[Starhawk]

2438.0 The Difficult Decisions
Admiral William Ross of the 3rd subjugation fleet sat in disgrace on his bridge, no one could have expected the Mantis navy to mobilize over a hundred ships so quickly to counter his operations in Corellian but they had, and in a matter of a month had destroyed all three of the other worlds that his fleet had fought for and killed over three hundred million of their own citizens in order to deny them to the Empire.
It had been decided by the Imperial command that the 3rd fleet had failed its mission and that there was no point continuing operations in that region of space, no one could blame him for that but still somehow Ross felt the failure like a ton of bricks on his back, not only had he suffered the heaviest casualties in any single engagement in decades but now he had to make even that costly victory nothing more then ash as he ordered his fleet for the warp point into the Risa system where the warp point back to Lacerta would be opened for his fleet to get out, and then it would be closed for decades at least so that the fabric of space in Lacerta would be safe.
“GFG sails set, warp jump in five seconds, system transition in ten….all hands brace for jump.” The ship’s sailing master’s voice echoed throughout the corridors of the Damocles as the swirling blue warp point grew on the screen, of course the warp point was actually invisible in real space but thanks to Icaran technology the ship’s sensors bombarded the warp point with particles that made it visible to the ship’s visual sensors which then translated the data into a simulated image of what a warp point “looked like”.
For a moment time seemed to freeze as the ship’s sails pulled her into the warp point, then the typical blueish green flash that followed initial pull, all of these Ross knew well but then as the ship returned to N-Space something that hadn’t happened to him in years happened……jump shock, pure bred jump shock which rendered several of his bridge crew, most of whom hadn’t even been born when jump shock was still “just a part of the job” into vomiting quivering masses on the deck.
“What the hell happened Sailing master!?” Ross bellowed as the nausea subsided
“I don’t know sir a massive shockwave followed us through the warp point….” The sick looking sailing master whimpered as he clutched his stomach for a moment as it recovered from the initial shock.
“Sir I’m getting hails from all over the fleet, they all are reporting similar cases of jump shock and a massive energy reading that the sensors recorded during warp jump.” The com officer- a young Spartan man- didn’t even look flustered by the jump shock as he listened intently to the messages pouring in from the 3rd fleet’s startled officers.
“Send a probe back through that warp point before we proceed on to Lacerta.” Ross kept his voice calm and level as he watched his crew quickly bounce back into their duties, and others cleaning up the decks with embarrassed looks. Ross hid a sigh, modern warships never bothered giving out the jump shock injections that he had during his days aboard the old destroyer Enterprise because the newest GFGs rendered jump shock a thing of the past, now the most you got was a slight quirk in your stomach as the ship returned to normal space.
“Admiral! Something’s wrong sir, the probe isn’t showing anything in Corellian anymore, no sun, no planets, nothing!” The tactical officer looked up from her console, clearly shocked by the readings the probe was giving back.
Ross felt his heart race for a moment as he suddenly realized what that shockwave must have been “Run a scan for debris, large asteroid fields that weren’t there before and also….run a reading for thorodon particles.”
A moment passed before the tactical officer looked up from her sensors again “Large amounts of asteroids in system, positive readings for thorodon particles.”
“What are thorodon particles Admiral?” Captain Palmer asked from across the bridge as she put aside a flexi that one of her officers had handed her.
“Thorodon particles, captain, are used in the construction of Anderman Nova bombs, our own nova weaponry leaves behind a nebulae because of the materials used, however the Anderman use thorodon particles in order to completely destroy the system and leave behind nothing but asteroids where once large planets had been.” Ross said grimly as he looked around his bridge and saw the stunned looks on his crew’s face, they had escaped a sun going nova by barely a minute and more then that the fact that the Anderman would kill over five billion Mantis citizens, not to mention destroy 75 warships in the process seemed utterly unbelievable, and it’s implications would likely be felt for years to come.

Birth of a Fleet:
The 5th fleet formation ceremony had been a grand and spectacular affair with dozens of nobles and thousands of commoners and naval personnel turned out to watch the spectacle as the fleet’s massive warships did a flyby in formation. The 5th fleet had officially been formed under Admiral Maria White however in truth for the time being her fleet had no infantry regiments and less then 60 warships, the reason they were formed this soon however was simple, the Riots in Zeerzinbroduch had to end and so the 5th fleet would escort a large transport with 2,000 State Security soldiers in system to put down the rioters.
In reality the 5th fleet would not see combat for at least a year as it must wait for the two infantry regiments currently assigned to their flag to finish training. But once they did the 5th subjugation fleet would join the battle against the Anderman and their allies and sweep aside a path to glory for the Icaran Empire!

Return of a Hero
Admiral Lady Yu Lin Ross and her Home Fleet returned to the Norvor system as Heroes of the Empire, they had pacified Torque with minimal losses to both sides and now waited in orbit of Icara for their next assignment, which would come in a matter of months and which they all knew would be the subjugation of the remaining enemy colonies within the Empire, as well as pacifying the Xeno populace that was still rioting and holding “pro-equality” demonstrations.

The Choices of Poltiics:
Praetor Rodrick the second sat alone in his massive bedroom sipping at a glass of brandy and reading over yet another report, his heart wasn’t in it this time however as he had just given the two hardest orders of his life, he had been forced to order the 3rd fleet into what many would consider disgrace by leaving their post and just this morning he had declared the entire former Christirian republic “expendable” along with the estimated 30 billion people who lived on those worlds. The navy had been ordered not to send any reinforcements or evacuation transports and all communications had been ordered restricted to military and government officials to ensure no riots ensued because of the orders….and all because there were simply not enough warships and troops to devote to the Anderman alliance and to protect the remaining worlds of the former republic.
However Rodrick had ordered the construction of Defender class starbases in orbit of whatever worlds could sustain them, so that they’d have at least some defense against the Mantis fleet that had been taking out former republic worlds one by one.