Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

Original is hard. Creative, not so hard.

Personally, I'd shoot for creative and just be really happy at anything that happened to be original.

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

Well put, mousey-wousey.

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

Thank you, human bean.

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

OK, given that I'm away from home at the moment, I don't want to write up TOO much, since all my notes & reference material is 3000km away and as such inconsitencies and plot holes would likely result, but I figure I've left you poor guys in suspense about what that boom was for a couple months, and that just ain't nice. So here ya go!

After extraditing himself from Alice, Kagan rose and surveyed the chaos all around them. People, as they do when the universe is not so kind as to provide forewarning before it does something unusual, were running quickly back and forth, although aside from managing a quite heroic amount of arm waiving, it wasn’t entirely clear what, if anything was being accomplished. Some semblance of order was restored as a few began to realize that not everyone had gotten back up, and various people began attending to the wounded. The semblance of order was quickly shattered, however, as a great number of people realized exactly how badly, or rather, how gruesomely, some of their fellows had been injured. This caused a great many people to hastily depart from the promenade, ostensibly having decided they’d much rather waive their arms somewhere much further away. It is worth noting at this point that having a Traxian knife-stand fall on you holds the record as the fourth messiest way to die in the universe. This holds little relevance to the story at hand, aside from explaining why Alice glanced down and said, “Ewwww!” This was followed shortly by, “Smoke. Smoke is bad in space.”
Kagan followed her gaze to the other side of the promenade and one floor up, where smoke was indeed drifting lazily out from one of the corridors. Without a second thought, he charged forward, nimbly weaving between the wounded and crowds of arm-waivers. As he neared the far side of the promenade, genetically and technologically enhanced muscles flexed, and he hurled himself up into the air, landing heavily at the entrance to the smoking corridor. He had just enough time to reprimand himself for being thoughtless enough to leave Alice behind to muddle up the stairs, and turn halfway around before she landed nimbly beside him.
“We’re going to talk about this later,” he said, eyeing her warily.
“Won’t help,” she informed him. “Don’t know.”
Kagan made a noise that perfectly transmitted his doubt on that particular subject, along with the slight sense of worry that she might be telling the truth, before the two of them jogged down the corridor. It wasn’t long before they came across someone who obviously knew something important, since he was busying himself with exhorting people to keep moving, and reminding them that despite evidence to the contrary, there was nothing to see here. Kagan caught a glimpse of his name-bade and raced up to him.
“Corporal Jonestown, report!” he barked authoritatively.
The young corporal snapped immediately to stiff attention. “Admiral Kagan, Sir!” he bellowed with such enthusiasm that Kagan had to suppress a wince. “There’s been an explosion, Sir! Berth 117A, Sir!”
“At ease, Corporal,” Kagan said, rubbing his right ear. Then in a more conversational tone asked, “What else do we know?”
Jonestown relaxed –slightly- and replied, “Not a lot sir. The Barinas –the freighter- was on final docking maneuvers when there was an explosion. Looks like something in one of the docking clamps blew, shot the clamp out like a kinetic warhead. It must of hit the Barinas’ main grav-thrust array, I don’t know that for sure, but she dropped all the way down to Tango deck.”
Kagan winced openly. That was a drop off a little over one hundred meters and probably hadn’t left much of the freighter intact. Or of Tango deck for that matter.
“Sabotage?” he inquired quietly.
“Well…. That hadn’t occurred to me sir, but now that you mention it, there isn’t anything in the docking clamps that can explode. You don’t think-“
“Admirals don’t think, Corporal,” Kagan interrupted. “We have people who are much better at it to do it for us. Give me a dump of the bay’s sensor logs and I’ll have my people take a look at it.”
“Aye, sir.” Jonestown’s fingers flicked across his handpad and a second later there was a beep from Kagan’s pocket indicating a successful transmission.
“Keep up the good work, Jonestown,” said Kagan as he jogged off.
“Admiral?!” Alice exclaimed as soon as they were out of earshot. “You’re an admiral?”
“Not any more,” was the reply.
“But he-“
“Sometimes, when everything has just gone horribly horribly wrong, people just want someone else to take charge, and they’re usually not to particular about who it is, at least, not until later.”
“Oh,” Alice said, the simple expression coming out far to thoughtfully for anyone’s liking.
“This, by the way,” Kagan pointed out. “Is why we should be running faster.”

A few minutes later, Corporal Jonestown was still basking in the glow of having met the legendary Admiral James Kagan, and even better, the admiral had known his name! Jonestown’s mind was running through the impressive list of accomplishments the admiral had racked up over the years until it hit the most recent event, namely the admiral’s honorable discharge at the end of the war. Jonestown turned back to the direction the admiral had disappeared and slowly uttered the immortal catchphrase of the duped.
“Wait a minute…”

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

Nice. Of course it only replaces the suspense with more suspense...

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

Suspencefull Suspence!

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

Thanks. As a matter of reference, it's about the size of the Serenity, and while that means nothing to those of you who haven't seen Firefly or Serenity, tough. Watch 'em both, you won't regret it.

Now, I've got a lovely treat for you all today, more story, AND another picture. Who loves ya? BTW, the pic isn't the finished version, which will be unveiled at the appropriate time, but can anyone tell me how to get rid of those 'stripes' on the rear section of the ship?

And now, the next installment!

Kaelan O’Shea stretched comfortably in his destroyer’s control chair. A small smile teased his lips as he allowed his mind to wander back towards the delightful young midshipwoman he’d encountered on McArthur’s fine, shiny station. As his mind slithered about the memories of their time together, the warm tingle of love spread through his body, starting in his belly and slowly spreading out towards his limbs, ending with a pleasant tingle in his fingertips. Of course, he reflected as he reached behind his chair, the warm glow might have less to do with love, and more to do with the case of Guinness he’d liberated from McArthur. Those Ruskies, he decided as he cracked open a can that had changed remarkably little in over 30,000 years, had absolutely no business hoarding that much fine brew. It just wasn’t right. As he poured the can carefully into a well-used glass, his shipboard detection system began beeping quietly.
“Ye can wait,” he informed it as he gazed intently at the glass, waiting for the perfect moment to complete the two-part pour. Completely unfazed, his ship to beep, albeit slightly more insistently. “I said ye can bloody well wait!” he snapped at it. Taking no heed of the alarm’s increasing volume, he completed his pour and set it in his chair’s armrest to settle. “Now, what’s all the commotion about?” he inquired placatingly as he slid his command chair forward to the control panel. “Oh,” he said as his eyes swept the sensor readouts. “Well now that’s hardly good now is it?”

