which the fleet emerged, dozens of squadrons arrayed around the massive superweapon at the heart of the fleet.
And Mirdif, that boiling, writhing scorn, was ahead of them.
Gyokuza-Pattern Void Engine - Axial Lagrange Point Three - Coronan Theatre
Scan.
Five-hundred owned vessels. One-thousand, eight-hundred enemy vessels. Two-hundred-and-forty noncombatants/allies/unidentified; rising.
Assess.
The mind processed. It predicted fleet movements. It analyzed potential armaments. It outlined ranges, possible factions, ship profiles; everything it possibly could. The future laid out before it in a vast sketch so dense it was black with lines, and then it stopped.
Scan.
Five-hundred owned vessels. One-thousand, eight-hundred enemy vessels. Three-hundred noncombatants/allied/unidentified; rising.
Assess.
The substrate was a tandem organism. It was the Gyokuza-Pattern's fifty-meter wide sphere, shining a perfect mirrored chrome marred by static domes in a honeycomb and swirling, unnerving probes swimming across its surface and leaving eerie ripples. It was the Eleventh Group's signal-mind, swimming between the various vessels alike a rippling, turbulent sea of gamma rays. It was also Nami-Unmei Nohito's mind, fragmented and spread across the Gyokuza-Pattern's hull in a throbbing web of liquid toughts and ideas. It was the executive, the nerve - but it was not a single being.
Authority permeated space. Space permeated authority. It saw with its eyes, and it saw with its sensors, and it saw through its signals and its other bodies in a game of telephone progressing at the speed of light. The authority's flow formed a mandala of the spheres and their companions, with triplet point defense units and pointed destroyer-patterns and looming battle/command-patterns swirling in a radial fractal. What the Sodalytes lacked in experience in void battles and technology, they attempted to compensate-for through numbers, tactics, signals, and saturation.
Scan.
Assess.
The future crystallized; the sketch warping into a tapestry before which the fleet laid bare.
Authority permeated space.
The substrate willed it into place like the moon pulling the tides.
To each of the allied formations, the Sodalytes had broadcast a message over infrared tightbeam. What the message actually contained was difficult to parse for most—it had been sloppily translated from analogue to digital formatting in a way that garbled and muddied its contents for an unprepared system. The gist of it, however, was this;
"Hail; you may address me as 'Nohito.' All neutral parties will coordinate fleet resources. Capabilities demanded/requested/needed. Summary/Explanation/Offer; Long-range assault. Point defense. Sandcaster. Magnetic cannon. Gamma-laser. Missile/Torpedo/Fragment: conventional, bomb-pumped laser, Casaba-type. Multiple complements of fighter/mecha/tandem frame. Multiple complements of strike frame/deflection unit/drone. Defense pattern, destroyer pattern, battleship pattern, battlecarrier pattern, launch/torpedo/missile/fragment pattern. Coordinate/Advise/Respond."
Alet-Zel Industrial System "Lyryth"
New Coronan Order Territory
Fleet Leader Naelle looked long and concerning reports dealing with both the spreading bioweapon and the newer threat of the oncoming biofleet of Yogg Narr. He had already sent out recommendations to Ministry of State and had informed the Order's leadership about coordinating plans to deal with the biohazard. The Yogg Narr fleet was a different story however.
Reports on the progress of the Yogg Narr swarmfleet indicated that it would not be possible to get additional ships to the Coronan theatre before the Swarmfleet's arrival. In addition, the forces available to him could not be spread too far due to the threat of the AotS-K forces. He had still signaled Shimmering Veil, and Laeneth-Xelas had informed him that as expected, Naelle was on his own.
He contacted Squadron Leader L'Kanne of the Spatial Carrier SVS Herald, and Ship Leader C'Rael of the Assault Ship SVS Bringer Of Judgment.
Holographic images of the two officers appeared in Naelle's holopod. Both saluted as Naelle issued his orders to them.
"The time has come for us to take action against the oncoming bio-fleet sent by Yogg Narr. High Command believes the fleet will attempt to obtain samples of the bioweapon Werewolf and others are spreading. This would be potentially disastrous and we will render what assistance we can. I have worked out a tactical plan for this engagement. The main part of the fleet must stay here to assist the New Coronan Order. I am sending your two vessels, backed up by Lan-1/Digam's Battlecrystal complement, to intercept."
Turning to L'Kanne, he continued "Squadron leader, you will position yourself at the rear of the allied formation at maximum range and use your Apparition Beams to snipe larger bioships. Deploy your Shards through the Wings of the Anais' system and direct them at targets of opportunity. Delay deployment though, as Ship Leader C'Rael will strike the first blow."
The Kalizwah nodded, tail rapidly moving back and forth in the manner his species did when excited at the thought of combat. Turning to C'Rael, a muscular Chimeran male Naelle smiled. "Ship Leader, you will load Phoenix Reaction Missiles. Once in the combat theater you will fire them in area radiance mode, optimal dispersal. I've gotten reports from Avrel-Naret at Askandar. Let's show One that he's not the only being that can bring an artificial sun-or six, to a battle."
"Once you deploy your missiles, phase out and disengage from the battle. Your ship's other armament will not add much to the tactical balance, and we want to avoid infection vector transmission." C'Rael saluted and then Naelle simply said. You have your orders. Deploy immediately and may the Blessing of the Anais' be with you."
Lorelei Fortress Nyeth
Shimmering Veil System
Nyeth's Essence floated in the eerie void at the core of the Lorelei Fortress. A zone of twisted spatial geometries that would drive most insane. He was in Communion with Blessed Laenas and First Fleet Leader Laeneth-Xelas.
I am ready to realize your desires, Blessed Laenas. My Systemry and escort vessels will ensure that any bioships that try to return to this galaxy shall experience the cold blessing of Oblivion Nyeth responded.
Laeneth-Xelas sent a feeling of satisfaction. I will be sending several Lan-class transports carrying additional Probe Pods. They will act as pickets to detect the fleet ahead of it's arrival.
Then it is decided Laenas resonated to the two. Go with my Blessings, Nyeth. And those of my Parents and Linkparent.
I hope to see Makel'va again one day. But you know what they say. Have to get out of my shell before such an auspicious event.
As Battle Force Nyeth and the transports started moving out of the system, already beginning to phase out. Laenas and Laeneth-Xelas on impulse looked out into space thinking of Nyeth's last comment.
Looking towards Zaingraf.
Coronan Theatre Defense Line
The eight ships shimmered into existence where all the forces were gathering to stand against the oncoming biofleet. SVS Herald surrounded by the six Battlecrystals, with SVS Bringer of Judgment off to her side, her decks loaded with six massive Phoenix Reaction missiles. Herald started launching Shards, the small crystalline craft orbiting around the blazing blacklight nonagrams of her two Wings of the Anais' gates. "All stations stand by for hyperdimensional vector Shard deployment on my command. Activating his neural comm, he signaled SVS Bringer of Judgment. "Ship Leader, get ready for
missile deployment. Burn them to ash!"
Swarms of Probe Pods launched from Herald's bays as well. They streaked ahead to take up positions near the front of the allied forces, facing the approach vector of the incoming hostile force. They were to give advance warning as the fleet approached, and tied their sensors into the fire control systems of the larger ships.
Onboard Bringer of Judgment, Ship Leader C'Rael said to his bridge crew,” You heard the Squadron Leader, Heat 'em up!" Lines of blazing actinic light glowed on each of the 6 huge missiles as their initiators and containment fields went active. Onboard control systems came online, awaiting targeting data.
“Courage in Adversity”
The motto of the Federation naval forces had echoed throughout the ages as the ideal standard of everything a flag officer should be. The FNF had always fought outnumbered, be it against the Solar Hegemony or their early brush wars, the FNF had fought against the odds and come out triumphant. There was… one important difference though. They had only been outnumbered in single-digit figures, now, they were outnumbered by at least 50:1.
Tac-space was a riot. Fleets were popping out and rapidly assigned colour codes from unknown yellows to friendly greens as they identified themselves, the automated tracking sensors barely able to keep up. Then, there was the swarm, Yogg-narr wasn’t here, but the swarm fleet had enough numbers to completely turn separate light-coded dots into a wall of red. All methods of visual distinction in tac-space had failed to break the swarm, and all that was visual was a mass of flesh and twisted plague, creatures. There was little point in visual distinctions anyways.
They were all targets, and just like before, they would all be destroyed.
There was no room for half-measures.
They had to be destroyed.
The Federation 3rd fleet had been rapidly deployed from fighting the TRF contingent, leaving behind their bases in IHIL to travel through FTL before rapidly burning their way here, outside the Coronan theatre; just along the space runner highway. They came like burning comets, riding on the death of thousands of subatomic particles as their torch drives were on full burn. There was no room for delay.
The Federation of Man had only been in Corona for a while, but when Nightwatch and at least a dozen other nations had called- no, begged for an intercept of a swarm, people listened. One of those people was HIGHCOM, and the powers that be had ordered that Jeanne take her third fleet -now free from the TRF- and burn rapidly for the swarm fleet.
“All tubes loaded, our DC teams are on standby and fleet reports all green.”
The white uniform of a starship captain stepped forwards out of the void.
Flag officer Lucian was neither new nor young to the game. He was approaching forty, and had command of his own battlecruiser. He was Jeanne’s second in command, and unfortunately, they had met before. Both knew that neither of them was likely to come out of this alive. Most of the men on this mission had accepted that this was the end for them, save for divine intervention, this was it. That made it all the worse that the person she was commending to his fate was her long-time friend.
“Good. Make sure our IFFs are calibrated, weapons-free captain.”
“Aye-aye ma’am, entering combat positions, weapons free,” his avatar faded out of tac-space with a smile.
She knew what that smile meant. It was an understanding that if he died, he wouldn’t blame her for his death. He knew what he was going to say if conversations on tac-space didn’t make official records, and she didn’t like it one bit.
Jeanne Armelle, third fleet Admiral and foreigner to Ancerious would remain in tac-space. Alone, she watched as the red tide of swarm fleets was met by an ever-increasing number of allied ships, and somewhere deep inside her, she thought they might actually come out of this alive.
The UDS only ever had one goal when they deployed a taskforce to Corona. Support their allies. It wasn’t even direct military assistance- the task force was just there to protect their logistics and supply ships that were deploying to the SAGA beachhead there. To many, the fall of the Coronan Republic was an opportunity and a danger in equal measure. To the UDS it was just another regret in a long list of why they should have never been so brash when entering Ancerious. Yet still they had a duty to their allies. While they were not dealt the most ideal hand upon entering the galaxy they still were intent on playing it to the best of their ability. And making allies and showing that they themselves were good allies was decidedly a good play.
And now there was a virus rampaging throughout the Remnants with a high chance of it breaking containment and spreading through the galaxy. Now there was a swarm of disgusting bio-ships enroute to the Remnants with the intent of weaponising it. Now the entire galaxy was under threat of this.
Parliament was in an uproar over the thought of it spreading throughout the colonies and goodness forbid, the rest of the UDS.
Needless to say, travel between universes was going to become a lot restricted in the future.
Still, there was one clear choice that the Overseer Council was confident in making.
They could not stand by and allow these beasts to win. They could now stand by and let the people of Ancerious die due their own disinterest. They could not leave their allies behind. It was their moral imperative. Nothing more, nothing less. And that meant they dedicated everything to intercepting the fleet.
The supercarrier SSV Hyperion was immediately pulled off from patrol duty and sent straight to the SAGA beachhead alongside an escort force larger than the taskforce they originally sent. They too had only one goal.
Destroy the fleet. Contain the virus. Support their allies.
Save the galaxy.
[=][=]
Coronan Defence Line
SSV Hyperion
The mood on the bridge of the supercarrier was subdued. Officers and crewmen tended to their tasks in dutiful silence. The only source of noise were the beeps and hums of the computers and the soft whispers between the sailors controlling them. Admiral Kleiner sat at his command chair overlooking a tactical hologram projector of the star system they were in. Surrounding him were dozens more holograms of other officers- not just captains of the various ships attending the battle but the sub-commanders of the SSV Hyperion who manned the various hangars.
“Admiral,” his executive officer Francis presented him a data pad, “we’re seeing a lot of ships appear. They appear to be the rest of the interception force.”
Kleiner nodded, “how many do we have in comparison to the swarm fleet?”
Francis gulped, “we estimate that the swarm fleet of three thousand still outnumbers us considerably.”
Kleiner closed his eyes to think. It was only for a few moments before he spoke once more, “we will need to act assuming we are outnumbered at all times,” He stood up from his chair and opened his eyes. He knew that the rest of the command staff were now focused on him, “we must defend a line a few dozen AU long. If even one enemy ship makes it past then we are doomed,” was it an exaggeration? Maybe, but he refused to take any chances when the stakes were too high.
“We lack the power and numbers to necessarily get close and deal damage. But we have good range and interception options. Our ships are durable and hardy. I think that makes our plan of action clear-” he waved his hand across the holographic map of the system and pointed at the defence line, “we will divide our fleet into three battlegroups. Aleph, Bet, and Gimel. Each will be stationed at intervals along the defence line. Our duties shall be twofold- provide long range support and intercept any Midriff ship that makes it past our battlelines. Ours will be the last wall that holds them back. Ours will be the back on which hope rests upon.”
He looked at two holograms of officers- Commodore Cyrene and Franklin, “you two will command lead battlegroups Bet and Gimel, to be stationed at the flanks of the Hyperion... of which I shall command as the flagship of Aleph at the centre of the line. Our fighters and tachyon arrows will be vital in creating an overlapping field of fire. The Hyperion can deploy as many monitors and fighters as need be whether here or the frontlines. Remember to cooperate with your allies. Only through unity will we stand tall and ready against the oncoming darkness.”
There is a moment as the officers comprehend his plan. Then they raise their right hand over their heart and clench it into a fist. The traditional salute of the UDS.
Kleiner nodded, “Very well. I will see you all in person when the battle is over.”
NRS Laxin,
Deep Space, Near Corona
T-28
The Fever-class cruiser sits in cosmic silence, its outer hull totally darkened and invisible to the naked eye (and some advanced sensors!) due to the lack of a strong source of light. There are about 3 other ships within the immediate vicinity of the Laxin, sitting, waiting, pondering about their next assignment which was about to take place within the balkanized remnants of the Coronan Republic.
Within the stellar equivalent of a blink, all four ships were gone, only leaving behind the signature high-energy radiation that indicated a superluminal travel sequence. Their assignment had changed. But to what? The keyhole message didn’t explain any further, simply specifying the coordinates for which the Laxin, its three escorts and fourteen other ships were to rendezvous at. It looked to be somewhere outside of Corona, all the way out along the Spice-Runner highway.
Still in transit, further information came through keyhole messages, indicating that the feared biological warships of Mirdiff had broken out of their containment and were now speeding towards Corona. The Cascadians were strangers to the horrors that the Mirdiff inflicted upon the galaxy, but they were rational enough to deduce that whatever threat was big enough to scare this galaxy, was probably big enough to be a problem for them.
NRS Laxin, Tango
Spice-runner Highway,
T-17
The unified force, now led by both the Laxin and the destroyer Tango, having caught and watched the Kritzcorps falter and massacred to a ship from a great distance, was not too keen on engaging any Mirdiff ships. Fortunately, the mission objectives shifted in light of this information. Now they were tasked with shadowing the five-thousand strong force across the interstellar highway…
Tracing them by the radiation and high energy particles left behind, the Laxin force pushed and fatigued both its drives and its crews*, broadcasting the progress of the bioships through keyhole comms to friendly and allied ships as they trailed at a distance. At the end of their journey, when the CONA-SAGA interdictors had stopped the bioships and forced a confrontation just before Corona proper, the Laxin force had traveled the most distance in the shortest amount of time, out of any Cascadian military ship assigned to the Coronan theater.
