History of the Galaxy, part 1-Story Thread

[geoschmo]

Year 2405.2

Are you a healthy man or woman between the ages of 17 and 24?
Are you looking for a career with excitment, adventure, and plenty of room for advancment?
Do you want to make a difference with your life?

Join the Space Marines and help take the fight to the Bugs!

Earn the respect and gratitude of your friends and family. And take home 495 a month after taxes doing it. No advanced education or experince required. Visit your local recuiting office today.

Your republic needs you!

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Grandow reviewed the invasion plans. He had already made the final decision to go with the plan, and construction had begun on the combat vehicles two months before. Recruiting was well underway on all of the colonies. There had been no shortage of volunteers to join the newly commisioned Space Marines.

Casualty estimates varied wildly. Most of his advisors believed that the invasion would be sucessful, but the cost to the first wave of troops was likely to be horendous. The first phase would come next month when the fleet moved through the warp point to Organtrix. Once there a beachhead of sorts would be set up. Information would be needed about bug fleet strength and defenses. To do that we would need eyes in the bug system.

The plan allowed for three months before phase two, to allow for repairs to the fleet before moving on to the ground assault. Time would also be neeeded to revise the plans if it turned out the Xi'Chung homeworld, the primary target, were too heavily defended. If it became neccesary, one of the smaller colonies would be invaded first. This would give the Sallegans a base of operations in bug space. This would also demonstrate to the bugs the predicament of their situation.

They were almost totally isolated now. Along with the Norak and the Amonkrie, the Sergetti had agreed to a non-aggression pact with the Republic now and had declared war on the Xi. The only race known to have peaceful relations with the bugs now was the Cue Cappa. But they didn't fight with anybody it appeared. Despite all this, the Xi had refused the latest ultimatum to cease attacks in the Narciston system.

It was clear that the Queen was not open to negotiation. For whatever reason, she was bent on the destruction of the Sallegan race. This could not be allowed to happen. If it took the complete subjugation of the Xi'Chung race, that is how it would have to be.

Time was of the essence. The war with the Xi must be resolved before the conflict between the Zynarra and the Norak got out of hand. Offers had been made to mediate that dispute, and so to keep the support of the Sallegans two closest allies.

Also there were concerns in the research and development front. The Sallegan researchers had discovered it was possible to build space mines which were difficult to detect and could do considerable damage. So far we had not developed the technolgoy to sweep these mines. It is not clear whether the Xi have developed these mines yet, but they cannot be allowed to do so before the invasion.

The achealogical discovery in Cephredi had yielded fuit. The remains were in fact of an ancient civilization. Furthermore the technology was discoverd to build massive planetary energy shields. Currently the Sallegans do not have the resources or space to build these, but it is a technology valued highly by our allies. Enough so that they were willing to trade ship construction technology. The Sallegans were now capable of building 400Kt space vessels. This put them on a par with every known race.

But the invasion could not wait for these ships to be constructed. Plans were designed, and keels laid. But the fleet would have to make do with what they had now. The timing was too critical to do otherwise.

[ 25 March 2002: Message edited by: geoschmo ]