The Defiant was a decommissioned Revolution-class destroyer, one of the newer models the Empire had produced before the end of the war, and the haughty title bestowed on her class was not undeserved. The Revolution-class was markedly faster and more maneuverable, while still boasting significantly heavier weapons, shields and firepower than any of her predecessors. Of course, all of the decommissioned ships in the fleet had had their power plants, shields, armor and weapons stripped out, since the Navy was hardly going to release it’s most advanced equipment to the general public. That being said, if one knew the right people, it was quite possible to grease a few palms in the now cash-strapped Navy to have all of the above –save weapons, unfortunately- put back in. Which had been the second thing O’Shea had done after acquiring the Defiant. The first thing had been to have a Navy quartermaster sign off on the forms stating that all power plants, shields, armor and weapons had been stripped from the ship. He’d also managed to pull a few strings and have his ship fitted with the Komsa-class reconnaissance destroyer’s sensor suite. Which is why his ship was beeping at him far before any ship his size should have been able to see the light cruiser and two corvettes bearing down on him on a direct intercept course. O’Shea sat and watched the three blips moving steadily closer to him, though any ship moving on a course that direct and at that speed didn’t leave much to the imagination as to their intentions. The vast majority of the Revolution-class that had been decommissioned had found new employment as courier ships. Stripped of their weapons and magazines, they had a surprising amount of empty space to them and shipping companies had been eager to buy them up to use as high-speed transports to deliver valuable, time-critical goods across the Empire. This of course, made them a tempting target for pirates, and the three ships heading towards him seemed to be following the standard (and successful) tactics for capturing a speedy prey. Even with commercial power plants, the Revolution-class were still extremely fast ships, but even the fastest ships need time to accelerate, so the usual intercept was to use a light cruiser with a powerful sensor rig to pick targets from outside their own range, then build up enough speed before being noticed to make any attempts at evasion completely futile.

From his readouts, it was readily apparent to O’Shea that the three ships barreling towards him had already built up enough speed to overtake him well before he reached the nearest jump-node, even if the pirates hadn’t been in between him and said node. Faced with the prospects of certain death if they ran, versus only probably death if they didn’t, most pilots chose the former, hoping calm co-operation would save them from having their cockpit decorated with their own intestines. But O’Shea wasn’t worried just yet. These could just be a couple fine ordinary, entirely peaceful folks who just happened to be in an extraordinary hurry. He wouldn’t know for sure until they entered what they figured to be his maximum sensory range, which wouldn’t be for another –he consulted his readouts again- eighteen whole seconds. Kaelan O’Shea amused himself by inscribing a cloverleaf pattern into the head of his pint. The reasons for his fascination with the symbol had long been lost in the mists of time, but it always drifted into his mind when things were looking grim. Nineteen seconds later, his com-screen beeped and the words

Cut your engines and drop your shields

appeared on the screen. No voice, no visual, and completely lacking in piratiness, O’Shea reflected. No ‘Arrrr!’ and not even the essential ‘Prepare to be boarded.’ Amateurs, he decided with a snort and slipped his hands around the manual controls. The one thing O’Shea had that most commercial Revolution pilots didn’t, aside from a dangerously unstable psyche, was a gleaming new set of military grade pulse cannons that had been obtained from a heavy cruiser before it was scrapped. Their power requirements should have been a bit high for the Defiant’s reactor, but that was only if one ran the reactor at it’s ‘recommended’ output settings. O’Shea brought the guns to hot standby, transmitted a quick acknowledgment to the light cruiser, then spun his ship around and fired the engines to kill his momentum, before he spared a glance at his pint. In all likelihood, a spot of rough and tumble was about to ensue, he mused, and while there was little doubt about anything else in his mind, he didn’t much care for the drink’s odds of survival. Which only left one option. Grabbing his custom-made throttle control in one hand, and the pint in the other, he downed the whole thing in one go, tossed the glass out the cockpit door and slammed the throttle to full power. The Defiant leapt towards her pursuers, and immediately more and more severe threats began to pour across his com-screen. He let out a chuckle at one particularly virulent message which he deemed colourful enough to warrant his reply of, ‘Well, I’m definitely not gonna play nice now.’

He drew closer, accelerating all the time and making a beeline for the two corvettes, who decided they didn’t want to get any closer to a ship piloted by someone quite so suicidal and broke away from the light cruiser to set up an attack run –exactly as he’d hoped they would. A flick of a switch brought his weapons to full power, and his first salvo sliced through the cruiser’s shields to score direct hits on its sensor array. As he pealed off to set up another run, the first corvette fell victim to his cleverly hidden ventral-mounted auto-cannons, while the second was unfortunate enough to discover that, being swivel mounted, his pulse cannons could also fire backwards. The light cruiser managed to get her secondary sensors up and running and O’Shea chortled merrily as his ship flitted between interceptor bolts and point-defense beams. A single strafing run reduced the destruction being directed at him to a rather boring level. He executed a snap turn that would have made the most stringent flight instructor proud and loosed a disruptor missile (something good folk outside the military weren’t even supposed to know about). The missile struck home, and quite it’s power plants died and it’s guns spluttered out. O’Shea brought his destroyer in uncomfortably close to the light cruiser’s bridge and thumbed a com switch.
“Don’ bother tryin’ to fix it,” he said conversationally. “It ain’t ever startin’ again. Now,” he continued after a few seconds pause to let his words sink in. “Here’s what’s gonna happen…”

Within an hour, the Navy heavy cruiser Rawson arrived on the scene and took the pirate crew into custody. O’Shea was not unhappy to learn that a few of them had been daft enough to resist arrest and gotten themselves splattered all over a bulkhead or two. O’Shea shook his head ruefully as the Rawson’s extremely cute com officer relayed the news to him. Anyone who argued with an angry Marine in two and a half meters of powered battle armor had to be an amateur. He even stuck around for a few hours, but only in case the Rawson had to depart for some reason before the tug arrived to tow the damaged cruiser, and had absolutely nothing to do with the two hours he spent flirting with her com officer. Once all three ships had safely departed towards the nearest jump-node, he brought his ship back on course and continued along at cruising speed. Nine hours later, he was setting up his jump trajectory when a spike on one of his sensor displays indicated another ship was about to make transit to normal space. It was a fairly large spike, so he slowed the Defiant to give the new arrival plenty of room. Strictly speaking it wasn’t necessary, there was more than enough room at a jump-node for several dozen ships to simultaneously jump in and out, and since sensors could read into normal space from null-space, any exiting ship would have more than enough time to adjust their course in the extremely unlikely event of a collision hazard. Still, it was a courtesy that spacers extended to each other, and O’Shea waited patiently for the other ship to complete transit. Which occurred roughly ten seconds later, and O’Shea’s jaw dropped.