Warp Fatigue: A set of acute symptoms, most often headaches, fatigue, and moodiness that appear during or after a warp travel sequence.
NRS Laxin, NRS Cameron Johns
Defensive Line, Deep Space
T-0
At the start of the confrontation, the Laxin force linked up with the rest of 166 strong Cascadian force, and came under the command of the NRS Cameron Johns - the Supremacy-era battleship that was now leading one of the largest Cascadian forces deployed since the Second Republic’s founding.
TASK FORCE 71 – CORONA
- (2) Emancipation-class Battleships
→ NRS Cameron Johns
→ NRS Stillborn Star
- (39) Fever-class Cruisers / Laserstars
→ NRS Laxin
→ NRS Casterly Hill
- (62) Amphis-class Destroyers / Laserstars
→ NRS Tango
- (12) Express-class Frigates / Laserstars
- (51) Miscellaneous Auxiliary ships / Auxilistars
”We’re dropping in hot!”
The ships decelerated into realspace ahead of their allies, positioning themselves in an aggressive manner so that their weapons would be at the most effective distance. Taking a moment to calibrate their sensors, communications and datalinks, they broadcasted a simple message to their allies, aimed at informing them of the National Republican Navy’s overarching plan.
//TACOM: KYHL >> APAC223; BROADCASTING AT SUPER://
PULLING IN FRONT TO ENGAGE FORWARD ELEMENTS. EXPECT AGGRESSIVE POSITIONING AND ATTACKS. WILL RETREAT WITH TOO MANY LOSSES.
Then they unleashed their first barrage of Torch missiles, followed by a lengthy dump of UREBs and other particle weaponry in the general direction of the swarm fleet. With the distance between them and their enemies, it will take a long time for the weapons to reach their targets, and twice as long for them to ascertain whether or not they’ve hit or were intercepted. At least the beams of the particle weapons were neutralized, preventing electrostatic repulsion from pushing the constituent atoms apart.
Shemesh Forces en route to - Coronan Theatre
First Decreed Kheyylim of The Ancerius Galaxy
Prognostication chambers - Wrath-Unbound-By-Moral-Fallacies - Kheyylim command vessel
Purified silver, ground into dust and blessed thrice over, falls from the grasp of the Arcanist onto the marble floor, the tiny particles reflect the scant light given off by faerie flames of etherite lamps. The dust falls into creases and gaps chiselled by telekinetic pressure. The dust falls and forms patterns. The patterns form into shapes and meanings.
A cloud of dark smoke, covering the sun overlooking a battlefield.
{Defeat...}
The Dust falls, the patterns make waves.
The hand of a warrior, burnt and bloodied, clutching a blade of silver and gold.
{A sacrifice...of who ?}
The Dust falls and stops. Like a starlit sky on a moonless night, the particles stop. The etherite lamp burns brighter, though no command was given. The Light refracts from each grain of blessed silver.
It brings comprehension.
It shall be this way. Because there is no other way.
--
Wrath-Unbound - Inner temple
{"You are certain of Your vision."}
The ancient Arkiyonai speaks through word and memetic compulsion, each pulse of information hitting like a sledgehammer upon one's mind. There is no malice in such an action, merely the difference in aeons of study.
Boundless-Insight-Sought-by-Purity, covers before Their Elder, not daring to raise from the supplicant pose They had taken.
{"Kokhav Yeled has granted it to me. Of that I am certain, and if I stand incorrect. May my Glyph never return to Their embrace."}
{"Your precognition tells of disaster. The signs speak of oblivion. The threads of fate of those who you will take show no promise of return. Yet You still ask for half of this Decreed Kheyylim. Kokhav Yeled, Our God, stands shattered and broken, teetering on the edge of oblivion with the return of every fallen Kindred. Yet you still ask for hundreds of thousands to sacrifice their Divine Spark? And for what? For the lives of mere mortals, who shall not live a day in the Light of Yeled, Our God."}
Boundless Insight had no words to offer, for all would ring hollow. The Elder was right, this battle would cost countless Kindred, the influx of the slain would weaken Yeled even further, perhaps even bring its absolution. Yet if the Godling did not wish for such, would It have given the vision?
{ "Yes" }
In these moments, Boundless-Insight was glad that They shared no biological functions common with the species of the wider galaxy. Only through Their Heart Glyph, one could see the sheer pressure felt by the Arcanist. Its light had dimmed to nothing more than a spark, barely burning, but still alight. Still fighting for the righteousness of its cause.
Perhaps that is what the ancient Arkiyonai had seen. Or perhaps They had shared a similar vision.
{"It shall be this way. Because there is no other way. Take those who shall answer your call, no less and no more. Bring them back and be victorious, and one day we shall stand as equals. Loose their Divine Spark and I will ensure Your Glyph-descendants will suffer a thousand lifetimes for each of those lost."}
Absolute Defence Line
Like vast leviathans of ancient Oceans, the Shemesh Shevath broke through the thin walls between dimensions, breaking from X-space into reality one by one. The vessels were many in number and in purpose. Some appeared like primitive temples raised from some backwater world, riding on a wave of azure light. Others resembled nothing less than a true battleship, filled with hundreds of cannons and strange magical circles.
The Shemesh fleet concentrated around groups of Mobile Leylines, infusing their weaponry and hulls with Mana. Once complete the largest Temple ships moved into position, the Arkiyonai aboard already weaving Spacetime shields from raw solidified space, while Lokhem loaded Mana-pumped lasers and magic-missile arrays. Behind them, the ships of the line took point, followed by Construct carriers, already filled to the brim with combat Mitar and boarding Damar.
[
10 Battleships
50 Battlecruisers
150 Cruisers
50 Artillery / Ritual Cruisers
50 Construct Carriers
35 Mobile Leylines
35 Mobile Siphons
]
Martyr's-Folly - Local group flagship.
Boundless Insight stood bare against the cold embrace of the void. They wished to experience Their foes with a mind unburdened by enhancement rituals. A glance through the Arcane was enough, the situation was dire, worse than anything the Arcanist could have predicted. The mortals would die in their tens of thousands, and so would the Shemesh. Countless Kindred would return to Kokhav Yeled, never to get the chance to fulfil their true Holy duty. All because of one vision. All because of one interpretation taken from silver dust.
No. This was no time to bring doubts.
It shall be this way. Because there is no other way.
[GPCNS Aurora, Deep Space, Approximately 12 hours from Corona]
Admiral Diede Cæz was back in the saddle. However, it was an entirely different mission and with an entirely different fleet. He was promoted for his actions during the Hyperes Expedition, and the unveiling of the so-called “Aegis” within one of the solar systems. That same planet-cracking facility had been under extensive research for some time, including the nanomachine technology also discovered in the system. Their lengthy research time allowed for some groundbreaking technological advances, which led to the development of new civilian and military infrastructure. However, it had also gotten him transferred to the secretive and quiet Stealth Corps branch of the Empire’s military due to his familiarity with the recovered technology. Fortunately, there were plenty of familiar faces on board his new command, such as Warrant Officer Antoinætte and Lieutenant Ellard, both at their respective posts. Despite this change, the attitude of the ship was very much the same.
“Begging your pardon, sir. I have a question.” Antoinætte inquired to Cæz in her usual way.
“Go ahead, Warrant Officer.” Came the reply from Cæz. No doubt it was about their deployment, or what this ship and her escort fleet were doing so far from Pyrhan space.
“What have we been sent out here for? For a nation that’s not getting involved in the majority of galactic affairs, we’re seemingly doing quite a lot.” She stated plainly, turning briefly from her post. Her blue eyes glittered in the low-visibility bridge lighting, as the ship had been rigged for silent running along with the rest of the fleet.
“Securing potential alliances, gathering intelligence on galactic affairs, and rooting out potential incursions. Well, mainly the first two. That last part was a month ago, and now we’re to observe beyond our borders. There’s whispers from our expedition fleets of a major fleet movement in the region, and that’s our main objective to investigate. Is it into our own space, or into another space?” Cæz gave his detailed response, like he had over a month ago. They had brought a significant fleet for such a deployment, 50 ships from the Stealth Corps. And for the Corps, this was considered a major deployment. 50 of the Pyrhan’s most advanced ships, with the most elite crews the Empire had to offer. Cæz knew deep down that such a group was meant to deter and silence a major threat rather than intelligence gathering. The Corps believed these whispers of a major fleet movement. And they determined it a threat. His thoughts were almost immediately confirmed.
“Word from our advanced scouts! They’re detailing mass fleet movements from Corona towards a…. Hold on, they’re saying the target is under the name of ‘Mirdiff.’ I don’t really-“
“Request further intelligence. Is there a known route of space this ‘Mirdiff’ group is following?” Cæz didn’t want this to be true. Another conflict Pyrhus would have to get involved in. But this worry was quickly suppressed.
“Tapping into comms chatter in the region. These ‘Mirdiff’ seem to be quite disliked by a number of forces in the region. They evidently use bio-weaponry of a sorts. Some sort of virus, by-“
“That’s enough, Warrant Officer. That’s all I need to hear.” Cæz cut Antoinætte off. The words bio-weapon and virus were enough of a red flag as it was. So this was the mission the Stealth Corps sent them on. Confirm the reports of these potential mass bio-weapons, and remove the problem. This was a necessity for Pyrhus. No, for the galaxy as a whole. If a single ship made landfall… there wouldn’t be a second chance. This disease upon the galaxy had to be burned away, otherwise obliteration awaited them all.
“Prepare for FTL transit. Follow the ‘Spice Runner Highway’ as it’s called here, and intercept these Mirdiff forces. We cannot let such a threat spread any further.” Cæz ordered. A resounding “Yes, sir!” answered him, and the fleet began to charge their XSpace drives. In moments, dimensional vortexes opened before the fleet, and the ships vanished into them. Their target was the massive bio-fleet en route to Corona. Yes, the Pyrhans knew that Corona likely didn’t truly trust or see appeal in them given they were a colonial nation, but it was best to aid them nonetheless. The galaxy could not be lost to this threat, and the Pyrhans would aid in protecting it, no matter the cost.
Spice Runner Highway: Deep Space
Three shining stars had erupted inside the Mirdiff fleet, turning hundreds of ships into little more than ionized plasma in a single instant. Normally it would have caused panic, morale breakage and considerations for withdrawal.
But their enemy was not normal, in fact it was strangely perfect.
Mirdiff had no morale, its forces had absolute purpose, clarity and perfection of action, direction and set caste standing orders. Each individual part from the smallest organ to the hive mind directing the fleet new its only reason to exist and carried out only the necessary action to see it completed. Like some monstrous clockwork mechanism the Mirdiff fleet was beautifully perfect, taking only a fraction of a second to analyse its losses, consider the effective course of action and then decide on its next moves. Like a body realigning itself the Strixx barrage had hit hard, but it had not even made the horrific foe flinch.
It surveyed the forces now appearing in arrayed battle formation front of it, it surveyed the interdiction it now was anchored by, it knew its next moves. It only knew one motive, one emotion.
Hatred.
The swarm, now out of position began to move, it would take a little while to get back into formation, but it had no intention of keeping its formation. Shifting biological constructs of all shapes and sizes lit their drives and formed up, launching Standing weapons and smaller corvette sized vessels into the void as they went. Watching on sensors it was like the swarm fleet was orchestrating some kind of dance, spiralling cones of warships moved into helical patterns, each ejecting helically smaller forms. It was like the enemy was forming into five distinct conical lance formations all arrayed around one another, heavier elements such as battleship and dreadnought equivalents encased the outer layers while smaller and weaker elements such as escort and corvette sized vessels made up the innards, all of them began to accelerate. Ripped free of their warp bubbles the bioships accelerated hard, their swarms of Standing weapons now arraying themselves in front of their formations in their tens of thousands. The swarm was well aware that weapons fire was incoming, that it was being challenged by sentients.
It did not care, its mind had an objective, and that objective would be met.
The first wave of the arrayed forces against the swarm would face its fury.
Particle beams burst forth from across 3200 vessels, invisible in the darkness of space they were quickly joined by heavy kinetic barrages made up of sharpened composite biological chitin. The kinetics were timed to impact just after the particle beams to maximise damage against multi layered or adaptive defensive techniques, like those taught to the Unaligned during the Jihad by the AGA. Surprisingly no missiles were launched, but the Standing weapon forces began to split up.
Standing Bombers, lumpen monstrous forms twisted to look like those of the Little Light, now broke off in force, each carrying an array of munitions. From Alcubierre Gravity Explosives, Corrosive nano-pathogens to One shot particle beams and bio-plasma missiles. They split off in their hundreds, each escorted by entire wings of Standing fighters that swept out before them, their targets were not the front ranks. But the forces on the flanks.
The Swarm fleet was also well aware of other forms of warfare, biological phased array emitters cracked into position, flooding the battlefield with false signals, radar jamming, laser blinding pulses, powerful radiowaves and gravity distortions.
The battle had truly begun.
---
“Enemy fleet is firing”
“Creation preserve us… All hands, I know many of you are green, but I promise to get us through this. Though the fires of Aedleshaven may smoulder, we must do everything we can to protect this galaxy. If we don’t draw the line here, our families back home will suffer, and the Scorn of Mirdiff will once again threaten the galaxy. Ready interception systems, area defence shields to maximum power, launch fighters, all missile payloads to be fitted with BPLs, all mass driver rounds to be switched to AOE flak mode. We may only be 50 ships, but by the grace of the Emperor we will defend our allies with every scrap of ammunition we have! For the Union, For Ancerious!”
The Union formation spread out, its nano printers working overtime to realign ammunition to the desired type. Firestorm Fighters launched from hangar bays as Mass drivers swivelled into position. They could not hope to stand against the fury of 3200 ships, but they could help ablate that firepower against their allies.
“Fire Hyperfrequency lasers, lets see if we can take a few of those bastards with us. Deploy our own jamming too. Pilots, good luck may creation save us all”
SVS Herald
Defense Line
All stations alert. Launches and NPAWS fire detected from Biofleet. All defense units on full action alert.
The warning blared from speakers and neural displays all over the immense Spatial Carrier. L'Kanne's tail stood
up vertically as he ran his foreclaws across the deck. "Time to kill. Pity we don't have a Lifecrystal inductor.
I wonder what Yogg Narr ships essence tastes like?" He looked into the large tactical display sphere in the center of Herald's CIC and signaled SVS Bringer of Judgment. "Ship Leader C'Rael, permission to deploy Reaction Missiles granted. Cleanse them in Flame, Ship Leader!" Turning to the ship's CAG, he issued his orders. "Deploy additional Shards and Attack Wings Alet through Del to maintain CSP over the fleet. Send 100 Shards with each Phoenix missile to escort them in, have them break away when the missiles' detonations are imminent." Nodding, the CAG sent a neural command and the Shards started launching, joining those already patrolling. 600 Shards moved from the cloud towards Bringer of Judgment.
4 Wings of Night Talon and Sun Phoenix attack craft launched as well, taking up positions near the fleet, the Night Talons armed with anti-missile/anti-fighter ordnance, the Sun Phoenixes with Anti-ship torpedoes carrying a variety of warhead.
"Guns, Let them know we are here. Initiate Apparition Beam firing. Target the largest Bioships. Be precise with your beam steering, with this Anais' damned interdiction these will be difficult shots. And begin quantum launcher firing. Gateless mode, mix of Gravity shock and continual fusion missile heads. Also chuck some spatial shells at them with terminal guidance." (edited)
The quantum launchers began firing their mix of missile buses and shells, bereft of the normal gate systems the rounds would take a much longer time to reach their targets. The shells longer, though their lack of active propulsion might let them get close to the biofleet. Two blazing nonagrams of black light formed at the junction of the triaxial superstructures on each surface of the Spatial Carrier. Lurid beams of crimson light streaked forward, lattices of gravimetric force steering the beams somewhat as they streaked towards their Bioship targets.
