Charmaylarg Dufrain
🎖️ Game Master
- RP Date
- YE-46.7
- RP Location
- Freehold Factory System
One year.
In fact it had been thirteen months, nine days, and two hours the chronogitator listed on the Stupendemonias' mission timer from the time the massive flagship had first began its second maiden voyage a century after its christening when it went from misused and overtaxed bulk freighter to up-armored invasion mothership.
In that time a hundred and thirty thousand men, women, and otherwise had joined forces in a combined coalition of mercenary bands, corporations, humanitarian groups, pirate fleets, volunteers, and various small-sector government elements in the loosely shared goal to liberate a world beset upon by the NMX.
It had been close to six, almost seven months of nonstop fleet combat and bloody planetside warfare that had bent and even broken the coalition into a domino effect of risky gambles that had seen it a pyrrhic victory for the coalition and for Osman.
Though to many it was as good as defeat. Trapped with no option but to fight just for their very survival multiple warbands and mercenary groups and military forces had been wiped out or close to being extinguished altogether. And when the pay had dried out and the cost had begun to fall on the benefactors of the operation many had fled altogether and left those that remained no choice but to fight or die.
Of the some three thousand Strays and five companies of automated troops the Corporation had fielded on Osman less than one in five Strays survived until the conclusion of the campaign and many of the Fairys found themselves less and less able to be fielded as material became scarece and their bodies were unable to be fabricated planetside.
Many other forces had seen similar or even worse attrition rates. Which had made the final days of the post-climax of the death of the R'kk and the flaying of the enemy warmaster and much of his command brood Advanced Types almost as bad as much of the coalition descended upon Osman like jackals and scavengers. With hundreds of NMX vessels destroyed or more often than not scuttled or damaged beyond repair those with working vessels of their own raided the corpse of the mighty enemy vessels for technology with some towing entire frigates and destroyers outsystem as prizes.
Particle weapons and damaged Aether generators too damaged to function would no doubt end up sold to privateers and wrecking guilds while NMX surplus weapons and armor flooded the arms market. The most valuable assets seemed to be neko corpses as a few humanitarian groups showed their true colors by taking their claim of the dead bio-warriors corpses as hospital ships bled them literally dry for their valuable hemosynth for medicinal use and research while live captured NH-29 had to be taken back by literal gunpoint as they threatened to become commodities as pirate captains, entrepenuers, and less scrupulous types sought to breed their own private neko armies or in some instances had them rescued still alive and slowly being drip-bled as living bloodbags as a medical corporation sought to utilize them and their valuable hemosynth long term.
Of two thousand captured NMX neko almost all that were able to be re-secured were transferred under many objections to groups like the Reds of Fujiko and the Interstellar Patrol; Both having close ties to the Star Empire where they would be turned over to the Empire and would see arguably the best treatment they could hope for.
The rest, Nepleslian thralls, humans, and other types were turned over to the Osman Government to face trial while some even seemed to be secreted away to the various departing Mercenary groups as new recruits not that any of them seemed to complain when the alternative was forced labor rebuilding the world they had butchered or equally likely execution.
The SnS corporation had no slaves. No indentures. No prisoners of war. Instea,d they joined in on the groups who had taken promises of payment in other forms as the flagship was loaded up with enough Osmimum and war material to easily recoup their losses and costs while in secret the Warmaster herself dispatched salvage teams to various old battlefields to snatch up both NMX and even Coalition wargear, equipment, vehicles, and weapons as of yet uncovered and ferried to the Flagships holds as soon as they were emptied of the other groups to their own vessels.
The Flagship itself loitered the longest insystem even after much of the others had left. Under the guard of a new fleet of salvaged and retrofitted vessels like the new Krangnoids the Stupendemonia could no longer move under its own power after the trials of the campaign that almost saw it intentionally collide with Osman itself.
Retrofitted Pioneer salvage ships slowly drifted around it, pulling away and welding broken sections of plate while cutting away components and re-inserting third-party replacements from scuttled Coalition vessels until the mighty scarred beast more resembled an intimidating scrap heap of welded plates and rivets than the freighter it had once been.
After months of repairs the SnS salvage fleet still needed to tow the ship outsystem and despite being a days travel at best under normal conditions to FTL back to the freehold system had taken weeks or short, choppy jumps as the multiple smaller salvaged FTL drives in the flagship were arduously calibrated and aligned before it could fly faster than light without tearing itself apart.