Pointing out his cockpit window and with the sort of indignation that could only be mustered following the consumption of a heroic amount of alcohol, he demanded, “What the hell is that?”

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

Very nice story; thanks for writing it.

Do I detect some Terry Pratchett influence? If not, you should read his stuff. Methinks you might like it.

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

Thanks. There probably is some Terry Pratchett influence there, along with some Douglas Adams. I just like the way the English write.

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

I'm really enjoying it. It's the characters that make it work so well.

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

Yes, definately an engaging story. You know, eventually you are gonna have to answer the question. "What the hell is that?" I want to know!

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

By the way, you wanted stripes removed. Check the attachment. Is that the right part?

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

Yay! I thought I was crap at characters. Victory is mine!

Ah, don't worry, all will be revealed in time. Although I think that question will be getting asked a few more times yet. More to come tomorrow in all likelihood.

Edit: Oh, & for those of you wondering what the Taurens are flying around in, here's a pic of the Tauren battle cruiser of the same class that went bye-bye along with the Narf System.

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

Oooooohhh... shiny!

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

Tis indeed. I was just sneaky and used it backwards. Thanks very much for the part, it looks a damn sight better than before. Think I might have to name a star system after you. Course, that's not always the honour it should be. Just ask Narf. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/images/smilies/wink.gif


I like shiny.

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

If you are gonna name a star for me name it Fisher's Star or something like that. The JA part is just my first and middle initials http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...ies/tongue.gif

Also, If you would like, I can show you how to remove stripes and stuff from your DoGA parts. If you have any chat programs we can talk there or if you visit the #SpaceEmpires channel on IRC I am there a lot. It's just easier to explain stuff in "real time".

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

Cool. I'm on MSN with fairly regular frequency, just look for Agent_Zero(at)hotmail.com. And don't bother sending emails to that address, since I use it purely for MSN so I can stick it on forums & stuff & not care about the vast quantities of spam that get sent my way, but I won't be dropping by #SpaceEmpires until I'm back in Ireland. What timezone are you in, BTW?

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

I was thinking about doing a little bit of political intrigue next, but I've been reading War of Honor, and I'm SICK of intriuge in general, especially the political kind. So what does that leave?

That's right, we're blowin' some s*** up!

The seven-ship destroyer squadron screamed towards their target at speeds best not thought about, their parade-perfect formation suddenly exploding into a fiendishly complex, yet perfectly choreographed evasive maneuver as their entered the enemy’s energy weapons range. Like steel hummingbirds, they flitted around the streams of death being hurled their way, but unlike any bird, these Cumana class hunter-killers were carrying state-of-the-art shaped antimatter warheads designed specifically to take down ships much bigger than them. Closing from outside their target’s missile envelope to within reach of their short-range ordnance, their reformed formation for a split second to simultaneously launch their payloads before wheeling around to set up and new attack run. Only three of them survived the launching maneuver, but these three formed up with another shattered squadron and howled back into the jaws of death.

“Hard port! Missile control, FIRE!”
Admiral Nelson Esperance gripped the his command chair tightly as his ship’s overstressed compensators didn’t quite manage to cope with the strain of his helmsman’s perfectly executed snap turn. The maneuver swung his ship clear of the incoming missile salvo just long enough for the Renown’s point-defense turrets to deal with them, but also aligned her broadside with the ship that had launched them, and Nelson felt his chair shudder as she belched a full broadside towards- whatever that thing was.

It had popped out of hyperspace thirty-two minutes earlier, and the Renown’s sister ship, the Repulse, along with the Heroic, an orbital shipyard and three incomplete had died in that first hellacious salvo. Nelson had lost half his carriers and two cruiser squadrons to those massive spinal mounted beam cannons before he’d gotten his command out of range. Whatever could be said about it’s firepower, the juggernaut was neither fast nor maneuverable and Nelson hadn’t had much trouble keeping his ships outside of it’s energy weapon’s range and away from it’s deadly front end while they peppered it with incessant missile barrages. Yet after over twenty minutes of bombardment they still hadn’t even managed to put a hole in the colossal ship’s shields, and it’s missiles hadn’t stopped killing his ships. Just as the admiral allowed the despairing thought that they might lose this battle through attrition alone, the Renown’s extremely pretty com officer gave him a spark of hope.
“Sir, Tanzia reports enemy shield penetration! Aft grid, section seven,” Lieutenant Rebecca Morse reported excitedly.
“Thank you, lieutenant,” was all Nelson managed to say to her before a direct missile hit and the inevitable overloads blew out her station and hurled her clear across the bridge. He was vaguely aware of shouts for medics, the acrid smoke drifting into his nostrils and the smell of burnt human flesh, but none of that was terribly important as his focus turned to the red hole showing in that bastards shield layers. He reached out and opened a com-link to the only ships that had so far been not involved in the battle.
“Carrier command,” he said grimly. “You have a go for launch.”

The surviving members of Nelson’s carrier group still represented a formidable fighting force, each one capable of launching upwards of three hundred fighters in a single wave, and now thousands poured into space and bore down on their single target like angry dogs unleashed, determined to avenge their fallen comrades. They approached the colossus in neat, orderly formations that would be the dream of any point-defense operator, but seconds before they entered into range, the dream turned into a nightmare as the squadrons split apart into a chaotic, swirling cloud rushing forwards, and a split second later, everything got a whole lot worse as the ECM drones accompanying the fighters activated their full range of decoy systems. And right about the time when any point-defense operator would be thinking it couldn’t get any worse, every single fighter fired as one, their tiny payloads fired at an angle that slid three quarters of them in underneath their target’s shield layer to detonate all across the armored hull of the warship, doing little damage to the armor, but stripping off turrets and guns and melting shut missile tubes. The other quarter were targeted at a single point on the giant’s hull barely a meter square, and no material ever made could withstand the furnace of pure destruction. Armor melted and sizzled away into space as warhead after warhead slammed into it until finally it gave, and the remaining missiles slammed through the unprotected hull, and the resulting explosions blew away a massive chunk of the goliath’s aft armor.