SVS Bringer of Judgment
Ship Leader C'Rael moved to the firing station for the reaction missiles. He looked over at Gunnery Master X'Lara, A Mu woman that had served in the fleet for a long time. "We have Deployment authorization from Herald Actual. Slot them."
C'Rael and X'Lara each placed a glowing red crystal into a depression on a control panel, each panel was 3 meters apart so two individuals were required for launch. The neural authenticators scanned each officer. If they were not authorized the Sentience Core would attack them psychometrically.
The word READY flashed in the tactical sphere and C'Rael pressed a crystalline control stud. "May the Flames of the Anais' Wrath purge the Enemies of the People from the Tapestry. Hallowed are their Names."
The engines of the first two missiles activated, massive pressure-gravity thrusters propelling the missiles forward, lifting them from their launch cradles. When the missiles were away the second set started their engines, and then the third once the second set had cleared the deck. As C'Rael watched the launches-he always enjoyed seeing reaction missiles launch, he signaled the allied fleets.
"All allied forces. Give what escort to these missiles that you can afford without compromising fleet security. Coordinate your own missiles as well but don't keep them too close to these monsters. I don't want fratricide."
As the missiles moved forward, 600 Shards broke off from the cloud of them in front of the Anais Unity ships, 100 each moving to escort the giant missiles on their way. The missiles' own phase barriers and point defense systems activated and stood ready.
Hell was on its way to the Bioships.
"Allies incoming! Commencing IFF handshakes... Phaselords above, that's a lot." The communications officer confirmed with the rest of the bridge crew as more and more friendly ships appeared beside and in front of their formations. What Mayania originally thought to just be an overcomplicated suicide mission has turned out to be perhaps a winnable battle... Though their climbing confidence was quickly leveled with the new movements of the swarm. Moving like one being, like nanites flowing through the veins of a body. It reminded her of her own droneships that she commanded. Though, it was time to act, not think.
The Antimony cruisers on the outskirts of the Elvorian formation transmitted and received information from their own sensor arrays and forward scouts from allies on targets they should be focusing on. Drone destroyers line up with Elvorian-piloted battleships as they prepared for their first of many alpha strikes. The sounds of their charging CRLs deafened some of the weaker comms systems as they stood by to fire.
Adrenaline pumping through her veins, she slammed down on the table in front of her and stood up in front of her. Her voice was raised loud, loud enough for the maintenance and DCT team just outside the bridge to hear Maya order around the bridge crew.
"All hands on deck! Order every ship to fire on the formation closest to us! I want a 10 second burst from every single Cosmic Launcher! Followed by every secondary weapon and side Cosmic Launchers we have plastered on our ships. Get the fighters rolling out!" Mayania switched from her normal calm and somewhat controlled self into a being possessed by sheer adrenaline, fueled by the lives she knows that are on the line. "Every side gun to point defense mode, make sure those enemy fighters don't get an inch closer to our formation!... Oh, and before I forget... EVERY LOADED MISSILE INTO THAT FORMATION!" A few of her officers gave her side-eyes, worried about her heart's health. Considering that they've never seen her this energetic, they have a valid concern. But that wasn't a concern to the fleet admiral, there were more pressing issues than a bleeding heart.
"Come on crew! Ain't it a good day to die for the galaxy! If we don't make it out, we'll be remembered as martyrs… But if we do… well, beers on that officer then." Pointing to the person that made that comment moments ago, Mayania gave a proud smile. She had served the Elvorians since they were founded. There was no higher honor than to die for the galaxy.
"We will remember the fallen! And by god we will fight like hell for the living!"
---
The strikecraft of the Red Sea and her escorts were loaded onto their catapults and launched deep into space, closing the distance between them, and the enemy Standing Weapons. They were each assigned to missile escort and fire support roles, their mobile frame and large weapons being able to be of some threat to small enemy vessels. Overall, they had around 1500 manned and unmanned strike fighters in their fleet armed with a myriad of anti fighter and anti ship missiles and munitions, good enough to at least slow down the enemy's march to the defense line and destroy a lot of their standing weapons.
Their point defense arrays and hybrid cannons lit up the starry sky with fire. Their targets were standing weapons and small craft far, far away. Even if most of them may miss, the Elvorians had plenty of ammo to spare for their point defense. They also contributed towards the allies overlapping fields of defense, making sure to cover for the ones that were lacking in PD. Active Defensive Systems stood by for any incoming danger, though none were shot at the moment.
Tactical lasers lit up the sides of their ships as they made their way towards the enemy formations and standing weapons. Whilst not as monstrously powerful as the Cosmic Ray Launchers, their extreme range and damage over time made them a useful asset for killing off standing weapons. Secondary weapons popped off potshots that were meant to suppress the enemy and deny them freedom of movement to areas unless they'd like to get hit, making them easier targets for their main event.
The Elvorian Formations Cosmic Ray Launchers all charged up in sequence. From the tiniest of gun destroyers meant to sweep aside smaller craft, to the largest of battleships meant to stand toe to toe with enemies, their beams, despite their varying sizes and strength, were meant to rip into an enemy formation, and saturate the area with the rage of a thousand pulsars. The iconic wings of their spacecraft unfurled and glowed as hot as a star, before eventually releasing their energy. Their spinal weapons screeched and fired off their beams, jamming nearby communications as the sheer volume of cosmic rays punched their way straight into an enemy formation, their ships moving their hull in order to saturate as big of an area as possible. Their bigger guns mounted on their larger ships targeted the armor heavy battleships and dreadnaughts, their large hulls and thick skin making for the perfect prey for cosmic rays. While destroyer-sized weapons targeted the softer craft hidden within their formation, their beams intent to simply chop them up and cause some soft damage. Their first barrage was over in just a few seconds, their radiators ejecting coolant and weapons recovering from the extended burst. Only the Red Sea continued to fire, their twin black hole reactors being the only ones strong enough to maintain this oppressive volume of fire.
In the distance, the Kayoko guilds artillery platforms gave a mighty display as well. Their pulsar-like look to their muzzle flashes made it look like a supernova was occuring just a few AU away. But just like the launchers of the Elvorian fleet, they too fell silent as they waited for their reactors to get enough energy to recharge.
"30 seconds to next barrage, confirm the same target over?" Several of the ship captains and Typhoon-Class Lupotech hailed the Red Sea to confirm a second barrage.
"Whatever whatever. Weapons free! Keep firing until nothing's moving!" Her orders were simple, and her captains followed them.
Immediately following their barrage of cosmic rays, were their missiles. Spanning from high-yield antimatter missiles made to simply wipe out kilometers of enemies, to bomb pumped lasers to intercept standing weapons, to decoys masking as corvettes with their radar signatures, to one-shot NEFPs to target more heavily armored crafts. These would be escorted with a couple of dronefighter wings supplied by their copious amounts of dronecraft they're using in the battle.
The Elvorians had finished their first barrage. Missile nanoforges and automated ammo crafters pushed themselves to their limit to resupply their ships in the small downtime that they had between barrages. Fuel waste from their cold fusion reactors were dumped into their black hole reactors, helping to fuel their efforts. The Elvorians were done for the meantime, though meanwhile over at the Meranans…
---
"Today's a good day to die ain't it men!" Captain Yuri rowled his bridge crew up as he gave a wide grin, facing down the incoming swarm with a smile. "We ain't gonna be dying from an ambush or raiding civvies again. But for the fate of the Galaxy! Ain't that crazy!" He talked like this was a game, though even a few notes of nervousness slipped through the cracks.
The QMN Machine and QMN Infernal lined up with the rest of their strike fleet as they burned their Penrose drives to intercept the incoming formation. Loading up their kinetic weapons with flechettes and flak and all sorts of anti fighter and anti missile weapons, they opened fire using tactical lasers and a few side cosmic ray launchers, intending to soften up the target formation before the Elvorians barrage arrived.
"Haha!" His cheers were echoed by his team of roughnecks. "Missiles! Get the missiles!" The internal comms officer relayed this information to the gunnery crew as Yuri refocused on the enemy swarm in front of them.
The Infernals missile arrays shot out their 'Shooting stars', extremely fast moving, swarmer Anti Matter missiles. They were programmed to assist with the Allied missile barrages, quickly swooping in on the formations flank in order to deliver a side blow to the enemy. Alongside the Shooting Stars we're dozens of standard missiles fitted with nuclear payloads, meant to soften up targets ahead of the pack.
"Confirmed sensor contacts with Standing Weapons by both our scouts and allied craft, permission to engage?" Their gunnery crew quietly and timidly replied to Yuri.
"PeRmiSsIoN tO enGag- yeah yeah… OPEN FIRE!"
The engines of the Infernal lived up to it's name as their fusion torch boosters sparked to life. Their ships unleashing hellfire in the form of a shower of kinetic rounds of all shapes and calibers. From flak rounds to regular kinetic rounds to tiny flechettes, everything was thrown downrange and then reloaded with their internal microforges. Though with the amount of firepower they were firing, their ammo reserves won't last very long until they pause to let their forges run their course.
They formed up with the rest of the allied line fleets, ready to make a stand against this belligerent swarm. They were pirates, raiders, ships made to strike fast and strike hard. They weren't made to fight in a full on engagement like this, yet they still push on, for the future of this galaxy.
The Chamber of Shrines across each and every RANGSI ship had become unusual sites of rare serenity from the chaos of the battle. The 125th Strike Force hurriedly manoeuvred for a general right hook at Mirdif, and everywhere crewmen were running around making preparations for the inevitable battle, and while command centers were abuzz with comms chatter, tacticians discussing formations and phases of operations, and signallers frantically making calls and passing messages.
In contrast, it was quiet in the Chamber of Shrines - perhaps too quiet. A small space carved out, free from affairs of the mortal realm, where only the divine judgement of the gods existed - their pointed stares from the infinitely stretching rows of cubical pigeon holes, where small portable statues of the gods or other religiously significant items lay in display. At the front, leading this assembly of gods and the like, were the secular but equally sacred symbols of RANGSI - the trio of the individual ship’s Standard, the squadron Colours, and the State Flag itself.
Only small retinues of commissars remained in the Chambers, as the rest laboured elsewhere tending to their duties. Generally a party of around three - one held a small gong and striked it at slow, regular and steady intervals, another stood beside him and softly chanted prayers, and the one at the front tended to the individual shrines of the gods, placing incense sticks, making small offerings of uneaten ration bars, and giving short bows, salutes or other appropriate gestures of respect as they moved to the next.
-----
Praises and praises to Rama. As did your arrows strike true at Ravana, may our arrows too strike true at our enemy.
“Torpedoes locked! Firing!” the 22nd Hunter Killer squadron, which had been racing at the front of the 125th’s formation, launched all its anti-ship torpedoes, which joined the enormous barrage of the other nations. These torpedoes were primarily of two types - the bee-hive type NEFP that peppered enemy fleets with needles of plasma, and the more conventional thermonuclear explosive which created large balls of roiling plasma in space. They were aimed at the cloud of Mirdif Standing Fighters that formed the front of the swarmfleet.
Praises and praises to Guan Di. May our soldiers draw martial courage from your heavenly example, in this time of great need.
“Onward! For Singapore! For the galaxy itself!” following behind the wave of torpedoes were another wave of ‘torpedoes’ - giant cylinders of pure fuel and boosters that hosted nothing else but the hordes of starfighters and G-34D Striker Mechs attached in ‘coffin’ pods, these ‘transport torpedoes’ sent them to the front to intercept the Mirdif’s Standing Weapons and Bombers at relativistic speeds without wasting a drop of their own fuel, which would be much needed for the combat ahead.
-
Praises and Praises to the Almighty God of Abraham. May the deeds of your Children undivided be recorded on this day, and may You show mercy to their souls in the Hereafter, be they the Followers of Moses, the Followers of Christ, or the Followers of Muhammad, peace be upon them all, amen.
The battleship squadrons of the 125th Strike Force HQHA, under Chee-Baker’s direct control, meanwhile hung back and charged up their spinal Gamma Lasers, constantly processing the enormous data flows from the front and from allied fleets, their computers making constant readjustments to the firing solution that intended to see the gamma lasers slice across the length of the Mirdif lance. The enormous draw on the battleship’s power meant that the spinals could not fire at this very moment, and Chee-Baker anxiously looked at the counter estimating the time to completion, mere minutes seemed like hours when time was of the utmost essence. (edited)
-
Meanwhile, finally the commissars in the Chamber of Shrines arrived at the front of the room, where the secular trio of the Ship’s Standard, the squadron Colours, and the State Flag lay. With a final strike of the gong, they bowed, and offered a final salute.
Praises and praises to Matria Singapura. May the light of your grace end all hatred and bloodshed, may your flag unite all peoples, and may your fire inspire courage in those who call themselves your Singaporeans. May your Right Hand and Our Keeper witness our deeds, and deem us worthy of his Army of the Mid-After. Majulah Singapura, and Amen.
The moments before the shitstorm erupted were quiet aboard the Summer Solstice. The AIs had churned out firing solutions, the communications officer had synchronized launch with the rest of the fleet, there was nothing to but wait for the moment to arrive.
Klemmik watched the swarm of red dots dance and move on the screen, reminded of old videos of schools of fish. She’d always found the display mesmerizing, the way so many individuals were able to seemingly move as one through the water. The display on the screens was still mesmerizing in its own way. But it was hard to really enjoy the spectacle knowing that unlike a school of fish, the swarm of living ships were here to wreck her ship, and end the lives of everyone upon it.
Idly she wondered what scenes were taking place in all the places she couldn’t be. The men of her own ship, down in the missile tubes and the railgun ports would be screaming at one another over the cacophony of heavy machinery moving missiles and slugs into place, reporting to gunnery officers as the tubes were loaded and locked. Across her fleet, she imagined the scenes on the bridges would be similar to the one playing out in front of her. A pensive silence, broken only by the hum of computers and the occasional vocalized update as the swarm began to close.
And what about beyond her fleet? What thoughts passed through the minds of the others present? Did they give each other rousing speeches about duty and honor? Did they pray to whatever gods they believed in? Were they calm or panicking, she wondered? Did they give orders expecting an imminent demise or were they all false bravado and patriotic slogans?
“All strike craft have scrambled,” Someone on the bridge crew told her.
“Have them take up defensive formations around the fleet and prepare to receive hostile strike craft,”
“At once Commodore,”
She took a deep breath of recycled air, held it for a three count, and released through her mouth. There was no time left to muse on the scenes playing out across the fleet. The battle was here, and it was time to go to war.
“Missiles?”
“All tubes are showing green,” One man reported. “Fleet is cocked and locked, waiting for fire signal,”
It wouldn’t be long. Missiles and torpedoes were popping up on screens, leaving the other ships as the great display of synchronized fire began. Where the swarm moved with an organic grace, the missiles filling up the screen closed in on their targets with an unnatural mechanical precision. The dots shrieked across space on a course only a computer could hold.
“Launch signal received,”
“Send them.”
It took a fraction of a second for her order to be carried out across the fleet. The signal to launch hit the tubes with the same synchronized precision only a machine could achieve. Every second was factored and accounted for. The moments it took for thrusters to fire up, the heartbeat after the missile left the tube where bursts of compressed air oriented it on its course, and then the rapid acceleration as the missiles full burned toward the swarm. Some would detonate in the swarm of strike craft, poking holes through which the rest could travel to their appointed targets.