The corporation was busy in that time. Stopping by Higalfin they managed to regroup with the other half of their military forces in a skirmishing conflict with local Rixxikor while using the trash-bugs newly rebuilt shipyard to finalize repairs before together the douzen and change vessels of the SnS salvage fleet made their way back home.
The Osman conflict, overlooked widely by the larget sector powers and their people so out of the way it was got little notoriety. As exploits by famous captains and admirals overshadowed what was seen as just a small conflict over a backwater world more imfamy than anything came of it as a resurgence of ship pirates sporting jury-rigged particle weapons plagued the southern sector and Nepleslian Police began investigating the introduction of attempts to sell broken Aether tech and advanced weaponry to blackmarkets while more than a few pharmicudical companies found their ships intercepted in nullspace needing to explain the very shady fact they had their cargo holds full of butchered Nekos.
The fleet loitered now over one of the moons of Freehold Factory. Slowly ferrying the flagships cargo holds planetside down to the corporations' factories and storehouses.
The metal and ores would come in useful for future armor while shares paid out of partial ownership in a few Osmimum mines ensured the corporation wouldnt be lacking soon.
The war material would not see conflict again in the way it ws intended. With no source of spare parts or the ability to fabricate specialized parts and technology to keep them working in a place like freehold some was sold off to various warbands on good terms with the corporation while most was dismantled. The parts and components, more valuable in the longterm would be used in the corporations tech or geared down and downgraded as it was retrofitted into new, lower quality but easier to produce models.
The Flagship, intended to be scuttled and scraped would see new life in the hands of others, traded hands to another corporation that could better afford to keep it running it was stripped and refitted as a mobile factory base.
The most promising return, however, was the human element. The Strays, Lacking veterans to that point could now return to freehold with prescious Cadre. They would never be even the near-equal of any trained soldiery within the Sector but as their ranks refilled in the comming weeks as new recruitment drives filled with propoganda of the Osman conflict hit the InterNep mutant-kind and others would flock to the corporations banner and would see a lower spike in attrition rates as veteran lance commanders, Mage leaders, and commandos were more able to trickle down their experience to new recruits.
Abigail, Prime fairy, Pledias, and Warmaster looked over the red soil of Freehold from the bridge of the Stupendemonia. She had learned and even evolved her code much in the past year, earning her title thrice now she identified it as Hubris that she felt herself the equal of any other commander in the sector with her skillset and experience but before she quashed the feeling allowed herself to bask in it a bit longer. Osman had seen her lose a majority of her forces and even a number of her sisters, she deserved to feel some kind of accomplishment; After all the corporation forming, leading, and even participating in the Osman Campaign was done on a whim. With their loose ties to the Osman system it had been the wish of her mother, Shasta, and aunt, Phage to offer some kind of salve to the system and its plight.
And she had. But had found no signs of Lycosade, only her memory. No inheritance of the lady Phage or grand and quick triumph for her mother as she had nearly bankrupted the corporation in the endeavor and cut her dream short in the attempt.
There was a message waiting for her, she knew. She was procrastinating listening to her mothers extroverted praise and no doubt doting. She would want to see Abigail as soon as possible and hear everything first hand.
She would be upset about Slayer and the fallen Strays. Mother was always so sentimental like that. But something stopped Abigail as she turned from one side of the bridge to look away from Freehold and slowly strode to the other, metal heels clacking in her drone body as she looked out into the black ink of space and beyond the Freehold system.
In the Fae she secluded herself from her sisters temporarily as her stern visage began to change slowly. Lacking the constraints of the human body her cute fairy face twisted as her eyes narrowed into crescents and her lips pulled unnaturally high in a Cheshire grin as sharpened teeth were exposed as she stiffled a single chuckle that had escaped only to be swallowed by the ether.
She had lost so many of her men. She had lost some of her sisters. And yet...
The thrill of the fighting. Of the conflict as it evolved, as she moved her pieces against another commander who thought outside the parameters she operated on and had forced her to evolve and update!
She had felt it once on Gashmere. And again on Stenkagorad.
