[geoschmo]

Year 2401.8

It was not the kind of war Grandow expected. Of course he had little to go on except for the battles between nation-states on his own planet hundreds of years before. But somehow he expected more to happen. Of course it was probably a good thing that it hadn't.

Almost all of the resources of the Sallegan republic for the Last 14 months had gone towards building up defenses for the next wave of attack ships that would come pouring through the wormhole at any time. Weapons platforms had been built on both the homeworld, and Narcisston IX. And both planets had several sattelites in orbit capable of launching missles at any ship that came within range. There had not even been any effort to this point of rebuilding the research and production facilities destroyed in the original attack.

Grandow estimated that the the homeworld could survive an attack of at most half a dozen bug frigates at once. The colony less than that. Surely the bugs had that many ships, didn't they? They certainly wasted them like they had an endless supply. On two seperate occasions since the initial sneak attack they had sent lone frigates past the homeworld and attacked the smaller colony. In both cases they had been destroyed by the Drakken without getting off a shot. Once before even getting in range of the planets defensive missle batteries.

It didn't make any sense. Could it be that the Xi'Chung were as stupid as they were ruthless? Or were they just not anymore advanced than were are. If that's the case, why would they have attacked in the first place. Surely they would have built up their forces first. Grandow knew they would have to send some ships through that warp point soon. If nothing else, just to see how big the Hive was.

They had sent a ship through the southern warp point a few months before. They found a dead system with a burnt out star and nothing else but asteroids. In a more peacful time they might consider sending a ship to mine the asteroids for minerals. But they had neither the ships nor crews to spare in such mundane tasks now.

They also met ships from two new species. Obviously the scientists were wrong when they calculated the number of intelligent races out there, Grandow thought. If our little corner was typical, the galaxy must be absolutly teeming with them. Hopefully they all weren't as violent and irrational as the Xi'Chung.

The first of the two, a race calling themselves the Cue Cappa, turned out to be quite pleasant actually, and quite eager to establish trade relations. This was coming in very handy as the increased revenue was put to use rebuilding the damage to the homeworld. So far they had not expressed any interest in taking an active part in the war against the Hive, but at least they weren't attacking us too.

The second race was less open to cooperation. A worm like race, they called themselves the Amon'krie. So far they had rejected all our treaty offers, but they also had not attacked us. However one of their ships had travelled through Narcisston and disappeared through the wormhole into Xi'Chung space. No distress call was receieved, so we can only assume that they are on good terms with the Hive, or their ship was destoyed before they could make a report. Either option is troubling, Grandow thought. We shall have to watch that situation closely.

Obviously the Sallgan Republic was going to have to struggle hard if it was going to survive in this hostile galaxy. And that meant more work for Grandow. After saving the planet, his popularity among the people was so great that the remaining Senate members were forced to turn over unprecedented powers to the Space Service. They were pressing him to accept a promotion all the way to Admiral, and were consulting with him on almost every decision regarding the defense of the planets in the Narcisston system. He didn't like it, but he didn't trust anyone else to do it either, so he had accepted the added responsibilty. Although not the title as of yet.

The decision was made that the planets were safe for the moment. Safe enough at least to dedicate some manpower on building new laboratories. Boxed in as they were, the Sallegans would need better technology if they were going to be able to defend themselves. Especially if the Amon'Krie entered the war on the side of the Hive.

Current situation: 17 empires total

1st place - Fazrah
2nd place - Norak (Good job Mensch)
3rd place - Xiati
4th place - Cluk-Ruk (very good for a neutral, but it's early)
5th place - Cue Cappa

7th place - Amon'Krie
15th place - Sallega (pitiful)
16th place - Xi'Chung