“Well,” Admiral Nelson Esperance as a truly evil smile spread across his face. “Looks like our little friends have gone and made us a nice little blind spot. Signal the rest of the fleet, focus all fire at that hole and close to energy range.”
The unknown ship twisted and turned desperately as Nelson’s fleet closed on it’s gaping wound, but it was too big, and Nelson’s ships too fast and they bore down on it, firing endless streams of missiles which continued to widen the hole the fighters had made. Then the fleet entered energy range, and almost as one began to pour vengeful fire into their wounded adversary. The Renown and the other heavier ships slowed to maintain optimal firing range for their massive forward armaments, while the lighter ships closed the distance to use their more powerful short range weapons. Nelson was just beginning to ask himself exactly how much more punishment this thing could absorb when a massive explosion erupted from the center of the ship and split her right across her breadth. The forward section began to rotate away from the other as momentum carried it away, and then suddenly, the battle cruiser Hogart scored a direct hit on something important and the entire aft section detonated in a massive explosion that smashed the forward section into pieces and –Nelson grimaced- took the Hogart out with her. A ragged cheer went up on the Renown’s bridge as her sensor’s swept across the expanding debris field that had once been their enemy, followed by a slowly spreading silence as the survivors began to realize how much their victory had cost them.
“Well now,” Nelson said conversationally as he settled back into his chair. “Would someone explain to me, exactly what the hell WAS that?”



Edit: Realized I hadn't posted the Raezel yet.

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

Weeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee!

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

great stuff!

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

It's a baseship!

Well, he wanted an explanation.

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

Hush, little mouse, don't go giving away secrets. Oh, wait. It's not a baseship so no secrets are being divulged. Victory, once again, is mine!
But for those of you who want to know what the big nasty was before Nelson & Co. went and blew it up, check out the attatchment.

Oh, and a wee question as well. On one particular Doga model, when I try to load it, the program just exits and restarts at the little start up screen. Every other model I have is fine, and this one isn't even the biggest or most complex one, but I wanna work on it and I can't.

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

Oh, and also, MORE!

“Someone,” Kagan said grimly from behind his desk. “Was trying to kill me.”
“Hmmm?” Alice replied, having just entered the room.
Kagan looked up at her. It must be getting late, he realized, since she was already in her nightgown, though experience told him there wouldn’t be anything under it. “Someone tried to kill me,” he repeated as she crossed the ready room floor and plunked herself comfortably into his lap.
“Who?” she asked. “Why? How? And possibly, when?”
“Well, if I may answer your questions in reverse order,” he said, making the question a statement as he slipped a hand inside her gown to rest it easily on her bare hip. “This morning, when we were docking, the docking clamp that blew was supposed to kill me. As for why-“
“But the explosion wasn’t in our berth,” Alice interrupted.
“No,” Kagan admitted. “But it was in the berth we were supposed to be in, and that would have been determined as soon as they received our flight plan, which would have been a couple days ago, and who’s due to dock where is available to the public. Hell, they’ve got big screens in the arrivals area announcing arrivals for the next thirty-six hours. That’d give anyone who wanted to do us in more than enough head start. The freighter that took our berth was a last minute thing, unplanned, unforeseen. Shouldn’t have happened.”
“OK,” Alice agreed slowly. “But that explosion took out their main grav-thingy, right? That seems like a good way of doing someone in to me.”
“Admittedly, from the outside, it looks like good old-fashioned terrorism, but look at this.” With his free hand he entered a command into the desktop information console and a wireframe simulation of the docking area and the freighter entering from the top right of the screen. Two minutes and thirty-seven seconds into the recording, one of the docking clamps shot forward, and the simulation tracked it’s progress through the ship as a list of the freighter’s damaged and destroyed sections scrolled down the left hand side of the screen.
“Now, look what would have happened if it had been the Daedalus coming in.”
The simulation reset, and began to play again, this time with the Daedalus coming in from the top right using standard docking protocols. Two minutes and thirty-seven seconds in, the same clamp shot forward and the simulated damage to the ship scrolled up on the left. “See,” said Kagan tapping the screen where ‘Bridge’ was listed in the blood red indicating total destruction. “ I’ve run the simulation a hundred different ways, checked every single approach vector and variation in speed, and exactly what ends up getting destroyed is always different. Except-“ he said, turning off the console with an irritated slap. “For the bridge. That gets destroyed every single time, without exception. On the other hand, if that freighter had been traveling a bit faster or slower, or the explosion went off three seconds earlier or later, she would have survived it with minimal damage.”
“So if no matter what, our bridge would have been destroyed by the explosion,” Alice said slowly as she rolled the thought around in her mind. “But there’s only a very small margin for error for it to destroy the freighter, then that alone suggests that it was meant for us. So someone’s trying to kill us.”
“Not us, me,” Kagan said softly. “No one knows you’re here, so whoever it was, was after me.”
“But who would want to kill nice you?”
Kagan slumped back in the chair with a wry smile. “You got a few hours? We should probably get moving,” he added as he made to rise, but Alice pushed him back in the chair.
“In the morning,” she said firmly. “You’re far to distracted right now, anyway?”
“Distracted?” Kagan frowned. “By what?”
Her reply took the form of a raised eyebrow and a nightgown sliding to the floor.
“Oh. Jakers,” he murmured.