The swarm of smaller missiles from the frigates to the rear of her fleet formation may have seemed the least intimidating when compared to the hulking form of the nuclear munitions ahead of them, but it would be a mistake to judge them on looks alone. They carried payloads of anti-matter, the smaller missiles easily able to equal the payload of the larger nuclear munitions, some she suspected would even surpass them.
“All missiles away!” One man reported.
“Send order to repositions. Waypoint foxtrot. Reload and prepare for second salvo,”
“At once Commodore,”
She braced in her command chair as the engines fired to full burn and the fleet began moving. The formation adjusted as they scooted to their next firing position, moving to overlap point defenses to fight the incoming swarm. Captains and commanders adjusted their railguns, selecting targets as the fleet closed in, holding their main weapons to face whatever vengeance the swarm deemed suitable to punish them with for the megatons of munitions now on a collision course with them.
“Tea, sir?” Executive Officer Miranda said as she placed a steaming mug next to his command chair alongside a plateful of biscuits.
Kleiner offered her a small smile as he sipped from the mug, “thank you, comrade. These are stressful times and I had nearly forgotten that a serene mind is just as important as an active one,” indeed it was one of the personal philosophies he had drilled into himself and his men throughout his years of active service. He knew very well how many navies had their captains be boastful bombasts with large lungs to yell their commands with pomp and show. The UDS had a few such men as well. But overtime they had grown disciplined and focused. A calm crew who focused only on their stations were among the most efficient.
The datapad on his chair lit up with a message from one of his officers on the bridge. It was an alert that their alpha strike against the Swarm had done damage but was largely ineffective outside of thinning their numbers. Now the Mirdiff fleet was launching strike craft consisting of both bombers and fighters. His eyes glazed over the reports of allies returning fire before he made his choice.
“We will need to support the frontline units without compromising our own interference capacity,” Kleiner mused aloud.
“Battlegroup Gimel is in possession of twelve Rakiris. Enough to cover every ship there,” Miranda noted, “you’re not worried about them.”
The weary admiral nodded and placed his mug by the side, “our allies will need our help- the Sodalytes are in their direct path and will undoubtedly bear the brunt of their assault. To ensure the line holds, we must support them.”
Miranda frowned, “the Sodalytes do not deserve our aid. They are a terrible people,” she wasn’t wrong. The reports they heard from their controlled territories in Corona horrified many and their general policies were an affront to everything the UDS stood for.
But Kleiner knew that every ship counted for this war. And while he would gladly leave the Sodalytes to die in other circumstances, the stakes were too high now. If they burn, they will all burn together, “send a message to Commodore Franklin. Have Gimel move upwards to join the frontline and provide as much point defence they can. In the meantime, open hangars forty to fourty-five. Deploy every fighter and interceptor available within them and have them advance to reinforce Gimel. The line must hold.”
His orders done, he began to do the duty of relaying them to the communications officer. He typed up a quick report and sent it to the communications team who after a moment analysing the message, began to work on sending the orders with haste. He noted that Miranda had send a general message to the entire bridge alerting them of the latest development.
Things were running smoothly for now. He hoped that this lasted.
[=][=]
Each hangar on the SSV Hyperion was designed to hold a few thousand fighters even if it stored the full complement of five monitors. This was to enable it to always be able to provide support when need be and deploy its wings of strike craft to assist its allies. This was just another procedure to many.
Thousands of strike craft, mostly fighters and interceptors, were deployed at once to assist the Gimel. Their duties were to strike at their enemy counterparts with a distinct focus on bombers-analogies.
Meanwhile, Battlegroup Gimel mostly consisted of frontline brawlers yet it had twelve Rakiri-class corvettes- these ships were built primarily to provide Point Defence fire against enemy fighters and missiles. However they needed to reach thir allies first. And so Gimel began to move forward, not enough to compromise its position and leave a hole in the formation but enough so that it would be close enough to lend its point defence aid to their allies. Soon, the Hyperion’s own wings would arrive to bolster support.
Authority permeated space.
Space permeated authority.
Nohito, the Gyokuza-Pattern: the fleet of five-hundred. Each was a separate and singular entity, bound by invisible flashes of gamma bursts and made segregated by the inherent vastness of space. There were defense patterns, and destroyer patterns, and battleship patterns, and battlecarrier patterns, and launch patterns. The ships were nearly impossible to distinguish in function, however. Some were simply smooth orbs, complemented by auxiliary balls which opened thrust vanes like trypophobic mosaics. Some, mostly at the front, were angled and severe parabolas - with domes of thrust at the rear complemented by backwards inlets carved into them as if they had been punctured. Some had multiple balls blobbed together.
All were inscrutable. Chrome. Silent.
Scan.
Assess.
The Sodalyte fleet became animate all at once, a wall of gamma-constellations erupting between the disparate vessels as they rapidly coordinated data, sensor readouts, and timers. The machines' surfaces rippled, giving way to fathomless collections of dark spheres dotted across their surfaces in great weaves. These grew multi-barrels or single-barrels or eerie spikes, and thrust themselves out from their masters' personal, magnetized oceans as if they were the hairs of some twisted imagining. They swirled on the ships' surfaces in an alien way, giving rise to larger turrets with spiral-bound barrels and great, evil lances and pulsating cooling-spools like flowing hair or cilia.
Scan.
Assess.
From the Sodalyte vessels, nebulae of black ferrofluid exploded up from freakish pores in their surfaces, swirling around them in aggressive, alien clouds and walls. More orbs floated up from their masters, joining the outer seas and chaining and weaving into little-storms of condensed countermeasures. More chaff still flowed from them, developing into minefields of tiny, shaped nuclear charges that armed and primed and eagerly awaited their chances. They hunched there in a violent, noiseless tempest of their own making, the inscrutable fibres of death laced across their surfaces stood end-to-end with the facsimile of seething, frothing anticipation and bloodlust.
Scan.
Assess.
Engage.
One moment, the ships were still. The next, great instruments of death longer than most of their hulls sprung and unfolded from their seas of liquid armor. The things-which-should-have-been-spinal-weapons erupted in bursts of violence as vortices swirled to make way in their defensive storms, letting loose a shocking torrent of rail-and-laser-and-coilgun-and-chemical death. From any distance, it merely looked as if the Sodalyte fleet had let off a set of glittering shimmers within their black shrouds—and then the aftershocks came screaming after it.
From those fielding them, an umbrella of ten thousand objects swelled at blistering speed from the formation. These grew and distended and unfolded: presenting four long limbs, and single, spherical heads, and arrays of hateful, brutal weapons strapped to their bodies in personal arsenals. These Pseudo-Standing Weapons rose between twelve and eighteen meters tall, unfurling great spikes from their backs and matching pairs at either hip. They grouped into formations, merging their weapons with their overlong fingers, and paused, receiving data from the greater coalition fleet and the Sodalytes. The swarm stood still, calculating vectors, and then...
Comets.
Set apart from the vomit of missiles and the hail of torpedoes from the rest of the Sodalyte fleet, they looked stunningly like comets. They accelerated with such vicious glee that any living thing within them should have been liquefied regardless of any measures—with such mad abandon that one could literally see them as they streaked across the night sky, straight toward intercepts with the Mirdiff's own Standing Fighters.
Nohito/The Gyokuza-Pattern/The Fleet continued their same routine, all the while.
Scan.
Assess.
Repeat.
Little had really been seen or heard from Yog Narr once the Zarathustra massacare had concluded.
The living superweapon and Commander of Mirdiff had plunged into the interdicted zone, and once the media attention had moved elsewhere it had been somewhat forgotten by the public eye. But it was monitored, and observed from afar, and it had worried military analysts the galaxy over. While the galactic nations had ripped each other apart at Aedleshaven Yog Narr had been consuming the Ancerium star, and creating titanic swarm fleets, as well as undergoing some kind of yet unknown process.
When Corona had collapsed, the Swarmfleet had stirred, punching back out and destroying those token containment forces set to challenge it, the initial reports due to censorship as to not cause panic, had said 300 vessels. How wrong it had been. The fleet had made full speed to Corona.
But it would be challenged. The Krizpakt were well known, the crown of the Golden Cross trade lanes they were the natives who had benefitted most from colonial outsourcing and their own graft, becoming prosperous and wealthy nations who traded with much of the galaxy. The Krizpakt Corps were a jewel in that crown, created as a joint military venture they were equipped with some of the most advanced warships the natives could muster along with countless support assets. The Krizpakt Corps had not been sent to Aedleshaven despite Orillias demands, but instead kept for defensive purposes, the now free Swarmfleet however was designated a priority target. The Corps had slipped anchor, on high alert anyway they had rapidly moved to intercept the foe, pride of the Native ambition they promised to end the threat before it reached Corona.
The Krizpakt Corps were wiped out to a ship.
The enemy numbers had not been 300. They had been over 5000. And the enemy capability as well as tactics had been enough to take the Corps off guard. Garbled distress calls and reports were all that returned from the fight.
Furious at the loss of the Corps and with the fleet now disrupting and blockading all forces and assets into and out of the Coronan theatre the Krizpakt turned to their strategic arsenal.
And CONA, SAGA as well as neutral elements were already in position to strike. Co-operation was swift, and a plan was concocted, an interdiction and annihilation in deep space along the Spice Lane. As the Swarmfleet was harassed and attacked by smaller forces it was rapidly ripped out of FTL. The twin Interdictors of Velká Ciská Dilettante and Cognoscente pinning the foe down with their powerful gravity wells.
With allied forces now arriving on scene and SAGA forces taking up station the second asset to hit home did so. Deep within Hrast Tvardva three massive FTL guns based on the old Capitol design of Encanda Strixx were fed inputted targeting data, loading gigantic Bomb Pumped Laser munitions the size of dreadnoughts. In a moment they had charged and simultaneously fired their projectiles, through open FTL gates. All three projectiles exited at the edge of the interdiction zone, flying in at relativistic speeds the assembled forces were greeted with a beautiful sight.
Three huge blinding flashes detonated within the Mirdiff formation, wiping out upwards of 1800 vessels in a under a second, their vapourised forms merely becoming high velocity dust. While the enemy still had massive numbers, their formation had been broken, and it was time to strike.
They had to wipe the fleet out, if even one Mirdiff bio-ship made it to Corona, the virus could exponentially mutate and become impossible to stop.
Coronan Theatre
Name Pending, RANGSI FOB
125th Strike Force (Chee-Baker)
------
“Incoming WARNO sir!”
“Patch it through,” Force Admiral Chee-Baker leaned forward, as the rest of the command bridge anticipated this incoming order.
They were gearing for action, having been stuck on the backburner while their sister Strike Force, the 101st, rushed forward to support the Fleethood’s attack on the southern AOTS-K advance. Training the Coronans had been an immensely difficult affair - bordering the impossible in fact. They will do anything, any mission, if it meant getting out of this mess.
<<[FROM HICOM] WARNO: SITUATION AS FOLLOWS. INTEL REPORTS MIRDIF FORCES BROKE OUT OF CONTAINMENT FROM ZARATHRUSTRA. EN ROUTE TO CORONA ALONG SPICE RUNNER HIGHWAY. INTERCEPT IMMEDIATELY. URGENCY CODE TANGO-LIMA-MIKE.>>
Silence befell the entire bridge as the WARNO’s holographic text crawled in the air, its blue shimmer illuminating its dark confines. Suddenly, their eagerness disappeared. Vanished. Dissipated. Like a drop of water in the scorching desert. Hell, maybe being marooned on a scorching desert was far better than this.
-----
Palm Mirdif. The scorn that ravaged the galaxy in the fires of the Boreal Jihad while the colonial powers were too busy fighting AW2. He who hated all life, and wanted to see all life burn.
And now, His minions were enroute to the Corona theatre.
The pieces of the great puzzle were coming together for Force Admiral Chee-Baker. Nightwatch reports of the reactivated Mirdif bioweapons and the spread of the AFA ‘zombie virus’. The food producing biomass of Palm Rashidiya, Palm Mirdif’s nemesis, in Burgertown that fed not only the Coronans, but also countless lives across the entire galaxy. The Coronans’ degeneracy and propensity for wallowing in their filth and garbage and retardedness might not be easily missed if they were gone, but if Yog-Narr reached them both…
---
Chee-Baker’s eyes widened at the thought. Tango-Lima-Mike indeed. To-the-Last-Man. There is no possibility of retreat - they must defeat the Mirdif fleet there and then or die denting their numbers for others to have a better chance, not just for the sake of the Republik Angkasa, but for the sake of the entire galaxy itself.
Sweat dripped from his brow, and his heart was palpitating. He was no veteran admiral, whose tactical genius tempered in experience would save the day. Like many of the new batch, he had been rapidly promoted in wake of the rapid AW3 fleet expansion that created many, many empty billets. He was no natural and he was not top of his class either. Nor does the 125th Strike Force have anything up their sleeves. No superweapon. No prototype battleship. No secret ace.
So how the hell are they going to defeat Mirdif?
When Commodore Klemmik had accompanied Felix 44 to the Coronan Theater she’d come with expectations. She’d expected the Organization’s usual brand of raiding and boarding. She’d expected Felix to pick a fight with the Army. Hell, she’d even expected that they may find themselves in some stand up fight with them.
She was prepared for all of that. She could handle all of that.
She wasn’t prepared for a deadly viral outbreak to start burning its way across the remnants of the Coronan Republic. But even once it had started it seemed so far away from the base the Organization had established. Moreover it seemed the sort of crisis that was meant to be dealt with by governments and alliances. There was nothing she could do about it any rate. Let the powers that be sort that one out…
Only they weren’t sorting it out, and before she knew it something much, much worse was on its way to Corona to turn a shit situation into an apocalyptic one.
Even then, she thought the powers that be would surely put together a response capable of handling it. But as intelligence on fleet movements started to come in it started to be increasingly apparent that the powers that be were getting ready to fumble this one.
And it was absolutely not something that could be fumbled.
Felix had been informed, and he ordered her to rendezvous with him before the two of them would proceed with the whole fleet to the interception point. Four hundred ships could make quite the difference…
Only Felix never showed. The Army was apparently very upset about the convoy he destroyed. He was struggling to withdraw. She had waited for him at the rendezvous as long as she could, hoping her Admiral would show up. But there was no sign of him, and last she heard from him he was calling on Overdrive for support.
The message was clear. If Overdrive was his support plan, it meant he wanted her to carry on without him.
There was an air of impending doom that hung around the Commodore as her fleet completed the final FTL jump. She was showing up with half the forces she was supposed to, and she would be lying if she said she felt confident about their chances. There were just too many things that could go wrong. Too many things that already had gone wrong.
She sighed, and took her medication just before the ships left slipspace. There was no telling how long the battle might last, and the last thing she needed was to get sick in the middle of it. With the fresh injection coursing through her, her flagship the Summer Solstice was first to leave slip space. A bright flash, and a ripple across realspace heralded the Claymore-Class Battleship’s arrival.
It settled on the right edge of the main force, soon joined by dozens more flashes as the rest of Klemmik’s fleet tore its way back into realspace. A hundred and eighty ships in total were soon formed up with a military efficiency and precision one didn’t often see from vessels bearing the insignia of the Black Sail Organization.
Her fleet prepared, missiles loading and priming for launch while targeting AIs crunched through data and churned out targeting solutions for the rail guns. So long as the nations present didn’t decide to light up the pirate fleet as soon as it arrived, then she’d be in this.
In for a penny. In for a fucking pound. Galaxy on the line.
“No pressure Klemmik,” She muttered to herself. “No pressure at all…”
'New Haven Staging Grounds - Name Pending - Coronan Theatre'
The ringing of the Avalon Bells meant that something was up. No convoy protection duty, no skirmishing, or pirate raids this time. The Elvorians have always been in the backstage of galactic politics, partially due to their constant pirate presence around their nation, and partially because of laziness and decadence. However, this time, they'll be playing with the giants this time.
