Newbie Galactic Combat II - Story Thread

[CaptRR]

I know its been a while, and for that I appologize. I hope that you will think it was worth the wait. Here are the latest chapters.

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Chapter 28

The Draven Dreadnaught “Landing City” was a flurry of activity. People swarmed everywhere. Most were engaged in the standard trials that always happen just before a ship was brought into war, but there were a few that stood back from the flurry to reflect. Some of them wrote letters home, the electronic documents would be sent just before the ship passed through the warp point into the Draven home system, and transmitted through the rest of the Republic. Other’s were off duty, and were resting up for the long days to come. Deep in the heart of the great ship, in the fleet command center of F-COM as it was called, Prince Dravel watched the plot.

The room was the largest on the ship, measuring nearly 15 meters tall and twice that wide. In space such large volumes were hard for life support systems to deal with, it also decreased the structural integrity of the vessel. However, the “Landing City” was the newest ship made from alliance technology. Her new life support systems could handle almost 4 times the amount of space they were forced to deal with. Add to that, the ships structure was made from Fiber Steel, a relatively new invention that had 3 times the strength of normal ship construction material, with only a slight increase in weight. All these factors when combined with the need for a central control room for fleet operations had led to the addition of F-COM.

The room was far from empty though, over 75 members of Dravel’s staff busied themselves on with the activities required to move a fleet of over 65 ships even if most of them didn’t have crews. Along the walls were 3 stories of terminals and equipment necessary to support the fleet. In the center along with Dravels desk was the largest and most prominent addition to the room the 10 meter tall Holographic plot.

Dravel nodded in approval as the Last of the suicide ships was moved into position at the front of the fleet, its slow speed was evidence of its huge mass, after all this ship had started life as a transport, the only ships in the Draven inventory that were larger were the mammoth dreadnaughts. Finally the ships icon flashed green, showing that all its systems were good.

“Sir,” Sosha answered from her station just to Dravel’s right, “The Gold Rush is reporting all systems are green, the fleet is now ready for transit.”

“Thank you Sosha,” Draven said with a sigh, this was the moment he had, had nightmares about for weeks, he was about to send almost 50 thousand Dravens into battle, a battle that they were probably going to lose. Dravel had sent many people to their deaths, he and death were no strangers, but he had never done so against his own people. The people his fleet was getting ready to attack were no less honorable than he. They were doing their best to defend the republic, even if it was being run by a madman, and because of Dravel those thousands of live would be snuffed out. He was sure the nightmares he had, had would be nothing compared to the ones to come. The only comfort that he could count on was that he was doing it to save the republic.

He looked over as Sosha, her beauty was simply amazing even at a time like this. Over the Last couple of weeks they had grown closer. When Dravel had first met her, he was sure that it was no more than a hormonal attraction, a school boy love affair, that would pass with time. He was definitely sure that the feelings that he harbored towards her were not the same as those that she harbored for him. Something had happen over the Last couple of weeks though, he had gotten to work closer to her than ever, and he began to feel that their was definitely something their, something that Dravel had never felt before. Was it love? Dravel really didn’t know, what he did know is that once all this living hell over with he was going to ask her to Marry him, it would cost him and most likely her as well their commission’s but in the end they would be giving up the military for a life as a President and first lady. But first they had to survive the immediate future.

“Sosha, patch me into the fleet broadcast channel” Dravel paused while hit buttons on her panel to put him on every speaker on every ship in the fleet. Such occasions were rare, but, Dravel felt in this case it was needed. As the warning tone signaled almost all work stopped on the F-COM, he was sure the same scene was being repeated all over the fleet, as people turned to hear him speak what could be the most important speech in all their lives. Dravel took a breath.

“Brave men and women of Third Fleet, I speak to all of you now on what may be the darkest day in our Republics history. None of us want to be here, I’m sure that when we signed up for service none of us ever though we would be engaging our own brothers in battle. If we had known we no doubt would have chosen another path, but as dreadful a task this is, I assure you that if we don’t do this, it will be the end of everything that we hold dear.

Today, we stand on the edge of an abyss. We can sit still, and do nothing while the Draven Republic collapse around us, or we can fight. Fight for our friends, our Mothers, our Brothers, our sisters, and our Fathers. What we do today, will determine the future of the universe, whether the Dravens will continue to exist or fade into the darkness of history. Today, all of us, every single member of our fleet, makes a state. We will not go quietly into the night! We will fight to the end, and only when the Last of us has no more breath will the Dravens truly be beaten; I say again we will not go Quetly into the night!”