The following morning, the two extremely relaxed crewmembers of the Daedalus set about prepping the ship for launch, and within half an hour they’d received launch clearance from Kolis Control and were easing out of the docking berth. Once clear Kagan turned the helm over to Alice, partly for the practice, partly to get her mind off the fact that someone willing to kill thousands for a chance at killing one person was somewhere out there, looking for him.
“Set a course for Perth Nine, Victoria System,” he instructed her. “I’ve got a few friends there who might be able to shed some light on who wants me dead.”
With flawless precision, Alice brought the Daedalus into the queue for Edward’s Gambit’s outbound jump gate and fifteen minutes later, they were in null-space, enroute to what would hopefully be some answers. Who to ask, that was the question, he mused. He had many contacts on the Perth Nine system, having started operating the Daedalus from there at the end of the war. Not to mention saving it from being destroyed by a Tauren assault fleet during the war. That had to be worth a favour or two. And if all else failed, well-
The bridge lurched suddenly and Kagan was nearly knocked clear of his chair as a sloppy null-space band switch rocked the ship.
“Careful!” he snapped angrily.
“Sorry,” Alice cringed. “I’m still getting the hang of this.”
“Sorry,” he apologized in turn. “Having people try to kill me makes me cranky.”
“Ego, Mr. Kagan, ego,” a dry voice chuckled behind him. “What makes you think this has anything to do with you?”
Kagan spun out of his command chair, drawing his side arm as he did so to bring it up pointing squarely between the voice’s owner’s eyes.
“What the holy hell are you doing on my ship?” he snarled.
The owner of the voice, a shaved-bald man in a black trench coat and black sunglasses standing in the entrance to the bridge, smiled serenely at him. “You may address me as Fourteen,” he said calmly. “And I must commend you on your reaction time. Still keeping to the old military training regiment, hmmm?”
“I didn’ ask ye wha yer frackin’ name was,” Kagan growled, reverting unconsciously to his native accent. “I asked wha te frak yer doin’ on me ship!”
“Oh, dear. We really should have left yesterday,” Alice said quietly. “Sorry.”
“It’s no’ yer-“
“Actually,” Fourteen interrupted. “I’ve been aboard since you disembarked onto Kolis Station, so it wouldn’t have made much of a difference when you left. Although I must say, that was quite a performance you put on last night. Wore me out just watching.”
If looks could kill, the one Alice bestowed on Fourteen would have been enough to wipe out his entire bloodline, ancestors and descendents included. Her mouth opened to say something, but Fourteen’s attention would brought back to Kagan by the sound of an energy cell dumping into a capacitator as Kagan thumbed off the safety on his weapon.
“Scuze me,” Kagan grated. “But ye still haven’ explained wha’ yer doin’ on me ship. Now if I don’ get an answer soon, then whether yer intentions are honourable or not’ll be somethin’ fer God te decide. Am I makin’ meself nice an’ clear to ye?”
“Perfectly,” Fourteen replied with that same sereneness. “My associates and I-“ he gestured by spreading both hands out in front of him, and a dozen black-clad men appeared as they deactivated personal cloaking devices, and two of them seized Alice firmly. “-are merely here to collect the girl and bring her to our superiors for questioning. After which she, and whatever is left of her mind, will be returned to you if you so desire.”
“Not. Bloody. Likely,” Kagan replied through gritted teeth.
“Now Mr. Kagan,” Fourteen said reasonably. “There’s really no need for violence. Nor any point, since you are clearly outnumbered.”
“Well,” Kagan said with a defeated sigh. “I ‘spose… Well I ‘spose we’ll have to jus’ agree te disagree ‘bout tat.” No sooner had the last syllable escaped his lips than his finger tightened on the trigger and a blot of light leapt out at Fourteen. It struck him square in the forehead, causing him to flicker slightly, before carrying on to splash harmlessly against a corridor wall.
“Frackin’ hologram?” Kagan muttered with disbelief shortly before something decidedly unholographic slammed into the back of his head and he hit the deck face down, hard. He managed something approaching a, “Gurk,” as he turned his head towards Alice, while the rest of his muscles refused stubbornly to do what they were told. A man dressed in white stepped out from behind Fourteen and approached Alice, who began struggling fiercely the moment he produced a medical injector.
“Now relax, Ms. Montaigne,” Fourteen advised her. “The good doctor’s just going to give you a little something so you’ll sleep through the trip home.”
“No!” Alice screamed. “Not sleep! Neversleep! No! Don’t want to go!” With that last word, she threw her legs out so they were behind both of her restrainers, then thrust her arms backwards, throwing all three of them to the ground. Kagan’s eyes widened. Both of those men outweighed her by at least a factor of three, and she’d just thrown them to the ground with almost dismissive ease. The two released her as they hit the ground and she grabbed hold of the knives holster on their belts with either hand. Then, propelling herself upwards with the strength of her legs alone, she slashed her arms backwards, neatly slicing through the throats of the two on the ground. The moment she regained her vertical base she swung her around and slammed a knife into either side of the doctor’s head with astounding ease. Yanking them free, she kicked the body aside and strode towards the stun baton-armed men approaching her with grim determination.
Kagan for his part, suddenly realized that his right hand was actually quite cold. It took a split second for is mind to connect the fact that he could once again feel the gun in his hand to the fact that the effects of the stun baton had worn off. He leapt to his feet, his left hand pulling out his holdout from his ankle holster.
“A stun baton to the head is not very nice,” he informed the man who’d stuck him. “But then, neither is a plasma bolt. It’s an imperfect universe,” he reassured the fresh corpse. “Scuze me, luv,” he called out to Alice, who was busy carving her way through the seventh black-clad man. “Yer getting blood all over me floor an’ I only cleaned it yesterday.”
She stared back at him with an uncomprehending gaze, not moving except to absent-mindedly slice the throat of someone who got too close.
“Right,” said Kagan. “Well do ye understand this?” he asked irritably as he raised both weapons to point in her direction. The message got through, apparently, as she launched herself backwards through the air to land with surprising agility on the railing in front of the view screen, flexing her knees as she landed into a combat stance. The men who had been vainly attempting to subdue her now found her far out of reach with a seriously pissed off, heavily armed New Eireannman training his weapons on them. They had exactly enough time to realize that he was now the more serious threat, and begin to formulate some sort of appropriate reaction before Kagan hauled back on both triggers in full-auto mode, and he and Alice were quite suddenly the only living things on the Daedalus. Which wasn’t to say they were the only ones making any noise, Kagan thought irritably as Fourteen’s hologram piped up.
“Now that, Mr. Kagan, Ms. Montaigne, was a terribly bad idea,” he scolded, his tone finally losing some of that infuriating calm. “There are going to be consequences for this, serious, dire consequences, I’m afraid.”
Kagan, poking through the bodies, finally found the holographic transmitter on a corpse that had been thrown clear across the bridge and was backwards over the railing behind his command chair, it’s near decapitated state making it clear it had been one of Alice’s victims, though how she’d managed to throw a one hundred-plus kilogram man roughly seven meters through the air wasn’t something Kagan really wanted to think about.
“Fourteen,” he said instead in an almost friendly tone as he took aim at the transmitter. “Get te hell off me ship.” He pulled the trigger and Fourteen’s indignant protest was lost forever as the hologram disappeared back into the ether.

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

wheee!

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

/me needs to stop blowing stuff up & killing people so I get more eloquent responses than wheee! Not that I don't appreciate wheee!

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

I'm still loving it. Is there anything that girl can't do? I'm beginning to suspect she's a robot and/ or ninja and/or pirate.

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

Yes, definately a good story. It has that special something that keeps you wanting more. Alice is definately interesting. Very good imagery with her in the fight scene.

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

And in the lingerie...

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

...Was fourteen Morpheus?

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

Nope, Fourteen's white. As for Alice & her limitless abilities, well, the reason for them will be revealed in the next few parts, but unfortunately y'all are gonna have to wait about a week coz I'm gonna be visiting my sisters and then heading back to Dublin this week, so I won't have much time. But after that, oh yes, there will be writing.

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

Ah, the similiar physique was simply a coincedence. And the sunglasses. And the trenchcoat.

Good luck with your vacation.