"Rumors have come out about an approaching Mirdif Fleet. If you guys aren't as aware of the galactic situation... well, in simple terms. It's an abhorrent monster that once swept across the galaxy intending to kill all life... and if you can't tell, they're back." The gathering hall was in a quiet, planning mood, as officers rushed about to pry as much as they can out of defensive operations and to send them against Palm Mirdif. Most of the junior officers seemed almost enthusiastic, their first taste of battle. But the veterans and the historians were in a morose mood, knowing that it's now or never against this existential threat.
Admiral Mayania approached the communications officer, both of them saluting each other before delving into the details.
"Our main objective is to protect the burgerzone. Palm Mirdif and Palm Rashy are bitter rivals, if Mirdif manages to get their grubby hands on Rashy, who knows what'll happen to the galaxy after that." The comms officers ran over the details, Mayania simply watching over. The nervous sweat the admiral was in couldn't be hidden, her face was as frozen as ice. "Maya, we've been through everything together." The officer put a hand on her shoulder, snapping her out of the trance. "You're the only admiral on station, everyone else is doing convoy protection or out of the Staging ground. No pressure but... the fate of the galaxy is kinda on the line." The officer releases his grip on her shoulder. "Goodluck, goodbye."
---
Interception Zone 'Dorothy' - 20 AU to NO RETURN
The bridge of the Red Sea was as clean and royal as always, the gold and red accents had made the officers feel like they were operating within a palace instead of a warship. Though with the overwhelming odds stacked against them this battle, it felt more like a decorated tomb than a comfortable residence. Admiral Mayania and her bridge crew performed their duties like they normally did, though one couldn't discount the tense atmosphere emanating through the entire room. Maya stared out of the window, seeing her ship slow down as they exited FTL, the incoming battle ahead of them.
"Hey guys!" One of the officers on the bridge broke the agonizing silence. "If we survive, I'll buy all of y'all the most expensive beers on Auvor, I promise." A few of the crew, Maya among them, gave a nervous laugh at his attempt to drain the tension out of the room. Though as the Red Sea saw her strike fleet appear alongside her, Maya is given a harsh reminder that this might just be the end of her. Close to the Elvorian strike fleet, the Meranan Raiders and a detachment of Kayoko Royal Engineers would appear, bringing alongside them heavy kinetic support and defensive support respectively.
Several ships went full burn back into their previous formations, as a few Kayoko Guild ships tug defensive emplacements filled to the brim with cosmic ray launchers and point defense in order to provide some support. The Elvorians would be shooting and scooting as fire support. The Meranans and what little Coronan independents will try and reinforce any other fleets holding the line. The Kayokos would set up moving artillery to constantly batter the enemies. But all plans falter when met with conflict, and Maya could do nothing but to swallow her nervousness, and pray to whatever holy spirits that would listen to her pleas.
The Red Sea prepared her cosmic ray launchers, it's humming joining a choir of dozens. The Elvorians will make their stand here, not one step back.
Svarthan Operations Command - Inner Halo Independence League - Coronan Theater
Annot was not happy.
Sure, the TRL backed down quite easily and despite the damage they managed to do was not a prolonged hyper problematic obstacle like many in ICEC feared. But it seemed like one obstacle was just being replaced with another. Not only did the Poleisi attack another ICEC member seemingly out of the blue, but this ACCURSED Mirdif fleet was blocking the galaxy and threatening to turn the already problematic plague unstoppable, and with their current luck, the AotS-K, the thing everyone SHOULD be fighting in Annot's mind, would be immune to the disease or be able to cure it somehow. For the latest time he curses those stupid Annihilationists and their moronic ideals, along with everyone who cannot see the real threat in the works here and would rather play pathetic and arrogant little games for their own power.
But that matters little, and punching bulkheads will also not fix it. No, for now, the immediate threat is the approaching biofleet. If it gets here, at the very least everyone in the theater will lose, maybe even the Synopticon, but then the galaxy will fall. Something must be done and it must be done quickly. Turning on his communicator, he starts to make calls...
Mirdif interception zone, staging area Alpha.
The Svarthan fleet drops out of FTL close to the largest concentration of allied fleet elements, a location they have dubbed the "Alpha" staging area. Arrayed before them is the combined might of some of the most powerful nations in the galaxy, and some that have just now emerged. It contains members from nearly every major alliance, including ICEC now that they are here, and it is certainly a sight to behold.
The fleet the Svarthan have brought is nothing to sneeze at either, consisting of a hundred combat vessels, including the "Mandatory Downsizing", their behemoth class vessel. Standing by it are the huge battle liners, the front line of the Svarthans support heavy combat style, their myriad of powerful defenses on maximum alert and power. Swarming around them are lighter ships, ranging from destroyers and cruisers, to point defense craft and emergency recovery and repair vessels.
But the real meat of their force is behind this veritable wall. Their support network. Generator vessels to keep ships powered at all times and facilitate more rapid attacks, sensor ships bristling with every type of detection the crabs have, and ready to spot whatever tricks the enemy may throw at them. Communications ships to help relay and maintain the certainly massive amount of transmissions and communications that will be occurring. But perhaps what the Svarthan are most iconic for, is the their mobile foundries. Space borne factories ready to churn out replacement parts for any ship that needs them, and even serve as a dry dock for smaller craft if time permits. Indeed, the ships send out messages informing all allies of their presence and the fact they are available for all of them to use.
Protecting all the support elements are two massive defense platforms are towed in, near immobile bastions that are already deploying a minefield around the Svarthan support assets. Their gigantic pion guns stand by to slaughter large hostiles while point defense and lighter guns will decimate and smaller force. They also house the critical FTL cannons to deliver the supplies from the foundries to the front.
Coronan Theater
BDCC Demarcation Zone 5 ADL
FWN 7th Fleet
0731 Standard Time
It was perhaps fate, or perhaps simple coincidence, that the signal sent to Chee-Baker and the signal sent to Admiral Lewiston of the 7th Fleet were the same. Tango-Lima-Mike, to the last man. The 7th Fleet had scarcely left home moorings when word reached them of the incoming Mirdif forces, and by then, their orders had been already clear, to fight Mirdif in whatever way they were needed.
Adjusting their trajectory to intercept had eaten valuable days, but those days had been used to prepare everything they could possibly check. Weapons were prepared, shields were cycled, every system in the over five hundred warships of the 7th had been checked from stem to stern to make sure that when they finally left FTL, they would be ready for it. Admiral Lewiston was no different, performing most of the checks he was able to aboard his flagship, Battlecruiser Rigel, in person. In FTL there was no way to go to the other ships in the fleet, much less the monolithic Tempest, but he had made it known to every crewman, every marine and every pilot he could see face to face that they were all equal in this. He was proud of them. They were frightened, many of them hadn't been in the service when the Boreal Jihad had occurred, but they looked to the older hands and their commanders to steady them and prepare for the storm that was to come. Charlie Lewiston himself had only been a lieutenant then, but he remembered.
And he knew.
Standing on the cramped and utilitarian bridge of the Rigel, Admiral Lewiston rested his hand on the top of his helmet as he looked over the holotank before him. The fleet was two minutes out from FTL exit, and sensors were already telling a grim tale. The intel reports had been correct, over five thousand swarm ships of the Scorn were going to be waiting for them.
It was the sort of fleet that he would have vastly preferred to be facing with three times the force he had alongside allied forces, but he didn't have that option. Even with the superweapon strikes, the enemy fleet still outnumbered the 7th by orders of magnitude. Good thing they, that the 7th wasn't alone.
He raised a sealed cup of coffee to his lips, and took a sip.
BDCC had marked a clear line of exclusion that Mirdif was not to cross at all if practical, several hundred kilometers head of the ADL, but had given orders that if this could not be maintained, the ADL itself was to be the last stand. TLM had been sent, countersent, confirmed and marked, and he could not help but think that if it came down to it, even if they wanted to run, there was nowhere to run to. Aktionsgruppe behind them, Mirdif in front, it was the proverbial hammer and anvil. So they would make a fight of it. And if the 7th were to die today, then they would make of it a fight to remember.
"Thirty seconds, admiral," the helmsman called out.
"All vessels, man battlestations. Beat to general quarters." he ordered. lifting his helmet to his head. "Seal the bridge."
"All squadrons reporting ready green," came the reply from the tacco as the streaking field of lines and impossible colors around them came to a crashing halt, replaced by the starry void and the searing, boiling blue portals from which the fleet emerged, dozens of squadrons arrayed around the massive superweapon at the heart of the fleet.
And Mirdif, that boiling, writhing scorn, was ahead of them.
Gyokuza-Pattern Void Engine - Axial Lagrange Point Three - Coronan Theatre
Scan.
Five-hundred owned vessels. One-thousand, eight-hundred enemy vessels. Two-hundred-and-forty noncombatants/allies/unidentified; rising.
Assess.
The mind processed. It predicted fleet movements. It analyzed potential armaments. It outlined ranges, possible factions, ship profiles; everything it possibly could. The future laid out before it in a vast sketch so dense it was black with lines, and then it stopped.
Scan.
Five-hundred owned vessels. One-thousand, eight-hundred enemy vessels. Three-hundred noncombatants/allied/unidentified; rising.
Assess.
The substrate was a tandem organism. It was the Gyokuza-Pattern's fifty-meter wide sphere, shining a perfect mirrored chrome marred by static domes in a honeycomb and swirling, unnerving probes swimming across its surface and leaving eerie ripples. It was the Eleventh Group's signal-mind, swimming between the various vessels alike a rippling, turbulent sea of gamma rays. It was also Nami-Unmei Nohito's mind, fragmented and spread across the Gyokuza-Pattern's hull in a throbbing web of liquid toughts and ideas. It was the executive, the nerve - but it was not a single being.
Authority permeated space. Space permeated authority. It saw with its eyes, and it saw with its sensors, and it saw through its signals and its other bodies in a game of telephone progressing at the speed of light. The authority's flow formed a mandala of the spheres and their companions, with triplet point defense units and pointed destroyer-patterns and looming battle/command-patterns swirling in a radial fractal. What the Sodalytes lacked in experience in void battles and technology, they attempted to compensate-for through numbers, tactics, signals, and saturation.
Scan.
Assess.
The future crystallized; the sketch warping into a tapestry before which the fleet laid bare.
Authority permeated space.
The substrate willed it into place like the moon pulling the tides.
To each of the allied formations, the Sodalytes had broadcast a message over infrared tightbeam. What the message actually contained was difficult to parse for most—it had been sloppily translated from analogue to digital formatting in a way that garbled and muddied its contents for an unprepared system. The gist of it, however, was this;
"Hail; you may address me as 'Nohito.' All neutral parties will coordinate fleet resources. Capabilities demanded/requested/needed. Summary/Explanation/Offer; Long-range assault. Point defense. Sandcaster. Magnetic cannon. Gamma-laser. Missile/Torpedo/Fragment: conventional, bomb-pumped laser, Casaba-type. Multiple complements of fighter/mecha/tandem frame. Multiple complements of strike frame/deflection unit/drone. Defense pattern, destroyer pattern, battleship pattern, battlecarrier pattern, launch/torpedo/missile/fragment pattern. Coordinate/Advise/Respond."
Alet-Zel Industrial System "Lyryth"
New Coronan Order Territory
Fleet Leader Naelle looked long and concerning reports dealing with both the spreading bioweapon and the newer threat of the oncoming biofleet of Yogg Narr. He had already sent out recommendations to Ministry of State and had informed the Order's leadership about coordinating plans to deal with the biohazard. The Yogg Narr fleet was a different story however.
Reports on the progress of the Yogg Narr swarmfleet indicated that it would not be possible to get additional ships to the Coronan theatre before the Swarmfleet's arrival. In addition, the forces available to him could not be spread too far due to the threat of the AotS-K forces. He had still signaled Shimmering Veil, and Laeneth-Xelas had informed him that as expected, Naelle was on his own.
He contacted Squadron Leader L'Kanne of the Spatial Carrier SVS Herald, and Ship Leader C'Rael of the Assault Ship SVS Bringer Of Judgment.
Holographic images of the two officers appeared in Naelle's holopod. Both saluted as Naelle issued his orders to them.
"The time has come for us to take action against the oncoming bio-fleet sent by Yogg Narr. High Command believes the fleet will attempt to obtain samples of the bioweapon Werewolf and others are spreading. This would be potentially disastrous and we will render what assistance we can. I have worked out a tactical plan for this engagement. The main part of the fleet must stay here to assist the New Coronan Order. I am sending your two vessels, backed up by Lan-1/Digam's Battlecrystal complement, to intercept."
Turning to L'Kanne, he continued "Squadron leader, you will position yourself at the rear of the allied formation at maximum range and use your Apparition Beams to snipe larger bioships. Deploy your Shards through the Wings of the Anais' system and direct them at targets of opportunity. Delay deployment though, as Ship Leader C'Rael will strike the first blow."
The Kalizwah nodded, tail rapidly moving back and forth in the manner his species did when excited at the thought of combat. Turning to C'Rael, a muscular Chimeran male Naelle smiled. "Ship Leader, you will load Phoenix Reaction Missiles. Once in the combat theater you will fire them in area radiance mode, optimal dispersal. I've gotten reports from Avrel-Naret at Askandar. Let's show One that he's not the only being that can bring an artificial sun-or six, to a battle."
"Once you deploy your missiles, phase out and disengage from the battle. Your ship's other armament will not add much to the tactical balance, and we want to avoid infection vector transmission." C'Rael saluted and then Naelle simply said. You have your orders. Deploy immediately and may the Blessing of the Anais' be with you."
Lorelei Fortress Nyeth
Shimmering Veil System
Nyeth's Essence floated in the eerie void at the core of the Lorelei Fortress. A zone of twisted spatial geometries that would drive most insane. He was in Communion with Blessed Laenas and First Fleet Leader Laeneth-Xelas.
I am ready to realize your desires, Blessed Laenas. My Systemry and escort vessels will ensure that any bioships that try to return to this galaxy shall experience the cold blessing of Oblivion Nyeth responded.
Laeneth-Xelas sent a feeling of satisfaction. I will be sending several Lan-class transports carrying additional Probe Pods. They will act as pickets to detect the fleet ahead of it's arrival.
Then it is decided Laenas resonated to the two. Go with my Blessings, Nyeth. And those of my Parents and Linkparent.
I hope to see Makel'va again one day. But you know what they say. Have to get out of my shell before such an auspicious event.
As Battle Force Nyeth and the transports started moving out of the system, already beginning to phase out. Laenas and Laeneth-Xelas on impulse looked out into space thinking of Nyeth's last comment.
Looking towards Zaingraf.
Coronan Theatre Defense Line
The eight ships shimmered into existence where all the forces were gathering to stand against the oncoming biofleet. SVS Herald surrounded by the six Battlecrystals, with SVS Bringer of Judgment off to her side, her decks loaded with six massive Phoenix Reaction missiles. Herald started launching Shards, the small crystalline craft orbiting around the blazing blacklight nonagrams of her two Wings of the Anais' gates. "All stations stand by for hyperdimensional vector Shard deployment on my command. Activating his neural comm, he signaled SVS Bringer of Judgment. "Ship Leader, get ready for
missile deployment. Burn them to ash!"
Swarms of Probe Pods launched from Herald's bays as well. They streaked ahead to take up positions near the front of the allied forces, facing the approach vector of the incoming hostile force. They were to give advance warning as the fleet approached, and tied their sensors into the fire control systems of the larger ships.