At those Last words Dravens fist hit his desk, but the pounding was drowned out by the cheers around him. In every ship, everyone from the lowest ranking cook to the most decorated Admiral, crewmen cheered. Not for the deaths that were to come but for themselves, never had the future of so many relied on so few, no matter what happens history would never forget Third Fleet.

Dravel looked over to Sosha who had a broad grin on her face. Dravel stepped over to her, and put his hand on her shoulder, “Give the word to all ships, initiate Operation Redemption.”

Slowly the ships of Thrid fleet moved into the Warp point, and into their Destiny.

Chapter 29

Commander Linoris was bored. He had been giving command of the Kornephoras warp point defense station almost 6 months ago. At the time he had known that being assigned to the Defense base that orbited the warp point was a career ender, but he was still young and at the time had thought that it wouldn’t affect him. He would spend a few months their, 6 at the most and then be assigned one of the new dreadnaughts coming out of the yards, after all the way the war was going, the fleet was in need of command level officer. Unfortunately the war had ended when the Weyrlings defeated the terren’s, and that effectively ended Linoris’s chances of promotion. Now here he sat, in what must be the most boring assignment in the galaxy. The “alert” that Kornephoras X had ordered, had provided a few days of excitement while he went though drills, but that had passed quickly, and ground into dull routine.

Now here he was, on third watch, looking over the 3 warp point defense bases. Linoris sighed as he checked off another routine status report. Once again, all the automated systems appeared to work fine. He lifted his cup of Nanal leafe tea to his lips and began to take a sip.

Suddenly alarms went off; in his surprise Linoris spilled his cup on himself, leaving an impressive stain. “Son of a...”

His curse was cut off by the tech reporting, “We have incoming unscheduled transits, multiple signatures, and force estimate of at least 50 vessels.”

Linoris’s fear was now overtaking the burning sensation on chest. This wasn’t suppose to happen, all ships were required to file a flight plan before they transited the warp point. Certainly a fleet this size would have caught Linoris’s attention, it could only be an attack fleet. “Visuals.” He ordered. Almost instantly several of the screens scattered around the command deck showed a close up view of the warp point. It colors slightly distorted by the gravitational waves ripping though it, for a second it seemed that the storm at its center subside then in the blink of an eye, a bright light surged, and a ship took shape, then another, and another, and then they were lost in a sea of explosions.

The defenses on the warp point were an old Version. Their weapon systems had not been upgraded in almost a decade. After all the general theory was that if a fleet ever got this far the Draven Republic was doomed anyway. But what the defense system lacked in quality they more than made up in quantity. Before the first ship was finished transitioning, automatic defense system had activated the mines, and each of the small warheads had activated their friend or foe transceivers. By the time the second ship had finished transitioning it had been determined that the codes returned by the invading ships were not authorized. Cold computer logic kicked in, and each mine communicated with other beside them. Targets were prioritized, and compared to the mines internal database for the area that was weakest. When the third ship finished transitioning, the mines engaged their, hyper impeller engines. These engines could accelerate a device to almost a tenth of the speed of light inside of a second, unfortunately the devices were a one use variety, and the engine burned themselves up in half that time. It wasn’t a big deal though, at these ranges it brought the mine into lethal range of the invading ships almost instantly. The mines proximity warheads engaged and release the magnetic rings holding almost a liter of anti-matter. When the anti-matter came into contact with matter they exploded. The resulting explosions were equivalent to a 1 megaton nuclear explosion. Each ship had been assigned 10 mines, and as each went off, space itself rippled, as anti-matter and matte came together, and ships vaporized, but not fast enough.

The ships, Large transports really, were absorbing ungodly amounts of damage, often times, mines would have to attack the same target twice. Still the mines computer cores lashed out at the invaders, and ships would only appear for a few seconds before a group of mines would descend on them, lashing at them with Nuclear fire. But the ships kept coming, and soon the wall of fire produced by the mines began to slacken off, and finally the Last mine detonated, slightly damaging a large transport that had just translated into the system.