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

maybe i should have used more e's. at least im not the one comparing characters to movies, this time.

im waiting to see how everything comes together. there seem to be a couple of seperate plot threads that are about to converge into something cataclysmic. if thats the right idea, then its a very nice buildup.

if thats not the idea, then its good misdirection for suspense building. or maybe im just dense.

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

Ah, don't mind me. Complete originality is nearly impossible.

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

Hey, my sister has a computer with internet access. Who knew? I guess 'poor' is a relative term. And yep, the sunglasses & trenchcoat are mere conincidence. Don't think I mentioned anything about Fourteen's physique, but in my mind's eye he's a bit too skinny for a Morpheus. More like a bald Neo, if one must draw a comparison. Although it's not going to matter very much soon...

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

As I was saying....


It took another seven hours of travel before they reached the jump beacon for the Victoria System, and Alice brought them smoothly in line with the Perth Nine beacon before executing a perfect null-space transit back into normal space. Twelve seconds after they made transit, the Daedalus rocked violently.
“Not my fault!” Alice cried.
“I know,” Kagan growled. “Someone’s shooting at us.”
“Oh, frack,” she replied dejectedly. “Control is yours.”
Kagan slid his hands over the control panel that moved smoothly into place as Alice transferred ship control over to him. The tactical plot showed a small, destroyer-class ship right behind them. From its approach vector, it must have exited null-space along with him. In fact, he realized grimly, it’d probably been shadowing them all the way from Kolis Station. The ship rocked again and this time the sound of rattling deck plates was accompanied by the friendly chirp of an incoming transmission. The com screen came to life at Kagan’s command to reveal the smug face of Fourteen staring back at him.
“Now, Mr. Kagan,” he said, an almost undetectable hint of rage colouring his tone. “I’m giving you one last chance to play nice. If you do not cut your speed, drop your shields and turn the girl over to me, I am perfectly willing to cut my loses and blow you out of the sky.”
“Now, now, Mr. Fourteen,” Kagan replied in exactly the same tone, but humour rather than rage coloured his tone. “I’m sure even if your instructions aren’t particular to whether dead or alive, they do at least want her in more or less one piece. I’m sure your superiors would be none too pleased if you blew your objective into tiny little pieces.”
“Actually, Mr. Kagan,” Fourteen replied tersely. “My instructions do provide for such an act if it is deemed impossible to recover her by other means. And since you so handily dispatched my retrieval team, I really don’t have any other means.”
Kagan thought about this for a long moment, then finally nodded slowly. “Alright,” he said. “Coming about and cutting engines.”
“No!” Alice shouted jumping out of her chair. “I won’t-“
“Quiet!” Kagan snapped at her. “Sit back down!”
He’d never raised his voice to her before and the shock of it hit her like a blow and she dropped back into her seat in surprise. She opened her mouth to protest again, but closed it resignedly when she recognized the expression on Kagan’s face.
“Velocity at zero, Perth Nine relative,” he informed Fourteen. “Preparing to cycle down shield layers.”
“Good, Mr. Kagan,” the other replied. “I must say you are very lucky that I’m a patient man. Most men in my position wouldn’t have given you a second chance.”
“Aye, Mr. Fourteen,” Kagan agreed. “You are indeed a patient man, and I very much appreciate that patience.”
“Thank you, Mr. Kagan,” Fourteen replied, not noticing the dangerous edge in Kagan’s voice.
“I, on the other hand, am not a patient man,” the Eireannman continued and the dangerous edge was now very obvious. “And I ran out of patience for playing nice a long time ago!” He slammed his hand down on a control lever, and the bridge suddenly filled with noise. First the high pitch whine of backup power plants coming online, then almost simultaneously the clunk of some large things detaching from the hull. This was swiftly followed by the suffering moan of hydraulics being forced to work at higher than normal speed, which was ended by the clang of some large things locking into place. No sooner had silence begun to settle on the bridge of the Daedalus than it was interrupted by a new noise, this time a screeching noise from the com system as Fourteen’s ship reacted noisily to the targeting scanners that were suddenly sweeping it. He looked out at Kagan with an expression of shock, his face bathed in red emergency lights.
“Surprise,” Kagan grinned evilly.
“There was nothing in the brief about this,” Fourteen mumbled softly.
“Fourteen,” Kagan said in an almost friendly tone. “Git te hell outta me sky.”
He depressed a single button, and eight military grade beam cannons fired as one, all but obliterating Fourteen and his ship from existence. “Now then, my love,” Kagan continued. “Would you be a dear and plot a best-time course for Perth Nine?”
“Yessir, right away, sir,” she replied merrily, and responding to her nimble fingers, the Daedalus swung back around and accelerated towards the Perth Nine shipping station.

I know, kinda a short installment this time, but it's more finishing off the last installment than starting a new one. I only really have time to write when my sister's in a class, which is only an hour at a time, hence I can't be sure when the next installment will be ready.

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

...Do all private vessels in this universe regularly carry military weapons?

Cool.

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

whe--*cough* ah, and you were threatening to cut short the portions of "blam"

good to see that you're still lighting their ducks on fire - but we do want to see what the stooorey is about, too.

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

Um, no, not as a rule. But Kagan and O'Shea are kinda exceptions to that rule. War heroes and all that.

Yeah, but I like blam, dammit! http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...ies/tongue.gif But don't worry, all will be revealed in time.

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

Wouldn't be much of a story if they didn't:

(With apologies to AZ)

The Defiant was a decommissioned Revolution-class destroyer, and as such it was completely unarmed, its once-fearsome weaponry now safely retired to a dusty shelf in some military spaceyard. Even the Komsa-class reconnaissance destroyer’s sensor suite he'd wanted, and which would have fitted perfectly into his hull, had been denied him by the law that forbade military-grade hardware being installed into civilian craft. Which is why his ship was beeping at long after it was too late to do anything about the light cruiser and two corvettes bearing down on him on a direct intercept course. O’Shea sat and watched the three blips moving steadily closer to him, though any ship moving on a course that direct and at that speed didn’t leave much to the imagination as to their intentions. A stripped-down Revolution-class like his, now employed as a cargo-laden courier ship made tempting target for pirates, and the three ships heading towards him seemed to be following the standard (and successful) tactics for capturing a speedy prey.

