From the Begining New Chapter Added (9/12/06)

[Starhawk]

2433.2
There is no price to high for order, no price not worth paying for unity, and no price worth the value of the dominance of mankind.

It had been months since the 3rd fleet began patrolling the Selene system and Admiral Ross was growing anxious, they had spotted an Empire of Man fleet orbiting a Mantisoran world over a month ago, yet the Admiralty had ordered Ross and the 3rd fleet not to engage the EOM unless they left orbit of the Mantisoran world at least for while the Artemis flight was still in the neighboring system nabbing enemy starships for scrapping back in the home system.
The Navy had decided that protecting the stolen enemy ships was the most important task for the 3rd fleet, so for months they had been sitting on a warp point making sure no enemy ships managed to get through to the rally point where the stolen ships were being corralled for the return trip home, and all that while 21 EOM dreadnoughts were sitting behind Ross’ fleet leaving him wide open for attack which the Admiralty chose to ignore for the past several months, but now finally as the convoy of captured ships entered the Norvor Warp point, along with the 6 Artemis heavy raiders Ross felt his spirits rise and a great weight lift from his back, finally he could strike at the EOM and the Mantisorans in this system and then he could return to Icara for a few weeks anyway.

And so twenty-three hours after the convoy left the 3rd fleet closed in on the enemy fleet base like a juggernaught of ancient mythology, the EOM fleet and the Mantisoran base combined were of little threat to the overall victory of the 3rd fleet, the only question in the mind of Ross and his division commanders was how many ships and men Icara would lose before they achieved victory.
“Admiral we are entering EOM weapons range in three seconds, all commands report battle ready, main line of battle is positioned and ready for strike, PD ships also report in position for the assault.” Tactical officer Muller’s teeth were showing in a weird sort of smile as the anxiety of the moment caught up to him and he tried to look as relaxed as the veterans on the deck.
“Thank you Muller, inform all commands to commence assault, and godspeed.” Ross kept his tone level and friendly, though part of him wanted to laugh as the younger officer tried overly hard to look calm, it was his first combat action Ross knew and that gnawed at anyone, but if they survived it the next time and the time after that all became almost routine.
“Incoming! I count 231 birds in the air!” Muller’s voice cracked as the tactical plots showed 231 new crimson red lights blaze into life and race towards the Icaran battle line.
The counter missiles from the Icarans raced to meet their counterparts, the void of space came to life with hundreds of new stars as the two volleys collided upon one another.
But still more missiles came racing forward to engage the Icarans, only to have the thin blue lines of dozens of laser point defense batteries slice them apart as they closed creating an even more spectacular light show. Only eight missiles made it through and they splashed harmlessly against the Icaran shields.
The EOM fleet would never get off a second volley, as the entire 3rd fleet of Icara fired their broadsides off against their smaller, weaker opponents, a dozen EOM dreadnoughts vanished in a ball of fire as Icaran superdreadnoughts unleashed their broadsides against the inferior vessels, along with those ships thousands of lives also vanished in what seemed the blink of an eye.
Ross Frowned at his display as he saw the slaughter that was being inflicted by his fleet, he looked over at his exec and sighed again “This can’t be called war, it feels like murder.”
Commander Donald Sutherman looked at his commander with an equally grave expression on his face “M’ Lord, the Icaran Empire must rule over all mankind for us to have any hope of survival against whatever Xenos we will eventually encounter, not all of them will be as primitive as the Phong or the Xiati, and look at how much trouble they gave us, almost three decades of warfare, imagine a Xeno race as advanced as us…..no sir this isn’t murder, it’s a necessity and if these EOM soldiers were wise they would have surrendered to us months ago instead of fighting like this.”
Ross’ expression became even more grave as the last lights representing the EOM fleet vanished from the display and with them the last line of resistance between his fleet and the Mantisoran world. “Would we do anything less if we were in their place Don?”
The other man shrugged and then looked toward the main display as the 3rd fleet’s vanguard fired their broadsides into the main population centers of the undefended Mantisoran world.
“Sir to be honest with you I think we would have done nothing less than they had done, if we were in their place, but I also think we would not end up I their place as we would never ally ourselves with the likes of the treacherous Mantisorans or Andermanians.” Sutherman shrugged again and turned away from the main display as the last broadside from the 3rd fleet vanguard signaled the deaths of about 16 million people.
Ross couldn’t help but feel pity for those lives, or the soldiers who had died in a vein attempt to protect them, even now as his SAR cutters were launched he suspected they would not find many survivors, EOM ships were to frail and I-lasers too devastating for that to be possible. Of course in the end what were tens of thousands of lives compared to the 6.3 billion Andermanian alliance citizens and soldiers who had already died in what had started as a simple crusade against the Andermanian core worlds? Ross stood and left his command deck to return to his quarters, with the sudden urge to shower, yes Icara must prevail and yes mankind must be united, but at what price?

Meanwhile the “price” of unity was becoming even more clear as the entire former Corian Commonwealth erupted into a firestorm of riots, protests and full out rebellions, they felt as if their leaders had sold out to the Icarans and on top of that felt the Icarans had betrayed their oath to protect the worlds of the former commonwealth as there were no military or fleet units present in the Coria systems.
Thousands of people across dozens of worlds were dying as the rioters burned entire city blocks to the ground and fought against the local constabularies who tried to regain some semblance of order on their worlds.
When no Icaran military response appeared forthcoming the riots spread as rumors that Icara was losing the war against the Andermanian alliance spread through the Corian worlds like a wildfire, and the fact that Andermanian “liberation forces” had already taken over three former Corian worlds from Icara only helped the rumors of freedom from the Empire and the reformation of the Commonwealth spread.
What these people could not know was that the Icaran empire was not sitting still while over three billion humans rioted and rebelled, they were in fact mobilizing tens of thousands of State Security troopers in the Lacerta system aboard a massive cloaked starbase that belonged entirely to the State Security branch of the department of Justice. And that soon the steel fist of Icaran law and order would come crashing into the Corian Commonwealth like a giant smashing a toy.