She was built for war. Made for this. For conflict, for war... Freehold was too small for abigails ambitions. Given enough material she could build an army. She could convince her sisters to join the mass-partition and follow her. She could conquer and entire planet... A system...
A sector?
The thought gave her pause. Not recognizing the hubris again instead it was like an epiphany to have such a goal, such ambitions.
She was THE warmaster. A true immortal battlemaster she could defeat the Imperium and even the Star Empire if only she had the material on hand she just knew! Their technologies and advantages she believed she could evolve to beat. She could pit her mettle against the great leaders of the old generations. She already beat the Empire and Nepleslians once each, and even a phtrric victory against the NMX was still a victory in the end.
She could have a war that never ended if only she put her mind to it...
As fast as the thought had come, the feral twisted visage disappeared as she once again took on the mask of a cute young girl floating about the ephemeral sea of information.
The corporation's motto; "A Mad Mutants Ambitions" she mouthed experimentally. Neither she, her mother, or others of the corporation found any insult in its founders moniker and had even embraced it.
But mother was a mortal, a short lived ephemeral. She had only one life and when she died on this backwater...
Setting aside a querry to sequester some of the war material to a side location Abigail sent the order to clear out for her own personal use the Prime Fairy started to build a roadmap. She would have her army in time, her great war in time.
First, however, she would find a way to transcend her mother into the Fae to live forever with Abigail and her sisters. In the meantime she would aid her mother in her ambitions on this corpse of a world the sector had forgotten.
But when Shasta Archeletta finally saved this rotten rock it would be Abigails turn and she would be ready to meet the other great warmasters of this sector and then beyond until only this red pile of rock remained as a monument.
"Adjust course 44-degrees system-west, we're drifting," Abigail ordered passively as she sat her metal body on the command chair, seeing the stars shift as the massive vessel slowly began burning to the side to avoid freeholds gravity.
All at once, however, the bridge went dark as a power outage hit the ship, a gout of flame hundreds of meters long as a reactor ruptured could be seen from the side of the ship as all around the bridge people began arguing and panicking over a small electrical fire from one of the instrument panel.
"Fudge." Abigail cursed as the backup lights flickered on in the bridge and the ship rumbled as backup generators kicked online.
It was going to be a WHILE before any of her own ambitions became a reality at this rate...
In fact it had been thirteen months, nine days, and two hours the chronogitator listed on the Stupendemonias' mission timer from the time the massive flagship had first began its second maiden voyage a century after its christening when it went from misused and overtaxed bulk freighter to up-armored invasion mothership.
In that time a hundred and thirty thousand men, women, and otherwise had joined forces in a combined coalition of mercenary bands, corporations, humanitarian groups, pirate fleets, volunteers, and various small-sector government elements in the loosely shared goal to liberate a world beset upon by the NMX.
It had been close to six, almost seven months of nonstop fleet combat and bloody planetside warfare that had bent and even broken the coalition into a domino effect of risky gambles that had seen it a pyrrhic victory for the coalition and for Osman.
Though to many it was as good as defeat. Trapped with no option but to fight just for their very survival multiple warbands and mercenary groups and military forces had been wiped out or close to being extinguished altogether. And when the pay had dried out and the cost had begun to fall on the benefactors of the operation many had fled altogether and left those that remained no choice but to fight or die.
Of the some three thousand Strays and five companies of automated troops the Corporation had fielded on Osman less than one in five Strays survived until the conclusion of the campaign and many of the Fairys found themselves less and less able to be fielded as material became scarece and their bodies were unable to be fabricated planetside.
Many other forces had seen similar or even worse attrition rates. Which had made the final days of the post-climax of the death of the R'kk and the flaying of the enemy warmaster and much of his command brood Advanced Types almost as bad as much of the coalition descended upon Osman like jackals and scavengers. With hundreds of NMX vessels destroyed or more often than not scuttled or damaged beyond repair those with working vessels of their own raided the corpse of the mighty enemy vessels for technology with some towing entire frigates and destroyers outsystem as prizes.