Onboard Bringer of Judgment, Ship Leader C'Rael said to his bridge crew,” You heard the Squadron Leader, Heat 'em up!" Lines of blazing actinic light glowed on each of the 6 huge missiles as their initiators and containment fields went active. Onboard control systems came online, awaiting targeting data.
“Courage in Adversity”
The motto of the Federation naval forces had echoed throughout the ages as the ideal standard of everything a flag officer should be. The FNF had always fought outnumbered, be it against the Solar Hegemony or their early brush wars, the FNF had fought against the odds and come out triumphant. There was… one important difference though. They had only been outnumbered in single-digit figures, now, they were outnumbered by at least 50:1.
Tac-space was a riot. Fleets were popping out and rapidly assigned colour codes from unknown yellows to friendly greens as they identified themselves, the automated tracking sensors barely able to keep up. Then, there was the swarm, Yogg-narr wasn’t here, but the swarm fleet had enough numbers to completely turn separate light-coded dots into a wall of red. All methods of visual distinction in tac-space had failed to break the swarm, and all that was visual was a mass of flesh and twisted plague, creatures. There was little point in visual distinctions anyways.
They were all targets, and just like before, they would all be destroyed.
There was no room for half-measures.
They had to be destroyed.
The Federation 3rd fleet had been rapidly deployed from fighting the TRF contingent, leaving behind their bases in IHIL to travel through FTL before rapidly burning their way here, outside the Coronan theatre; just along the space runner highway. They came like burning comets, riding on the death of thousands of subatomic particles as their torch drives were on full burn. There was no room for delay.
The Federation of Man had only been in Corona for a while, but when Nightwatch and at least a dozen other nations had called- no, begged for an intercept of a swarm, people listened. One of those people was HIGHCOM, and the powers that be had ordered that Jeanne take her third fleet -now free from the TRF- and burn rapidly for the swarm fleet.
“All tubes loaded, our DC teams are on standby and fleet reports all green.”
The white uniform of a starship captain stepped forwards out of the void.
Flag officer Lucian was neither new nor young to the game. He was approaching forty, and had command of his own battlecruiser. He was Jeanne’s second in command, and unfortunately, they had met before. Both knew that neither of them was likely to come out of this alive. Most of the men on this mission had accepted that this was the end for them, save for divine intervention, this was it. That made it all the worse that the person she was commending to his fate was her long-time friend.
“Good. Make sure our IFFs are calibrated, weapons-free captain.”
“Aye-aye ma’am, entering combat positions, weapons free,” his avatar faded out of tac-space with a smile.
She knew what that smile meant. It was an understanding that if he died, he wouldn’t blame her for his death. He knew what he was going to say if conversations on tac-space didn’t make official records, and she didn’t like it one bit.
Jeanne Armelle, third fleet Admiral and foreigner to Ancerious would remain in tac-space. Alone, she watched as the red tide of swarm fleets was met by an ever-increasing number of allied ships, and somewhere deep inside her, she thought they might actually come out of this alive.
The UDS only ever had one goal when they deployed a taskforce to Corona. Support their allies. It wasn’t even direct military assistance- the task force was just there to protect their logistics and supply ships that were deploying to the SAGA beachhead there. To many, the fall of the Coronan Republic was an opportunity and a danger in equal measure. To the UDS it was just another regret in a long list of why they should have never been so brash when entering Ancerious. Yet still they had a duty to their allies. While they were not dealt the most ideal hand upon entering the galaxy they still were intent on playing it to the best of their ability. And making allies and showing that they themselves were good allies was decidedly a good play.
And now there was a virus rampaging throughout the Remnants with a high chance of it breaking containment and spreading through the galaxy. Now there was a swarm of disgusting bio-ships enroute to the Remnants with the intent of weaponising it. Now the entire galaxy was under threat of this.
Parliament was in an uproar over the thought of it spreading throughout the colonies and goodness forbid, the rest of the UDS.
Needless to say, travel between universes was going to become a lot restricted in the future.
Still, there was one clear choice that the Overseer Council was confident in making.
They could not stand by and allow these beasts to win. They could now stand by and let the people of Ancerious die due their own disinterest. They could not leave their allies behind. It was their moral imperative. Nothing more, nothing less. And that meant they dedicated everything to intercepting the fleet.
The supercarrier SSV Hyperion was immediately pulled off from patrol duty and sent straight to the SAGA beachhead alongside an escort force larger than the taskforce they originally sent. They too had only one goal.
Destroy the fleet. Contain the virus. Support their allies.
Save the galaxy.
[=][=]
Coronan Defence Line
SSV Hyperion
The mood on the bridge of the supercarrier was subdued. Officers and crewmen tended to their tasks in dutiful silence. The only source of noise were the beeps and hums of the computers and the soft whispers between the sailors controlling them. Admiral Kleiner sat at his command chair overlooking a tactical hologram projector of the star system they were in. Surrounding him were dozens more holograms of other officers- not just captains of the various ships attending the battle but the sub-commanders of the SSV Hyperion who manned the various hangars.
“Admiral,” his executive officer Francis presented him a data pad, “we’re seeing a lot of ships appear. They appear to be the rest of the interception force.”
Kleiner nodded, “how many do we have in comparison to the swarm fleet?”
Francis gulped, “we estimate that the swarm fleet of three thousand still outnumbers us considerably.”
Kleiner closed his eyes to think. It was only for a few moments before he spoke once more, “we will need to act assuming we are outnumbered at all times,” He stood up from his chair and opened his eyes. He knew that the rest of the command staff were now focused on him, “we must defend a line a few dozen AU long. If even one enemy ship makes it past then we are doomed,” was it an exaggeration? Maybe, but he refused to take any chances when the stakes were too high.
“We lack the power and numbers to necessarily get close and deal damage. But we have good range and interception options. Our ships are durable and hardy. I think that makes our plan of action clear-” he waved his hand across the holographic map of the system and pointed at the defence line, “we will divide our fleet into three battlegroups. Aleph, Bet, and Gimel. Each will be stationed at intervals along the defence line. Our duties shall be twofold- provide long range support and intercept any Midriff ship that makes it past our battlelines. Ours will be the last wall that holds them back. Ours will be the back on which hope rests upon.”
He looked at two holograms of officers- Commodore Cyrene and Franklin, “you two will command lead battlegroups Bet and Gimel, to be stationed at the flanks of the Hyperion... of which I shall command as the flagship of Aleph at the centre of the line. Our fighters and tachyon arrows will be vital in creating an overlapping field of fire. The Hyperion can deploy as many monitors and fighters as need be whether here or the frontlines. Remember to cooperate with your allies. Only through unity will we stand tall and ready against the oncoming darkness.”
There is a moment as the officers comprehend his plan. Then they raise their right hand over their heart and clench it into a fist. The traditional salute of the UDS.
Kleiner nodded, “Very well. I will see you all in person when the battle is over.”
NRS Laxin,
Deep Space, Near Corona
T-28
The Fever-class cruiser sits in cosmic silence, its outer hull totally darkened and invisible to the naked eye (and some advanced sensors!) due to the lack of a strong source of light. There are about 3 other ships within the immediate vicinity of the Laxin, sitting, waiting, pondering about their next assignment which was about to take place within the balkanized remnants of the Coronan Republic.
Within the stellar equivalent of a blink, all four ships were gone, only leaving behind the signature high-energy radiation that indicated a superluminal travel sequence. Their assignment had changed. But to what? The keyhole message didn’t explain any further, simply specifying the coordinates for which the Laxin, its three escorts and fourteen other ships were to rendezvous at. It looked to be somewhere outside of Corona, all the way out along the Spice-Runner highway.
Still in transit, further information came through keyhole messages, indicating that the feared biological warships of Mirdiff had broken out of their containment and were now speeding towards Corona. The Cascadians were strangers to the horrors that the Mirdiff inflicted upon the galaxy, but they were rational enough to deduce that whatever threat was big enough to scare this galaxy, was probably big enough to be a problem for them.
NRS Laxin, Tango
Spice-runner Highway,
T-17
The unified force, now led by both the Laxin and the destroyer Tango, having caught and watched the Kritzcorps falter and massacred to a ship from a great distance, was not too keen on engaging any Mirdiff ships. Fortunately, the mission objectives shifted in light of this information. Now they were tasked with shadowing the five-thousand strong force across the interstellar highway…
Tracing them by the radiation and high energy particles left behind, the Laxin force pushed and fatigued both its drives and its crews*, broadcasting the progress of the bioships through keyhole comms to friendly and allied ships as they trailed at a distance. At the end of their journey, when the CONA-SAGA interdictors had stopped the bioships and forced a confrontation just before Corona proper, the Laxin force had traveled the most distance in the shortest amount of time, out of any Cascadian military ship assigned to the Coronan theater.
Warp Fatigue: A set of acute symptoms, most often headaches, fatigue, and moodiness that appear during or after a warp travel sequence.
NRS Laxin, NRS Cameron Johns
Defensive Line, Deep Space
T-0
At the start of the confrontation, the Laxin force linked up with the rest of 166 strong Cascadian force, and came under the command of the NRS Cameron Johns - the Supremacy-era battleship that was now leading one of the largest Cascadian forces deployed since the Second Republic’s founding.
TASK FORCE 71 – CORONA
- (2) Emancipation-class Battleships
→ NRS Cameron Johns
→ NRS Stillborn Star
- (39) Fever-class Cruisers / Laserstars
→ NRS Laxin
→ NRS Casterly Hill
- (62) Amphis-class Destroyers / Laserstars
→ NRS Tango
- (12) Express-class Frigates / Laserstars
- (51) Miscellaneous Auxiliary ships / Auxilistars
”We’re dropping in hot!”
The ships decelerated into realspace ahead of their allies, positioning themselves in an aggressive manner so that their weapons would be at the most effective distance. Taking a moment to calibrate their sensors, communications and datalinks, they broadcasted a simple message to their allies, aimed at informing them of the National Republican Navy’s overarching plan.
//TACOM: KYHL >> APAC223; BROADCASTING AT SUPER://
PULLING IN FRONT TO ENGAGE FORWARD ELEMENTS. EXPECT AGGRESSIVE POSITIONING AND ATTACKS. WILL RETREAT WITH TOO MANY LOSSES.
Then they unleashed their first barrage of Torch missiles, followed by a lengthy dump of UREBs and other particle weaponry in the general direction of the swarm fleet. With the distance between them and their enemies, it will take a long time for the weapons to reach their targets, and twice as long for them to ascertain whether or not they’ve hit or were intercepted. At least the beams of the particle weapons were neutralized, preventing electrostatic repulsion from pushing the constituent atoms apart.
Shemesh Forces en route to - Coronan Theatre
First Decreed Kheyylim of The Ancerius Galaxy
Prognostication chambers - Wrath-Unbound-By-Moral-Fallacies - Kheyylim command vessel
Purified silver, ground into dust and blessed thrice over, falls from the grasp of the Arcanist onto the marble floor, the tiny particles reflect the scant light given off by faerie flames of etherite lamps. The dust falls into creases and gaps chiselled by telekinetic pressure. The dust falls and forms patterns. The patterns form into shapes and meanings.
A cloud of dark smoke, covering the sun overlooking a battlefield.
{Defeat...}
The Dust falls, the patterns make waves.
The hand of a warrior, burnt and bloodied, clutching a blade of silver and gold.
{A sacrifice...of who ?}
The Dust falls and stops. Like a starlit sky on a moonless night, the particles stop. The etherite lamp burns brighter, though no command was given. The Light refracts from each grain of blessed silver.
It brings comprehension.
It shall be this way. Because there is no other way.
--
Wrath-Unbound - Inner temple
{"You are certain of Your vision."}
The ancient Arkiyonai speaks through word and memetic compulsion, each pulse of information hitting like a sledgehammer upon one's mind. There is no malice in such an action, merely the difference in aeons of study.
Boundless-Insight-Sought-by-Purity, covers before Their Elder, not daring to raise from the supplicant pose They had taken.
{"Kokhav Yeled has granted it to me. Of that I am certain, and if I stand incorrect. May my Glyph never return to Their embrace."}
{"Your precognition tells of disaster. The signs speak of oblivion. The threads of fate of those who you will take show no promise of return. Yet You still ask for half of this Decreed Kheyylim. Kokhav Yeled, Our God, stands shattered and broken, teetering on the edge of oblivion with the return of every fallen Kindred. Yet you still ask for hundreds of thousands to sacrifice their Divine Spark? And for what? For the lives of mere mortals, who shall not live a day in the Light of Yeled, Our God."}
Boundless Insight had no words to offer, for all would ring hollow. The Elder was right, this battle would cost countless Kindred, the influx of the slain would weaken Yeled even further, perhaps even bring its absolution. Yet if the Godling did not wish for such, would It have given the vision?
{ "Yes" }
In these moments, Boundless-Insight was glad that They shared no biological functions common with the species of the wider galaxy. Only through Their Heart Glyph, one could see the sheer pressure felt by the Arcanist. Its light had dimmed to nothing more than a spark, barely burning, but still alight. Still fighting for the righteousness of its cause.
Perhaps that is what the ancient Arkiyonai had seen. Or perhaps They had shared a similar vision.
{"It shall be this way. Because there is no other way. Take those who shall answer your call, no less and no more. Bring them back and be victorious, and one day we shall stand as equals. Loose their Divine Spark and I will ensure Your Glyph-descendants will suffer a thousand lifetimes for each of those lost."}
Absolute Defence Line
Like vast leviathans of ancient Oceans, the Shemesh Shevath broke through the thin walls between dimensions, breaking from X-space into reality one by one. The vessels were many in number and in purpose. Some appeared like primitive temples raised from some backwater world, riding on a wave of azure light. Others resembled nothing less than a true battleship, filled with hundreds of cannons and strange magical circles.
The Shemesh fleet concentrated around groups of Mobile Leylines, infusing their weaponry and hulls with Mana. Once complete the largest Temple ships moved into position, the Arkiyonai aboard already weaving Spacetime shields from raw solidified space, while Lokhem loaded Mana-pumped lasers and magic-missile arrays. Behind them, the ships of the line took point, followed by Construct carriers, already filled to the brim with combat Mitar and boarding Damar.
[
10 Battleships
50 Battlecruisers
150 Cruisers
50 Artillery / Ritual Cruisers
50 Construct Carriers
35 Mobile Leylines
35 Mobile Siphons
]
Martyr's-Folly - Local group flagship.
Boundless Insight stood bare against the cold embrace of the void. They wished to experience Their foes with a mind unburdened by enhancement rituals. A glance through the Arcane was enough, the situation was dire, worse than anything the Arcanist could have predicted. The mortals would die in their tens of thousands, and so would the Shemesh. Countless Kindred would return to Kokhav Yeled, never to get the chance to fulfil their true Holy duty. All because of one vision. All because of one interpretation taken from silver dust.
No. This was no time to bring doubts.
It shall be this way. Because there is no other way.
[GPCNS Aurora, Deep Space, Approximately 12 hours from Corona]
Admiral Diede Cæz was back in the saddle. However, it was an entirely different mission and with an entirely different fleet. He was promoted for his actions during the Hyperes Expedition, and the unveiling of the so-called “Aegis” within one of the solar systems. That same planet-cracking facility had been under extensive research for some time, including the nanomachine technology also discovered in the system. Their lengthy research time allowed for some groundbreaking technological advances, which led to the development of new civilian and military infrastructure. However, it had also gotten him transferred to the secretive and quiet Stealth Corps branch of the Empire’s military due to his familiarity with the recovered technology. Fortunately, there were plenty of familiar faces on board his new command, such as Warrant Officer Antoinætte and Lieutenant Ellard, both at their respective posts. Despite this change, the attitude of the ship was very much the same.