Only after the battle was over, would anyone relies the beauty of Prince Dravel’s plan. The lead ships had been procured from the bone yard, and had been programmed to go though the warp point first. They had no crews, and over the Last couple of weeks Dravels engineers had loaded as much armor onto the ships as they could handle. The result was a slow, ugly, defenseless ship that could absorb huge amounts of damage. This was an ideal answer to Dravel’s problems with regard to his inability to procure any mine sweepers. Instead of sweeping the mines guarding the warp point, Dravel had simply absorbed them with worthless ships. Now the doorway was clear, as the first of Dravel’s warships began to transition into the Kornephoras system.

[Ruatha]

I would have liked to see that fireshow!

[Raging Deadstar]

Go Prince Dravel! A sound tactic, Lets just hope the endings happier than ruathas Will love blossom between the two and i'm interested to know what will happen to yalare. Keep up the good writing, it was worth the wait

[CaptRR]

Chapter 30

Linoris watched as the Last of his mines detonated itself against yet another invader, their seemed to be no end to them. Tactical had reported over 15 ships destroyed, but they kept coming.

The command deck of the Kornephoras had been busy to the point of panic the Last 2 minutes. No one had ever tried to invade the Kornephoras system. Even during the dark days when it looked like the Dravens and Weyrlings were going to go to war, no one had put much faith in an attack on the Draven home system, it was just too bold of a move, the system was too well dedended, yet here someone was sending what seemed like waves of ships against his mines.

His tactical officer looked at him, her look was one of death, “Sir,” she said, her voice, almost cracking, somehow she kept it under control. “We have identified the ships, they are Draven.”

“What?” Linoris started to breath hard, he had just destroyed 15 draven ships, what the hell was a Draven doing trying an unauthorized transit, what was going on.

“Communications get me in contact with whoever is in charge of that fleet, find out what the hell is…”

“Commander, the commander of the fleet is signaling us.” She paused for a second listening to her ear piece. “We are being ordered to power down our weapons, and deactivate warp point defense systems, if we do not comply immediately we will be attacked.”

Linoris was speechless, what was a Draven ship doing threatening his stations. This was mad. “Tell the whoever is in command over their that we will not power down our weapon system’s until we know what is going on.”

The communications officer nodded, and began talking into softly. The computer automatically separated his voice from the background noise and sent the signal out. It only took a moment to get a response. “The fleets commander is requesting a visual.”

“Agreed.”

Waiting for a visual took a little longer, encryption keys had to be exachanged but overall Linoris’s communications officer was able to expidate the process rather quickly, in less than a minute the screen on his console blinks, and on it appeared the image of a familiar Draven. Linoris gasped in surprise.

The voice spoke with the same pride that had been seen on countless holovids. “Commander, I am Prince Dravel, if you do not comply with my orders I will be forced to open fire.”

Chapter 31

Dravel watched the holographic image of the commander. The man was young for his position, but that wasn’t so unusual these days. The recent war with the Terrens had propelled many through the ranks much faster than they otherwise would have. What did come as unusual was the fact that he hadn’t been fire upon yet. The three base station’s guarding the warp point were capable of tremendous fire, despite their age. Dravel was sure he could take out the stations before his fleet was destroyed, but he would take losses. Losses he couldn’t afford.

The surprise on the commander’s face made it evident that he hadn’t expected a Draven fleet. He probably didn’t even expect a real attack through the warp point, after all the Kornephoras warp point defense was suppose to be one of the most boring assignments, with several systems of friendly territory between it and the nearest neighbor it wasn’t expected that an attack would just come out of nowhere.

The Commander seemed to get control of himself. “I’m afraid I can’t do that sir, my orders are not to let anyone into the system without authorization, and it’s clear by your entry that you do not have permission to pass.”

“Commander,” Dravel said, his voice pleading, he didn’t want to fire on the station if he could help it but he was being left little choice, “We have 15 Landing City class dreadnaughts pointing shield skipping weapons at you, you won’t Last 10 minutes in a firefight. Commander, I’m pleading with you, don’t be a fool, we are here to free the Republic, Yalare is not worth dieing for.”

The commander sighed; Dravel wondered what thoughts were going through the young Draven’s mind. In the end Dravel got his answer, “Sir, I am ordering you to stand down your weapons, or I will be forced to defend this system.”

“I can’t do that commander.”