Particle weapons and damaged Aether generators too damaged to function would no doubt end up sold to privateers and wrecking guilds while NMX surplus weapons and armor flooded the arms market. The most valuable assets seemed to be neko corpses as a few humanitarian groups showed their true colors by taking their claim of the dead bio-warriors corpses as hospital ships bled them literally dry for their valuable hemosynth for medicinal use and research while live captured NH-29 had to be taken back by literal gunpoint as they threatened to become commodities as pirate captains, entrepenuers, and less scrupulous types sought to breed their own private neko armies or in some instances had them rescued still alive and slowly being drip-bled as living bloodbags as a medical corporation sought to utilize them and their valuable hemosynth long term.
Of two thousand captured NMX neko almost all that were able to be re-secured were transferred under many objections to groups like the Reds of Fujiko and the Interstellar Patrol; Both having close ties to the Star Empire where they would be turned over to the Empire and would see arguably the best treatment they could hope for.
The rest, Nepleslian thralls, humans, and other types were turned over to the Osman Government to face trial while some even seemed to be secreted away to the various departing Mercenary groups as new recruits not that any of them seemed to complain when the alternative was forced labor rebuilding the world they had butchered or equally likely execution.
The SnS corporation had no slaves. No indentures. No prisoners of war. Instea,d they joined in on the groups who had taken promises of payment in other forms as the flagship was loaded up with enough Osmimum and war material to easily recoup their losses and costs while in secret the Warmaster herself dispatched salvage teams to various old battlefields to snatch up both NMX and even Coalition wargear, equipment, vehicles, and weapons as of yet uncovered and ferried to the Flagships holds as soon as they were emptied of the other groups to their own vessels.
The Flagship itself loitered the longest insystem even after much of the others had left. Under the guard of a new fleet of salvaged and retrofitted vessels like the new Krangnoids the Stupendemonia could no longer move under its own power after the trials of the campaign that almost saw it intentionally collide with Osman itself.
Retrofitted Pioneer salvage ships slowly drifted around it, pulling away and welding broken sections of plate while cutting away components and re-inserting third-party replacements from scuttled Coalition vessels until the mighty scarred beast more resembled an intimidating scrap heap of welded plates and rivets than the freighter it had once been.
After months of repairs the SnS salvage fleet still needed to tow the ship outsystem and despite being a days travel at best under normal conditions to FTL back to the freehold system had taken weeks or short, choppy jumps as the multiple smaller salvaged FTL drives in the flagship were arduously calibrated and aligned before it could fly faster than light without tearing itself apart.
The corporation was busy in that time. Stopping by Higalfin they managed to regroup with the other half of their military forces in a skirmishing conflict with local Rixxikor while using the trash-bugs newly rebuilt shipyard to finalize repairs before together the douzen and change vessels of the SnS salvage fleet made their way back home.
The Osman conflict, overlooked widely by the larget sector powers and their people so out of the way it was got little notoriety. As exploits by famous captains and admirals overshadowed what was seen as just a small conflict over a backwater world more imfamy than anything came of it as a resurgence of ship pirates sporting jury-rigged particle weapons plagued the southern sector and Nepleslian Police began investigating the introduction of attempts to sell broken Aether tech and advanced weaponry to blackmarkets while more than a few pharmicudical companies found their ships intercepted in nullspace needing to explain the very shady fact they had their cargo holds full of butchered Nekos.
The fleet loitered now over one of the moons of Freehold Factory. Slowly ferrying the flagships cargo holds planetside down to the corporations' factories and storehouses.
The metal and ores would come in useful for future armor while shares paid out of partial ownership in a few Osmimum mines ensured the corporation wouldnt be lacking soon.
The war material would not see conflict again in the way it ws intended. With no source of spare parts or the ability to fabricate specialized parts and technology to keep them working in a place like freehold some was sold off to various warbands on good terms with the corporation while most was dismantled. The parts and components, more valuable in the longterm would be used in the corporations tech or geared down and downgraded as it was retrofitted into new, lower quality but easier to produce models.
The Flagship, intended to be scuttled and scraped would see new life in the hands of others, traded hands to another corporation that could better afford to keep it running it was stripped and refitted as a mobile factory base.
The most promising return, however, was the human element. The Strays, Lacking veterans to that point could now return to freehold with prescious Cadre. They would never be even the near-equal of any trained soldiery within the Sector but as their ranks refilled in the comming weeks as new recruitment drives filled with propoganda of the Osman conflict hit the InterNep mutant-kind and others would flock to the corporations banner and would see a lower spike in attrition rates as veteran lance commanders, Mage leaders, and commandos were more able to trickle down their experience to new recruits.