From his readouts, it was readily apparent to O’Shea that the three ships barreling towards him had already built up enough speed to overtake him well before he reached the nearest jump-node, even if the pirates hadn’t been in between him and said node. Seconds later, his com-screen beeped and the words

Cut your engines and drop your shields

appeared on the screen. No voice, no visual, and completely lacking in piratiness, O’Shea reflected. No ‘Arrrr!’ and not even the essential ‘Prepare to be boarded.’
"Please don't shoot," He squealed into the comm, "I'm unarmed." Long seconds dripped from the viewscreen as he awaited the reply. Suddenly, his sensors told him that the pirates had cut their acceleration, and a new message appeared on his screen:
"Actually, so are we."
"Phew!" Thought O’Shea, and returned to his pint.

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

LOL, I believe the above is an exerpt from "Hell is for People", a re-envisioning of the AZ classic "Hell is for Heroes" toned down for the excitement intollerant.

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

I thought it was the children's version, 'Heck is for Heroes', toned down for consumption by the underage. Been watching loads of children's programming with my niece the last few days and seriously, anyone raised on that junk is in for a NASTY suprise when they bang into reality. Anyway, due to the aforementioned babysitting duties, I'm not sure if I'll get around to any updates before I get back to Dublin. That's Wednesday evening, so don't expect anything new before Thursday. I'm not saying I won't try to suprise you, but don't hold your breath.

Or, do. It'll be funny, trust me.

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

I'll tell you what, I tried and it wasn't funny. So, come on and get some more writing done.

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

Bring Us More Pie!



“Frak,” murmured Alice some time later. “What the hell's that?”
Kagan glanced up at the view screen, while making a mental note to mind his mouth around the girl. She seemed to be picking up his bad habits with gleeful aplomb. “That would be Perth 9. Not the friendliest place in the galaxy, but it's where we need to be.”
Allowing Alice to busy herself with the docking maneuvers, Kagan opened up a communications link to the station. He keyed in a series of codes, then waited. Within a few seconds, a long stream of seemingly random numbers and letters filled the screen, and Kagan sat back with a sigh of satisfaction. She was here.

“Who was that?” Alice asked after the Daedalus had latched securely to the station.
“Just checking up on an old friend,” Kagan replied.
“Odd,” she muttered as she went about shutting the ship down.
“What's that?” he inquired.
“Well, the proper communications protocol for contacting someone on board the station would be seven-six-two-eight, or two-nine if they were on a ship docked with the station, but yours was nine-seven-four-six. Which like I said is odd, especially since civilian protocols stop at seven.”
“How-” Kagan stopped to allow a good frown to form. “How did you see that from there?” he asked slowly.
“Didn't see,” she informed him. “Heard. The little beeps it makes when you press a key.”
“But those beeps all sound exactly the same,” he pointed out.
“Nope,” she disagreed cheerfully. “Slight frequency difference depending on which row and what position the key is in. A one sounds like 'beep' and a nine sounds like 'beep'.”
“I couldn't tell any difference between your beeps,” said Kagan.
“No, me neither,” she agreed. “But the human vocal apparatus simply isn't designed to create such slight variations in frequency.”
“But the human ear is?”
“No, not most of them.”
Kagan's frown deepened to the point where it was in serious danger of becoming a scowl, and he turned back to the communications console and began alternating between pressing the one and the nine. After a few minutes, he resigned himself to the fact that there was no difference between the two, and that he was in love with a raving lunatic. A raving lunatic who'd also been completely right, he reminded himself. Deciding that was a conversation for another time, he tucked his sidearm into its shoulder holster and headed on to Perth 9 with Alice in tow.

The smell was the first thing one noticed upon arriving on Perth 9, and it wasn't a pleasant experience. The air was thick with the smell of unwashed bodies, vomit, excrement and other bodily products best not thought about. Greasy, filthy bodies squeezed past each other in the tight confines of the corridors, though Kagan and Alice were given some measure of space, thanks partly to Kagan's sleeveless shirt which showed off both his firearm and the long line of dates and places tattooed down his right bicep that identified him as military, and partly to the disproportionately massive sidearm Alice wore slung low off her hip.
"Why do we have to be here?" Alice inquired, trying to ignore the leers that no weapon in the galaxy would protect her from; women weren't a common sight on the station.
"Because a friend is here," Kagan replied. "Probably the only person who might know what the frack's been going on the last few days."
"What's he look like?" wondered Alice.
"She," Kagan emphasized. "Looks.... Terrifying."
"Oh. Dear," she muttered, casting her gaze around to see if anyone matched that description. Many adjectives came to mind to describe the crowd around her: Disgusting, revolting, vile, mildly disturbing, but none that could be considered terrifying, and definitely none that could be considered female.
"There," said Kagan, looking ahead.
Alice, being somewhat shorter, had to wait a moment longer for her first glimpse of Kagan's friend. The crowd suddenly parted, the slovenly workers suddenly trying to put as much distance between themselves and the woman striding purposefully down the corridor. She was tall, almost the same height as Kagan, and slender but she moved with a noticeable aura of barely restrained power, a sort of quiet lethality that Alice had to agree, was terrifying. Almost as much as her face, which was completely white except for her black lips and blacker eyes. As they drew closer, Alice realized with a sense of growing trepidation that the woman approaching them was not wearing any make up, that the disturbing mask was no mask at all, but bare skin. The woman swept her gaze across the corridor, and the filthy men filling it seemed to wither under her gaze. Alice felt a cold chill run through her as the woman's eyes fell upon her. A fearful knot tightened in her stomach, though she could think of no rational reason for it, Alice was stuck with the unshakable feeling that the eyes of Death itself were upon her.
She stopped in front of Kagan and extended her hand expressionlessly. He gripped it firmly, and the two of them pulled each other towards themselves, wrapping their free arm around the other's shoulders in a tight embrace.
"Alice, I'd like you to meet Saraea Azen," Kagan said.
Saraea nodded politely towards Alice. "A pleasure," she said.
"Eek," Alice said.

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

Woot! More Hell is for Heroes. I like it. Good imagery on the dirty, slovenly station. Hopefully your writers block has broken.

One criticism. I don't feel that you really conveyed the terrifying aspect of Saraea very well. She just didn't feel terrifying to me. I don't know if she is terrifying because of her appearance or maybe she just radiates terror or something, but a quick line or two describing what exactly makes her terrifying, maybe in the form of inner dialogue from Alice or something, would clear it up.

Hopefully we will see some more Hell is for Heroes in the NEAR future. http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/image...ies/tongue.gif

Joshua

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

Yay! Critism! I like critism. Makes for better stories, methinks. I've added a couple extra lines to better explain the terrifyingness of Saraea, and the full scope of her scariness will become apparent as the story progresses.

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

That was much better. Thank you for clarifying her terrifying demeanor.

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

Welcome....