The expressions of Linoris’s face said it all, he was a man trapped by duty. Since his days in the academy he had it drilled into him that the defense of the Republic was paramount, now he was in a dilemma. The Republic was corrupt, he knew that, but it was still the rightful government, a government he had sworn to protect. “In that case sir, you leave me no choice.”

The image instantly disappeared. Draven could hardly restrain himself. “That stupid fool! He’s outnumbered, outgunned, why won’t he just give up.”

It was Sosha who answered, “He’s doing his duty Prince, at least what he feels his duty is.”

Dravel looked at her, she was right, but damn how he wished the young man would have just surrendered, instead of throwing his life away.

A voice boomed over the loudspeakers in the F-COM, it was the fleet Tactical officer, “Base stations have opened fire, all hands brace for inpact.”

Dravel looked at the plot the bright red lines arched themselves across the screen. A time to inpact notice shown over them, as well as weapon type, and hit percentage. Already the Third Generation Alliance Jammers were lowering that percentage down at a staggering rate. A few would hit, but the damage would be far less than Dravel had feared.

Dravel took a breath, he could feel the pit of his stomach fill with vile at his next word, Father forgive me, he said to himself. “All hand’s return fire.”

The Base stations had huge power draw from their fusion rectors could put out twice as much power as that of a ship. Add to that their massive size, and the fact that they didn’t need heavy propulsion systems, and you have a heavily armed beast. Each station mounted 7 Telekenetic Projectors, but they were of an old variety. From the moment that the base’s had fire, ECMS had lashed out at the Base’s guidance systems. As guidance was lost each of the Telekentic projections began to veer of course. 21 shots had been fired from the Base’s of those only 3 hit their targets, and those were easily shrugged off by the dreadnaughts shields.

Now Third Fleet brought its own fire to bear. The Landing City Class of dreadnaughts sported a new weapon. The Phased Polaron beam was a new alliance development. After realizing that soon all empires would have the ability to shield their ships, alliance HQ had began work on a way to bypass an enemies protective shield. After almost 3 years of work the Phase Polaron Beam was developed. The weapon used a small amount of antimatter, which is brought slightly out of phase with the resonance of the universe. The antimatter is for all intense and purposes invisible to any type of energy shielding. However once it is brought into contact with “real” matter, it is brought back into phase rather violently. The only flaw was that only a small mount could be brought out of phase at a time.

The alliance had figured that the trade off was worth being able to bypass shields, and ordred the weapon developed. Unfortunately it wasn’t ready in time for the end of the Terren War, but all new alliance ships were being built with this new weapon system. Now a wall of phased anti-matter was ejected at near light velocities towards the lumbering base ships. As designed the anti-matter passed through the base’s shield as though they weren’t their, and sliced deep into the hull of the massive fortresses.

Explosion after explosion ripped into the base’s without protective shielding only armor was left to absorb the energy being released, and that didn’t Last long. Layer after layer was ripped away, and giant sections buckled and fell away, but that wasn’t the end of it. After all the punishment the bases were still standing, weakened, yet still operational. Their shields gone, most of their weapon systems disable or destroyed, they attempted to fire on third fleet again. They never got the chance though, behind the wall of Phased anti-matter came an equally impressive wall of telekinetic projections from third fleets smaller vessels. The weakened bases were no match for this, and one of them disappeared in a ball of plasma, it multiple reactors going critical.

The remaining two took this as a sign, and immediately shut down their remaining weapons. By this point though they were basically floating scrap metal, already escape pods were flowing from their mangled hulls, a sure sign that it was over.

Dravel looked at the carnage he wrecked, he hadn’t lost any ships, but he had just sent several thousand Dravens to their grave. He tried to take a calming breath but it didn’t seem to help, “Pick up survivors, then head towards Kornephoras X, its time we end this. If anyone needs me I’ll be in my quarters.”

Without even waiting for an acknowledgement Draven turned and left the room, he felt sick and needed to be alone.

Sosha watched as her prince turned and left, if everyone hadn’t been too busy trying to search for survivors they would have noticed the thing line of a tear down the side of her face.

[Ruatha]

Ah, Duty, so misguided!

[Raging Deadstar]

Great Chapter, seems a shame for honourable dravens to perish needlessly but i guess change and peace comes at great cost. I'm looking forward to seeing more!

[Ruatha]

CaptRR I want more.
And Tbontob, if you ever get time, what happened to Strong-In-Arm and the rest of them?