“Begging your pardon, sir. I have a question.” Antoinætte inquired to Cæz in her usual way.
“Go ahead, Warrant Officer.” Came the reply from Cæz. No doubt it was about their deployment, or what this ship and her escort fleet were doing so far from Pyrhan space.
“What have we been sent out here for? For a nation that’s not getting involved in the majority of galactic affairs, we’re seemingly doing quite a lot.” She stated plainly, turning briefly from her post. Her blue eyes glittered in the low-visibility bridge lighting, as the ship had been rigged for silent running along with the rest of the fleet.
“Securing potential alliances, gathering intelligence on galactic affairs, and rooting out potential incursions. Well, mainly the first two. That last part was a month ago, and now we’re to observe beyond our borders. There’s whispers from our expedition fleets of a major fleet movement in the region, and that’s our main objective to investigate. Is it into our own space, or into another space?” Cæz gave his detailed response, like he had over a month ago. They had brought a significant fleet for such a deployment, 50 ships from the Stealth Corps. And for the Corps, this was considered a major deployment. 50 of the Pyrhan’s most advanced ships, with the most elite crews the Empire had to offer. Cæz knew deep down that such a group was meant to deter and silence a major threat rather than intelligence gathering. The Corps believed these whispers of a major fleet movement. And they determined it a threat. His thoughts were almost immediately confirmed.
“Word from our advanced scouts! They’re detailing mass fleet movements from Corona towards a…. Hold on, they’re saying the target is under the name of ‘Mirdiff.’ I don’t really-“
“Request further intelligence. Is there a known route of space this ‘Mirdiff’ group is following?” Cæz didn’t want this to be true. Another conflict Pyrhus would have to get involved in. But this worry was quickly suppressed.
“Tapping into comms chatter in the region. These ‘Mirdiff’ seem to be quite disliked by a number of forces in the region. They evidently use bio-weaponry of a sorts. Some sort of virus, by-“
“That’s enough, Warrant Officer. That’s all I need to hear.” Cæz cut Antoinætte off. The words bio-weapon and virus were enough of a red flag as it was. So this was the mission the Stealth Corps sent them on. Confirm the reports of these potential mass bio-weapons, and remove the problem. This was a necessity for Pyrhus. No, for the galaxy as a whole. If a single ship made landfall… there wouldn’t be a second chance. This disease upon the galaxy had to be burned away, otherwise obliteration awaited them all.
“Prepare for FTL transit. Follow the ‘Spice Runner Highway’ as it’s called here, and intercept these Mirdiff forces. We cannot let such a threat spread any further.” Cæz ordered. A resounding “Yes, sir!” answered him, and the fleet began to charge their XSpace drives. In moments, dimensional vortexes opened before the fleet, and the ships vanished into them. Their target was the massive bio-fleet en route to Corona. Yes, the Pyrhans knew that Corona likely didn’t truly trust or see appeal in them given they were a colonial nation, but it was best to aid them nonetheless. The galaxy could not be lost to this threat, and the Pyrhans would aid in protecting it, no matter the cost.
Spice Runner Highway: Deep Space
Three shining stars had erupted inside the Mirdiff fleet, turning hundreds of ships into little more than ionized plasma in a single instant. Normally it would have caused panic, morale breakage and considerations for withdrawal.
But their enemy was not normal, in fact it was strangely perfect.
Mirdiff had no morale, its forces had absolute purpose, clarity and perfection of action, direction and set caste standing orders. Each individual part from the smallest organ to the hive mind directing the fleet new its only reason to exist and carried out only the necessary action to see it completed. Like some monstrous clockwork mechanism the Mirdiff fleet was beautifully perfect, taking only a fraction of a second to analyse its losses, consider the effective course of action and then decide on its next moves. Like a body realigning itself the Strixx barrage had hit hard, but it had not even made the horrific foe flinch.
It surveyed the forces now appearing in arrayed battle formation front of it, it surveyed the interdiction it now was anchored by, it knew its next moves. It only knew one motive, one emotion.
Hatred.
The swarm, now out of position began to move, it would take a little while to get back into formation, but it had no intention of keeping its formation. Shifting biological constructs of all shapes and sizes lit their drives and formed up, launching Standing weapons and smaller corvette sized vessels into the void as they went. Watching on sensors it was like the swarm fleet was orchestrating some kind of dance, spiralling cones of warships moved into helical patterns, each ejecting helically smaller forms. It was like the enemy was forming into five distinct conical lance formations all arrayed around one another, heavier elements such as battleship and dreadnought equivalents encased the outer layers while smaller and weaker elements such as escort and corvette sized vessels made up the innards, all of them began to accelerate. Ripped free of their warp bubbles the bioships accelerated hard, their swarms of Standing weapons now arraying themselves in front of their formations in their tens of thousands. The swarm was well aware that weapons fire was incoming, that it was being challenged by sentients.
It did not care, its mind had an objective, and that objective would be met.
The first wave of the arrayed forces against the swarm would face its fury.
Particle beams burst forth from across 3200 vessels, invisible in the darkness of space they were quickly joined by heavy kinetic barrages made up of sharpened composite biological chitin. The kinetics were timed to impact just after the particle beams to maximise damage against multi layered or adaptive defensive techniques, like those taught to the Unaligned during the Jihad by the AGA. Surprisingly no missiles were launched, but the Standing weapon forces began to split up.
Standing Bombers, lumpen monstrous forms twisted to look like those of the Little Light, now broke off in force, each carrying an array of munitions. From Alcubierre Gravity Explosives, Corrosive nano-pathogens to One shot particle beams and bio-plasma missiles. They split off in their hundreds, each escorted by entire wings of Standing fighters that swept out before them, their targets were not the front ranks. But the forces on the flanks.
The Swarm fleet was also well aware of other forms of warfare, biological phased array emitters cracked into position, flooding the battlefield with false signals, radar jamming, laser blinding pulses, powerful radiowaves and gravity distortions.
The battle had truly begun.
---
“Enemy fleet is firing”
“Creation preserve us… All hands, I know many of you are green, but I promise to get us through this. Though the fires of Aedleshaven may smoulder, we must do everything we can to protect this galaxy. If we don’t draw the line here, our families back home will suffer, and the Scorn of Mirdiff will once again threaten the galaxy. Ready interception systems, area defence shields to maximum power, launch fighters, all missile payloads to be fitted with BPLs, all mass driver rounds to be switched to AOE flak mode. We may only be 50 ships, but by the grace of the Emperor we will defend our allies with every scrap of ammunition we have! For the Union, For Ancerious!”
The Union formation spread out, its nano printers working overtime to realign ammunition to the desired type. Firestorm Fighters launched from hangar bays as Mass drivers swivelled into position. They could not hope to stand against the fury of 3200 ships, but they could help ablate that firepower against their allies.
“Fire Hyperfrequency lasers, lets see if we can take a few of those bastards with us. Deploy our own jamming too. Pilots, good luck may creation save us all”
SVS Herald
Defense Line
All stations alert. Launches and NPAWS fire detected from Biofleet. All defense units on full action alert.
The warning blared from speakers and neural displays all over the immense Spatial Carrier. L'Kanne's tail stood
up vertically as he ran his foreclaws across the deck. "Time to kill. Pity we don't have a Lifecrystal inductor.
I wonder what Yogg Narr ships essence tastes like?" He looked into the large tactical display sphere in the center of Herald's CIC and signaled SVS Bringer of Judgment. "Ship Leader C'Rael, permission to deploy Reaction Missiles granted. Cleanse them in Flame, Ship Leader!" Turning to the ship's CAG, he issued his orders. "Deploy additional Shards and Attack Wings Alet through Del to maintain CSP over the fleet. Send 100 Shards with each Phoenix missile to escort them in, have them break away when the missiles' detonations are imminent." Nodding, the CAG sent a neural command and the Shards started launching, joining those already patrolling. 600 Shards moved from the cloud towards Bringer of Judgment.
4 Wings of Night Talon and Sun Phoenix attack craft launched as well, taking up positions near the fleet, the Night Talons armed with anti-missile/anti-fighter ordnance, the Sun Phoenixes with Anti-ship torpedoes carrying a variety of warhead.
"Guns, Let them know we are here. Initiate Apparition Beam firing. Target the largest Bioships. Be precise with your beam steering, with this Anais' damned interdiction these will be difficult shots. And begin quantum launcher firing. Gateless mode, mix of Gravity shock and continual fusion missile heads. Also chuck some spatial shells at them with terminal guidance." (edited)
The quantum launchers began firing their mix of missile buses and shells, bereft of the normal gate systems the rounds would take a much longer time to reach their targets. The shells longer, though their lack of active propulsion might let them get close to the biofleet. Two blazing nonagrams of black light formed at the junction of the triaxial superstructures on each surface of the Spatial Carrier. Lurid beams of crimson light streaked forward, lattices of gravimetric force steering the beams somewhat as they streaked towards their Bioship targets.
SVS Bringer of Judgment
Ship Leader C'Rael moved to the firing station for the reaction missiles. He looked over at Gunnery Master X'Lara, A Mu woman that had served in the fleet for a long time. "We have Deployment authorization from Herald Actual. Slot them."
C'Rael and X'Lara each placed a glowing red crystal into a depression on a control panel, each panel was 3 meters apart so two individuals were required for launch. The neural authenticators scanned each officer. If they were not authorized the Sentience Core would attack them psychometrically.
The word READY flashed in the tactical sphere and C'Rael pressed a crystalline control stud. "May the Flames of the Anais' Wrath purge the Enemies of the People from the Tapestry. Hallowed are their Names."
The engines of the first two missiles activated, massive pressure-gravity thrusters propelling the missiles forward, lifting them from their launch cradles. When the missiles were away the second set started their engines, and then the third once the second set had cleared the deck. As C'Rael watched the launches-he always enjoyed seeing reaction missiles launch, he signaled the allied fleets.
"All allied forces. Give what escort to these missiles that you can afford without compromising fleet security. Coordinate your own missiles as well but don't keep them too close to these monsters. I don't want fratricide."
As the missiles moved forward, 600 Shards broke off from the cloud of them in front of the Anais Unity ships, 100 each moving to escort the giant missiles on their way. The missiles' own phase barriers and point defense systems activated and stood ready.
Hell was on its way to the Bioships.
"Allies incoming! Commencing IFF handshakes... Phaselords above, that's a lot." The communications officer confirmed with the rest of the bridge crew as more and more friendly ships appeared beside and in front of their formations. What Mayania originally thought to just be an overcomplicated suicide mission has turned out to be perhaps a winnable battle... Though their climbing confidence was quickly leveled with the new movements of the swarm. Moving like one being, like nanites flowing through the veins of a body. It reminded her of her own droneships that she commanded. Though, it was time to act, not think.
The Antimony cruisers on the outskirts of the Elvorian formation transmitted and received information from their own sensor arrays and forward scouts from allies on targets they should be focusing on. Drone destroyers line up with Elvorian-piloted battleships as they prepared for their first of many alpha strikes. The sounds of their charging CRLs deafened some of the weaker comms systems as they stood by to fire.
Adrenaline pumping through her veins, she slammed down on the table in front of her and stood up in front of her. Her voice was raised loud, loud enough for the maintenance and DCT team just outside the bridge to hear Maya order around the bridge crew.
"All hands on deck! Order every ship to fire on the formation closest to us! I want a 10 second burst from every single Cosmic Launcher! Followed by every secondary weapon and side Cosmic Launchers we have plastered on our ships. Get the fighters rolling out!" Mayania switched from her normal calm and somewhat controlled self into a being possessed by sheer adrenaline, fueled by the lives she knows that are on the line. "Every side gun to point defense mode, make sure those enemy fighters don't get an inch closer to our formation!... Oh, and before I forget... EVERY LOADED MISSILE INTO THAT FORMATION!" A few of her officers gave her side-eyes, worried about her heart's health. Considering that they've never seen her this energetic, they have a valid concern. But that wasn't a concern to the fleet admiral, there were more pressing issues than a bleeding heart.
"Come on crew! Ain't it a good day to die for the galaxy! If we don't make it out, we'll be remembered as martyrs… But if we do… well, beers on that officer then." Pointing to the person that made that comment moments ago, Mayania gave a proud smile. She had served the Elvorians since they were founded. There was no higher honor than to die for the galaxy.
"We will remember the fallen! And by god we will fight like hell for the living!"
---
The strikecraft of the Red Sea and her escorts were loaded onto their catapults and launched deep into space, closing the distance between them, and the enemy Standing Weapons. They were each assigned to missile escort and fire support roles, their mobile frame and large weapons being able to be of some threat to small enemy vessels. Overall, they had around 1500 manned and unmanned strike fighters in their fleet armed with a myriad of anti fighter and anti ship missiles and munitions, good enough to at least slow down the enemy's march to the defense line and destroy a lot of their standing weapons.
Their point defense arrays and hybrid cannons lit up the starry sky with fire. Their targets were standing weapons and small craft far, far away. Even if most of them may miss, the Elvorians had plenty of ammo to spare for their point defense. They also contributed towards the allies overlapping fields of defense, making sure to cover for the ones that were lacking in PD. Active Defensive Systems stood by for any incoming danger, though none were shot at the moment.
Tactical lasers lit up the sides of their ships as they made their way towards the enemy formations and standing weapons. Whilst not as monstrously powerful as the Cosmic Ray Launchers, their extreme range and damage over time made them a useful asset for killing off standing weapons. Secondary weapons popped off potshots that were meant to suppress the enemy and deny them freedom of movement to areas unless they'd like to get hit, making them easier targets for their main event.
The Elvorian Formations Cosmic Ray Launchers all charged up in sequence. From the tiniest of gun destroyers meant to sweep aside smaller craft, to the largest of battleships meant to stand toe to toe with enemies, their beams, despite their varying sizes and strength, were meant to rip into an enemy formation, and saturate the area with the rage of a thousand pulsars. The iconic wings of their spacecraft unfurled and glowed as hot as a star, before eventually releasing their energy. Their spinal weapons screeched and fired off their beams, jamming nearby communications as the sheer volume of cosmic rays punched their way straight into an enemy formation, their ships moving their hull in order to saturate as big of an area as possible. Their bigger guns mounted on their larger ships targeted the armor heavy battleships and dreadnaughts, their large hulls and thick skin making for the perfect prey for cosmic rays. While destroyer-sized weapons targeted the softer craft hidden within their formation, their beams intent to simply chop them up and cause some soft damage. Their first barrage was over in just a few seconds, their radiators ejecting coolant and weapons recovering from the extended burst. Only the Red Sea continued to fire, their twin black hole reactors being the only ones strong enough to maintain this oppressive volume of fire.
In the distance, the Kayoko guilds artillery platforms gave a mighty display as well. Their pulsar-like look to their muzzle flashes made it look like a supernova was occuring just a few AU away. But just like the launchers of the Elvorian fleet, they too fell silent as they waited for their reactors to get enough energy to recharge.
"30 seconds to next barrage, confirm the same target over?" Several of the ship captains and Typhoon-Class Lupotech hailed the Red Sea to confirm a second barrage.
"Whatever whatever. Weapons free! Keep firing until nothing's moving!" Her orders were simple, and her captains followed them.
Immediately following their barrage of cosmic rays, were their missiles. Spanning from high-yield antimatter missiles made to simply wipe out kilometers of enemies, to bomb pumped lasers to intercept standing weapons, to decoys masking as corvettes with their radar signatures, to one-shot NEFPs to target more heavily armored crafts. These would be escorted with a couple of dronefighter wings supplied by their copious amounts of dronecraft they're using in the battle.