Without another word, Kagan and Saraea turned and headed back towards the Daedalus. Alice, for her part disappeared into the crowd, reappearing to cast an apprehensive glance back at the two every time Kagan started to wonder about where she'd gotten off to. They reached the ship considerably faster than they'd left it, thanks to the wide berth the crowds continued to give Saraea, the two of them ducking slightly as they passed through the airlock door. Kagan glanced backwards, waiting for Alice to board before he sealed the doors. When she failed to materialize, he cast an anxious look up the corridor and slammed his head into the airlock door from the start of finding Alice looking back at him.

"Fracking son of a fracking frack!" he snarled. "Don't do that!"
Alice watched him impassively for a moment longer before turning the same gaze towards Saraea. "What happened to your hand?" she asked with innocent curiosity.
Saraea glanced down at her seemingly entirely flesh and blood right hand and flexed it gently. "I lost it during the Corporate Wars," she said. "How did you know?"
"When we were walking back to the ship you brushed it against a pipe that was one hundred and forty seven degrees Celsius and didn't even flinch," Alice replied. "That and the noise."
"The noise?" asked Kagan irritably, still rubbing his head. "Prosthetics make the same amount of noise as normal flesh and blood. In other words, frack all."
"No," Alice replied slowly, as if speaking to a particularly slow child. "They make noise. And her right hand makes a different noise to her left. Mechanical. Squeaky. Almost distracting." She stood still for a moment, staring off at a point in between Saraea and Kagan's bewildered faces, as if lost in deep thought. Then, she shrugged suddenly, dismissing whatever thoughts she'd been having. "No matter," she decided. "I'm filthy. Grubby men and all that. Going to shower." With that, she stripped off her admittedly reeking clothes and tossed them to Kagan. "Probably want to burn those," she advised before strolling down the corridor and disappearing around a corner.
"How does-" Saraea finally managed.
"Don't know," Kagan admitted. "I'm still trying to get passed the beeps thing."

Yolanda Powell felt something crunch beneath the sole of her armored environment suit. She froze, willing herself to look down, but far to aware of the hefty dose of sedatives it had required for her to stay in control of herself the last time something had gone crunch, and she'd glanced down to find she'd trodden on a child's skull. Eventually, she managed to force her eyes downwards and breathed a sigh of relief as they fell upon a large piece of ceramocrete poking up through the ashes. She pushed on, and soon reached the crest of the hill they'd been climbing for the last hour. She stared into the valley below, and knew without a shadow of a doubt that it was only the deadening effect of the sedatives coursing through her veins that allowed her to retain any semblance of composure as she beheld the remnants of her home. What had once been a thriving metropolitan colony, home to fifteen million souls was now nothing more than a blackened scar on the valley floor below. Everything had been reduced to soot and ash, just like everything else on the entire surface of the planet. She heard a choking sob over the comlink and turned her head to the right in time to see Lieutenant Liu crumple to her knees and press her head to the ground. Her entire family had been here, Powell knew. Grandparents, parents, husband and children, all now nothing more than ash drifting through the valley. She left Liu to the attention of Ensign Jones, knowing that in her emotionally dead state, she was more likely to make things worse for the lieutenant than she was to help. Instead, she turned her head to the left, to her Exec, Edwin O'Shea and knew she should feel guilt as she looked upon the expression of horror on his face. The sedatives she'd taken were a luxury afforded to captains only, and aside from O'Shea, no one on the ship even knew they existed.
"Why?" he whispered. "Who? How?"
"It's only the last two that concern me, Ed," Powell said grimly. "Why can wait until we've tracked down the bastards who did this and decorated their ships with the intestines of her crew."
Edwin's admonishment was cut short by a cry from Liu. "Captain!"
Powell turned to see the Lieutenant on her feet and pointing at something down in the valley. She turned the zoom on her suit's visor up to maximum and frowned at the strange object in the dust below.
"O'Shea?" she inquired.
"I know, ma'am," he said resignedly. "What the hell is that?

Kaelan O’Shea flicked a switch and the Defiant transited from the chaos of null-space into the very depths of Hell itself. Missiles and weapon fire swarmed about him and he cursed quite creatively as he forced his nimble ship to duck and weave its way to a relatively safe portion of space. It was only then that he turned his ship's powerful sensors on the maelstrom behind him.
"Well now," he said in surprise. "That just ain't right."
A massive Tauren fleet swarmed around the colossal ship Kaelan had been tracking for the last six days. Unrelenting fire poured down onto it's massive hull, and answering fire poured back just as savagely, but the unfathomably big ship continued relentlessly towards the planet ahead of it. Kaelan turned his sensors towards the planet itself, and got another less than pleasant surprise. It was inhabited, heavily so, and they energy signatures his sensors were picking up were unmistakably Tauren.
"What are you lot doing with a colony this far out?" he wondered. "And how'd you get it so big without us noticing you, hmmm?"
As he watched, an entire squadron of Tauren light cruisers bore down on the colossus, firing madly, but rather than pull out to execute another run, they continued forward and suicided themselves upon it's hull. Kaelan scowled. The Taurens were just as unlikely to perform such an act as humans, and if they were willing to take such drastic measures, they must be trying to prevent something very, very bad. He hadn't long to wait to discover what the Taurens were so desperate to avoid, as the alien vessel reached whatever range it needed to reach, and two incredibly bright, incredibly large beams of light flashed outwards and slammed into the planet. The burst lasted a mere few seconds, but the effect was devastating. A massive wave of fire plumed outwards from the epicentre of the blast and raced across the planet with incredible speed. As Kaelan stared in absolute horror, the colossus began to accelerate, it's task complete, it headed rapidly for the outer reaches of the solar system to make null-space transit. Numb with shock, Kaelan was only motivated to action by the fact that the beast was heading towards the same part of the outer reaches of the solar system that he himself was currently occupying. Acting on pure instinct, he brought his small ship around and flashed into null-space, bringing the Defiant up through the hyperspace bands a little bit faster than was really safe as he set a course back for Terran space, with only one thought running through his mind.
'What the hell was that?'

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

Nice! Super-huge mystery ship of DOOM! You have to love it. Sorry, but this time I don't have any criticisms for you. Oh, wait, yes I do. It isn't long enough. I want more.

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

Thanks, it's so nice to have a fan. Fans would be nicer, but hey, whatcha gonna do. I know it's a bit short, but that's part of my fiendish plot to break down my writer's block. Bounce quickly between threads to move the story along, then go back and flesh them out later.

BTW, any English Majors or fellow writers out there feel like being the 'editor' for the story?

Re: OT: Hell is For Heroes.
 

what am i, chopped liver? you have more S's on your Fan, they just dont always have usefull things to say.