Abigail, Prime fairy, Pledias, and Warmaster looked over the red soil of Freehold from the bridge of the Stupendemonia. She had learned and even evolved her code much in the past year, earning her title thrice now she identified it as Hubris that she felt herself the equal of any other commander in the sector with her skillset and experience but before she quashed the feeling allowed herself to bask in it a bit longer. Osman had seen her lose a majority of her forces and even a number of her sisters, she deserved to feel some kind of accomplishment; After all the corporation forming, leading, and even participating in the Osman Campaign was done on a whim. With their loose ties to the Osman system it had been the wish of her mother, Shasta, and aunt, Phage to offer some kind of salve to the system and its plight.
And she had. But had found no signs of Lycosade, only her memory. No inheritance of the lady Phage or grand and quick triumph for her mother as she had nearly bankrupted the corporation in the endeavor and cut her dream short in the attempt.
There was a message waiting for her, she knew. She was procrastinating listening to her mothers extroverted praise and no doubt doting. She would want to see Abigail as soon as possible and hear everything first hand.
She would be upset about Slayer and the fallen Strays. Mother was always so sentimental like that. But something stopped Abigail as she turned from one side of the bridge to look away from Freehold and slowly strode to the other, metal heels clacking in her drone body as she looked out into the black ink of space and beyond the Freehold system.
In the Fae she secluded herself from her sisters temporarily as her stern visage began to change slowly. Lacking the constraints of the human body her cute fairy face twisted as her eyes narrowed into crescents and her lips pulled unnaturally high in a Cheshire grin as sharpened teeth were exposed as she stiffled a single chuckle that had escaped only to be swallowed by the ether.
She had lost so many of her men. She had lost some of her sisters. And yet...
The thrill of the fighting. Of the conflict as it evolved, as she moved her pieces against another commander who thought outside the parameters she operated on and had forced her to evolve and update!
She had felt it once on Gashmere. And again on Stenkagorad.
She was built for war. Made for this. For conflict, for war... Freehold was too small for abigails ambitions. Given enough material she could build an army. She could convince her sisters to join the mass-partition and follow her. She could conquer and entire planet... A system...
A sector?
The thought gave her pause. Not recognizing the hubris again instead it was like an epiphany to have such a goal, such ambitions.
She was THE warmaster. A true immortal battlemaster she could defeat the Imperium and even the Star Empire if only she had the material on hand she just knew! Their technologies and advantages she believed she could evolve to beat. She could pit her mettle against the great leaders of the old generations. She already beat the Empire and Nepleslians once each, and even a phtrric victory against the NMX was still a victory in the end.
She could have a war that never ended if only she put her mind to it...
As fast as the thought had come, the feral twisted visage disappeared as she once again took on the mask of a cute young girl floating about the ephemeral sea of information.
The corporation's motto; "A Mad Mutants Ambitions" she mouthed experimentally. Neither she, her mother, or others of the corporation found any insult in its founders moniker and had even embraced it.
But mother was a mortal, a short lived ephemeral. She had only one life and when she died on this backwater...
Setting aside a querry to sequester some of the war material to a side location Abigail sent the order to clear out for her own personal use the Prime Fairy started to build a roadmap. She would have her army in time, her great war in time.
First, however, she would find a way to transcend her mother into the Fae to live forever with Abigail and her sisters. In the meantime she would aid her mother in her ambitions on this corpse of a world the sector had forgotten.
But when Shasta Archeletta finally saved this rotten rock it would be Abigails turn and she would be ready to meet the other great warmasters of this sector and then beyond until only this red pile of rock remained as a monument.
"Adjust course 44-degrees system-west, we're drifting," Abigail ordered passively as she sat her metal body on the command chair, seeing the stars shift as the massive vessel slowly began burning to the side to avoid freeholds gravity.
All at once, however, the bridge went dark as a power outage hit the ship, a gout of flame hundreds of meters long as a reactor ruptured could be seen from the side of the ship as all around the bridge people began arguing and panicking over a small electrical fire from one of the instrument panel.
"Fudge." Abigail cursed as the backup lights flickered on in the bridge and the ship rumbled as backup generators kicked online.
It was going to be a WHILE before any of her own ambitions became a reality at this rate...