The Elvorians had finished their first barrage. Missile nanoforges and automated ammo crafters pushed themselves to their limit to resupply their ships in the small downtime that they had between barrages. Fuel waste from their cold fusion reactors were dumped into their black hole reactors, helping to fuel their efforts. The Elvorians were done for the meantime, though meanwhile over at the Meranans…
---
"Today's a good day to die ain't it men!" Captain Yuri rowled his bridge crew up as he gave a wide grin, facing down the incoming swarm with a smile. "We ain't gonna be dying from an ambush or raiding civvies again. But for the fate of the Galaxy! Ain't that crazy!" He talked like this was a game, though even a few notes of nervousness slipped through the cracks.
The QMN Machine and QMN Infernal lined up with the rest of their strike fleet as they burned their Penrose drives to intercept the incoming formation. Loading up their kinetic weapons with flechettes and flak and all sorts of anti fighter and anti missile weapons, they opened fire using tactical lasers and a few side cosmic ray launchers, intending to soften up the target formation before the Elvorians barrage arrived.
"Haha!" His cheers were echoed by his team of roughnecks. "Missiles! Get the missiles!" The internal comms officer relayed this information to the gunnery crew as Yuri refocused on the enemy swarm in front of them.
The Infernals missile arrays shot out their 'Shooting stars', extremely fast moving, swarmer Anti Matter missiles. They were programmed to assist with the Allied missile barrages, quickly swooping in on the formations flank in order to deliver a side blow to the enemy. Alongside the Shooting Stars we're dozens of standard missiles fitted with nuclear payloads, meant to soften up targets ahead of the pack.
"Confirmed sensor contacts with Standing Weapons by both our scouts and allied craft, permission to engage?" Their gunnery crew quietly and timidly replied to Yuri.
"PeRmiSsIoN tO enGag- yeah yeah… OPEN FIRE!"
The engines of the Infernal lived up to it's name as their fusion torch boosters sparked to life. Their ships unleashing hellfire in the form of a shower of kinetic rounds of all shapes and calibers. From flak rounds to regular kinetic rounds to tiny flechettes, everything was thrown downrange and then reloaded with their internal microforges. Though with the amount of firepower they were firing, their ammo reserves won't last very long until they pause to let their forges run their course.
They formed up with the rest of the allied line fleets, ready to make a stand against this belligerent swarm. They were pirates, raiders, ships made to strike fast and strike hard. They weren't made to fight in a full on engagement like this, yet they still push on, for the future of this galaxy.
The Chamber of Shrines across each and every RANGSI ship had become unusual sites of rare serenity from the chaos of the battle. The 125th Strike Force hurriedly manoeuvred for a general right hook at Mirdif, and everywhere crewmen were running around making preparations for the inevitable battle, and while command centers were abuzz with comms chatter, tacticians discussing formations and phases of operations, and signallers frantically making calls and passing messages.
In contrast, it was quiet in the Chamber of Shrines - perhaps too quiet. A small space carved out, free from affairs of the mortal realm, where only the divine judgement of the gods existed - their pointed stares from the infinitely stretching rows of cubical pigeon holes, where small portable statues of the gods or other religiously significant items lay in display. At the front, leading this assembly of gods and the like, were the secular but equally sacred symbols of RANGSI - the trio of the individual ship’s Standard, the squadron Colours, and the State Flag itself.
Only small retinues of commissars remained in the Chambers, as the rest laboured elsewhere tending to their duties. Generally a party of around three - one held a small gong and striked it at slow, regular and steady intervals, another stood beside him and softly chanted prayers, and the one at the front tended to the individual shrines of the gods, placing incense sticks, making small offerings of uneaten ration bars, and giving short bows, salutes or other appropriate gestures of respect as they moved to the next.
-----
Praises and praises to Rama. As did your arrows strike true at Ravana, may our arrows too strike true at our enemy.
“Torpedoes locked! Firing!” the 22nd Hunter Killer squadron, which had been racing at the front of the 125th’s formation, launched all its anti-ship torpedoes, which joined the enormous barrage of the other nations. These torpedoes were primarily of two types - the bee-hive type NEFP that peppered enemy fleets with needles of plasma, and the more conventional thermonuclear explosive which created large balls of roiling plasma in space. They were aimed at the cloud of Mirdif Standing Fighters that formed the front of the swarmfleet.
Praises and praises to Guan Di. May our soldiers draw martial courage from your heavenly example, in this time of great need.
“Onward! For Singapore! For the galaxy itself!” following behind the wave of torpedoes were another wave of ‘torpedoes’ - giant cylinders of pure fuel and boosters that hosted nothing else but the hordes of starfighters and G-34D Striker Mechs attached in ‘coffin’ pods, these ‘transport torpedoes’ sent them to the front to intercept the Mirdif’s Standing Weapons and Bombers at relativistic speeds without wasting a drop of their own fuel, which would be much needed for the combat ahead.
-
Praises and Praises to the Almighty God of Abraham. May the deeds of your Children undivided be recorded on this day, and may You show mercy to their souls in the Hereafter, be they the Followers of Moses, the Followers of Christ, or the Followers of Muhammad, peace be upon them all, amen.
The battleship squadrons of the 125th Strike Force HQHA, under Chee-Baker’s direct control, meanwhile hung back and charged up their spinal Gamma Lasers, constantly processing the enormous data flows from the front and from allied fleets, their computers making constant readjustments to the firing solution that intended to see the gamma lasers slice across the length of the Mirdif lance. The enormous draw on the battleship’s power meant that the spinals could not fire at this very moment, and Chee-Baker anxiously looked at the counter estimating the time to completion, mere minutes seemed like hours when time was of the utmost essence. (edited)
-
Meanwhile, finally the commissars in the Chamber of Shrines arrived at the front of the room, where the secular trio of the Ship’s Standard, the squadron Colours, and the State Flag lay. With a final strike of the gong, they bowed, and offered a final salute.
Praises and praises to Matria Singapura. May the light of your grace end all hatred and bloodshed, may your flag unite all peoples, and may your fire inspire courage in those who call themselves your Singaporeans. May your Right Hand and Our Keeper witness our deeds, and deem us worthy of his Army of the Mid-After. Majulah Singapura, and Amen.
The moments before the shitstorm erupted were quiet aboard the Summer Solstice. The AIs had churned out firing solutions, the communications officer had synchronized launch with the rest of the fleet, there was nothing to but wait for the moment to arrive.
Klemmik watched the swarm of red dots dance and move on the screen, reminded of old videos of schools of fish. She’d always found the display mesmerizing, the way so many individuals were able to seemingly move as one through the water. The display on the screens was still mesmerizing in its own way. But it was hard to really enjoy the spectacle knowing that unlike a school of fish, the swarm of living ships were here to wreck her ship, and end the lives of everyone upon it.
Idly she wondered what scenes were taking place in all the places she couldn’t be. The men of her own ship, down in the missile tubes and the railgun ports would be screaming at one another over the cacophony of heavy machinery moving missiles and slugs into place, reporting to gunnery officers as the tubes were loaded and locked. Across her fleet, she imagined the scenes on the bridges would be similar to the one playing out in front of her. A pensive silence, broken only by the hum of computers and the occasional vocalized update as the swarm began to close.
And what about beyond her fleet? What thoughts passed through the minds of the others present? Did they give each other rousing speeches about duty and honor? Did they pray to whatever gods they believed in? Were they calm or panicking, she wondered? Did they give orders expecting an imminent demise or were they all false bravado and patriotic slogans?
“All strike craft have scrambled,” Someone on the bridge crew told her.
“Have them take up defensive formations around the fleet and prepare to receive hostile strike craft,”
“At once Commodore,”
She took a deep breath of recycled air, held it for a three count, and released through her mouth. There was no time left to muse on the scenes playing out across the fleet. The battle was here, and it was time to go to war.
“Missiles?”
“All tubes are showing green,” One man reported. “Fleet is cocked and locked, waiting for fire signal,”
It wouldn’t be long. Missiles and torpedoes were popping up on screens, leaving the other ships as the great display of synchronized fire began. Where the swarm moved with an organic grace, the missiles filling up the screen closed in on their targets with an unnatural mechanical precision. The dots shrieked across space on a course only a computer could hold.
“Launch signal received,”
“Send them.”
It took a fraction of a second for her order to be carried out across the fleet. The signal to launch hit the tubes with the same synchronized precision only a machine could achieve. Every second was factored and accounted for. The moments it took for thrusters to fire up, the heartbeat after the missile left the tube where bursts of compressed air oriented it on its course, and then the rapid acceleration as the missiles full burned toward the swarm. Some would detonate in the swarm of strike craft, poking holes through which the rest could travel to their appointed targets.
The swarm of smaller missiles from the frigates to the rear of her fleet formation may have seemed the least intimidating when compared to the hulking form of the nuclear munitions ahead of them, but it would be a mistake to judge them on looks alone. They carried payloads of anti-matter, the smaller missiles easily able to equal the payload of the larger nuclear munitions, some she suspected would even surpass them.
“All missiles away!” One man reported.
“Send order to repositions. Waypoint foxtrot. Reload and prepare for second salvo,”
“At once Commodore,”
She braced in her command chair as the engines fired to full burn and the fleet began moving. The formation adjusted as they scooted to their next firing position, moving to overlap point defenses to fight the incoming swarm. Captains and commanders adjusted their railguns, selecting targets as the fleet closed in, holding their main weapons to face whatever vengeance the swarm deemed suitable to punish them with for the megatons of munitions now on a collision course with them.
“Tea, sir?” Executive Officer Miranda said as she placed a steaming mug next to his command chair alongside a plateful of biscuits.
Kleiner offered her a small smile as he sipped from the mug, “thank you, comrade. These are stressful times and I had nearly forgotten that a serene mind is just as important as an active one,” indeed it was one of the personal philosophies he had drilled into himself and his men throughout his years of active service. He knew very well how many navies had their captains be boastful bombasts with large lungs to yell their commands with pomp and show. The UDS had a few such men as well. But overtime they had grown disciplined and focused. A calm crew who focused only on their stations were among the most efficient.
The datapad on his chair lit up with a message from one of his officers on the bridge. It was an alert that their alpha strike against the Swarm had done damage but was largely ineffective outside of thinning their numbers. Now the Mirdiff fleet was launching strike craft consisting of both bombers and fighters. His eyes glazed over the reports of allies returning fire before he made his choice.
“We will need to support the frontline units without compromising our own interference capacity,” Kleiner mused aloud.
“Battlegroup Gimel is in possession of twelve Rakiris. Enough to cover every ship there,” Miranda noted, “you’re not worried about them.”
The weary admiral nodded and placed his mug by the side, “our allies will need our help- the Sodalytes are in their direct path and will undoubtedly bear the brunt of their assault. To ensure the line holds, we must support them.”
Miranda frowned, “the Sodalytes do not deserve our aid. They are a terrible people,” she wasn’t wrong. The reports they heard from their controlled territories in Corona horrified many and their general policies were an affront to everything the UDS stood for.
But Kleiner knew that every ship counted for this war. And while he would gladly leave the Sodalytes to die in other circumstances, the stakes were too high now. If they burn, they will all burn together, “send a message to Commodore Franklin. Have Gimel move upwards to join the frontline and provide as much point defence they can. In the meantime, open hangars forty to fourty-five. Deploy every fighter and interceptor available within them and have them advance to reinforce Gimel. The line must hold.”
His orders done, he began to do the duty of relaying them to the communications officer. He typed up a quick report and sent it to the communications team who after a moment analysing the message, began to work on sending the orders with haste. He noted that Miranda had send a general message to the entire bridge alerting them of the latest development.
Things were running smoothly for now. He hoped that this lasted.
[=][=]
Each hangar on the SSV Hyperion was designed to hold a few thousand fighters even if it stored the full complement of five monitors. This was to enable it to always be able to provide support when need be and deploy its wings of strike craft to assist its allies. This was just another procedure to many.
Thousands of strike craft, mostly fighters and interceptors, were deployed at once to assist the Gimel. Their duties were to strike at their enemy counterparts with a distinct focus on bombers-analogies.
Meanwhile, Battlegroup Gimel mostly consisted of frontline brawlers yet it had twelve Rakiri-class corvettes- these ships were built primarily to provide Point Defence fire against enemy fighters and missiles. However they needed to reach thir allies first. And so Gimel began to move forward, not enough to compromise its position and leave a hole in the formation but enough so that it would be close enough to lend its point defence aid to their allies. Soon, the Hyperion’s own wings would arrive to bolster support.
Authority permeated space.
Space permeated authority.
Nohito, the Gyokuza-Pattern: the fleet of five-hundred. Each was a separate and singular entity, bound by invisible flashes of gamma bursts and made segregated by the inherent vastness of space. There were defense patterns, and destroyer patterns, and battleship patterns, and battlecarrier patterns, and launch patterns. The ships were nearly impossible to distinguish in function, however. Some were simply smooth orbs, complemented by auxiliary balls which opened thrust vanes like trypophobic mosaics. Some, mostly at the front, were angled and severe parabolas - with domes of thrust at the rear complemented by backwards inlets carved into them as if they had been punctured. Some had multiple balls blobbed together.
All were inscrutable. Chrome. Silent.
Scan.
Assess.
The Sodalyte fleet became animate all at once, a wall of gamma-constellations erupting between the disparate vessels as they rapidly coordinated data, sensor readouts, and timers. The machines' surfaces rippled, giving way to fathomless collections of dark spheres dotted across their surfaces in great weaves. These grew multi-barrels or single-barrels or eerie spikes, and thrust themselves out from their masters' personal, magnetized oceans as if they were the hairs of some twisted imagining. They swirled on the ships' surfaces in an alien way, giving rise to larger turrets with spiral-bound barrels and great, evil lances and pulsating cooling-spools like flowing hair or cilia.
Scan.
Assess.
From the Sodalyte vessels, nebulae of black ferrofluid exploded up from freakish pores in their surfaces, swirling around them in aggressive, alien clouds and walls. More orbs floated up from their masters, joining the outer seas and chaining and weaving into little-storms of condensed countermeasures. More chaff still flowed from them, developing into minefields of tiny, shaped nuclear charges that armed and primed and eagerly awaited their chances. They hunched there in a violent, noiseless tempest of their own making, the inscrutable fibres of death laced across their surfaces stood end-to-end with the facsimile of seething, frothing anticipation and bloodlust.
Scan.
Assess.
Engage.
One moment, the ships were still. The next, great instruments of death longer than most of their hulls sprung and unfolded from their seas of liquid armor. The things-which-should-have-been-spinal-weapons erupted in bursts of violence as vortices swirled to make way in their defensive storms, letting loose a shocking torrent of rail-and-laser-and-coilgun-and-chemical death. From any distance, it merely looked as if the Sodalyte fleet had let off a set of glittering shimmers within their black shrouds—and then the aftershocks came screaming after it.
From those fielding them, an umbrella of ten thousand objects swelled at blistering speed from the formation. These grew and distended and unfolded: presenting four long limbs, and single, spherical heads, and arrays of hateful, brutal weapons strapped to their bodies in personal arsenals. These Pseudo-Standing Weapons rose between twelve and eighteen meters tall, unfurling great spikes from their backs and matching pairs at either hip. They grouped into formations, merging their weapons with their overlong fingers, and paused, receiving data from the greater coalition fleet and the Sodalytes. The swarm stood still, calculating vectors, and then...
Comets.
Set apart from the vomit of missiles and the hail of torpedoes from the rest of the Sodalyte fleet, they looked stunningly like comets. They accelerated with such vicious glee that any living thing within them should have been liquefied regardless of any measures—with such mad abandon that one could literally see them as they streaked across the night sky, straight toward intercepts with the Mirdiff's own Standing Fighters.
Nohito/The Gyokuza-Pattern/The Fleet continued their same routine, all the while.
Scan.
Assess.
Repeat.