RP: 188604 [Star Wasp] 9: Operation Bright Venom

[Zack]

~ 36 hours after Star Wasp 8

I'ee System

The Wild Rabbit had entered the I'ee system nearly an hour ago. The ship was 'surprised' by the NMX task force in the system, and made a run for the system's edge so that it could FTL away... only to be 'surprised' again as the rest of the NMX fleet exited hyperspace right infront of it to block the ship's path.

Enemy fighters would stream out from their carriers, as precision strikes disabled the Wild Rabbit's engines.

It seemed like easy prey, but the Wild Rabit was transmitting targeting information back to the fleet.



The Queen's Slave, deep space

Uso was closely watching the data feeds coming from the I'ee home system.

3...

"Well, it looks like they've taken the bait. The NMX fleet is fully deployed and both of their groups are focused on the Wild Rabit." Uso looked over at Vier, who's bodies were all also looking at the display table in the center of the Queen's Slave. "You're up."

2...

Vier would start distributing targeting data to the fleet. Their final destination for FTL jump was passed on along with exactly where to aim their weapon systems.

1...

The large combat drones that had been built so far all started adjusting their positions accordingly, getting just a bit out in front of the manned ships that Uso would prefer not to lose in the fight. The flat pannels on the side of the ship starting to disort space as the FTL drives were brought to full power.

0!

The next few seconds were a flurry of activity. The drones jumped first, followed by the jump signal for the rest of the fleet less than a milisecond later.

Then those drones arrived at the edge of the I'ee system where the smaller part of the NMX fleet was located. Their weapons were already in the process of firing when they arrived, the bright flash of the ships exiting hyperspace joined by the much brighter flash of their laser-arrays pumping energy into the NMX ships.

One moment, the NMX were eager to capture new prey. The next, 6 of their Pillager class cruisers were gone, and the entire upper side of the carrier they were protecting had been turned into a glowing red pool of super-heated metal.

Just inside of the I'ee system, where FTL drives wouldn't work, was the rest of the NMX fleet. 12 more pillagers and two more carriers along with assorted fighters and bombers... still not having had time to process what had just happened, and too far away to fight back...

 

[Gunhand4171]

Necromancer Bridge:

The bridge of Werner's ship was a bustle of activity. The Ragnarock Soldiers were prepped and their transports were ready to go. Their leader Cyrus stood on the bridge next to Raphael, whose own operators were decked out in black impulse armor and ready to fight as well. Werner sat in his command chair as he waited for the command to mobilize. His own fighters were ready and his new drones were prepared as well. Not to mention his ships massive quad-railgun and the slightly smaller dual-barreled railguns and other assorted instruments of war.

After a few moments his comm officer yelled above the noise. "Sirs! We have received the the jump order." He yelled.

"Are all assets onboard?" Werner asked.

"Yes sir." XO Kovac said. "The USO mech team is onboard and awaiting launch orders, and all our other guests are all in battle rattle."

Werner nodded. "Helm! Commence FTL jump!" He yelled. "Comm sound general quarters."

The ship began spinning up its FTL drives and a shrill town sounded all across the ship. A automated voice spoke next. "General quarters, general quarters. All hands, man your battle stations. This is not a drill. Repeat..."

A few moments later the ship was ready and the ship warped out of 188604 space, and into a much more hostile area...

"Sir! Jump successful." The sensor operator said, looking back from his console. "We have received all the sensor data from the drones. 6 Pillagers down and one Battlecarrier is heavily damaged."

"Good..." Werner said, as he looked to his console and opened up a feed to his sister Hazel who was the ship's CAG (Chief of the Aerospace Group). "CAG, you are go for launch, good hunting." He then opened up a new comm link to the mecha team. "You are cleared for launch! Commence combat operations." He looked to his systems operator. "As soon as the Hounds and mecha teams clear the flight decks, deploy the drones."

"Helm, bring us into extreme weapons range of the NMX fleet. Tactical, prep all torpedo tubes for snapshot and load the missile launchers. Let's turn those ships into slag..."

All the personnel in the room sounded an "Aye aye!" In unison and began their work

The battle for the I'ee had begun...

 

[Alex Hart]

I'ee System

Battle theme

Alex was the first one to activate his thrusters and lift off of the hanger deck. After having an idea and radioing to the bridge and flight control he said, "Alex to control, I'm taking off now. Please have the Necromancer's point defences and guns cover our approach."

Things were moving too fast. He knew that Jason was supposed to be in charge, but there wasn't time to discuss a plan. Speaking now to his teammates, he continued. "I've asked the Necromancer to cover us on the way in. Let's go!"

Speeding out of the hanger, Alex immediately began to weave around the incoming fire. An enemy fighter had managed to launch too. Alex latched onto it, just out of the firing arc of its weapon. Activating the pile driver in the left arm, he let it smash the enemy cockpit again and again untill it burst, and then promptly roasted the pilot inside.

Using the hulk of the now inseparable enemy fighter to shield him, Alex looked back at his team. "Come on!" He said, "I can't do this on my own!"

 

[LittleWasp]

Number One Rival

Riding along in the Necromancer's FTL bubble was the I'ee Dragoon corvette from the JTE, brought along to provide fire support. "We have arrived," Gut-Stripe spoke from the bridge, broadcasting openly; even to her foes. "The Misshuvarthyar are wrong, and shall be erased, like any other mistake. We will now fire." As she spoke, the corvette had already picked its target and charged its main gun: A powerful particle cannon.
As Gut-Stripe finished speaking, the cannon fired, launching a glowing, dull orange 'bubble' which sped across space, impacting the hull of the wounded NMX carrier, where it exploded in a dazzling display of orange lightning and sparks. "We recharge." Gut-Stripe announced calmly, as the cannon began recharging its capacitors; an orange glow slowly and steadily filling its barrel again.

 

[Ace]

The Eternal Pilgrim Bridge

Spacecase would broadcast from his own ship. "This is the Pilgrim standing by for orders. Readying for anti-small craft fire." The ships many AA guns would rear they're barrels towards the general area of the remaining carriers. "Main guns rearming, combat Junkers on standby."

 

[Legix]

Space - I'ee Star System

"Lack of finesse. Must not be from Yamatai."

Even without his trademark cigarette, his suit full-up and the helmet locked into place to ensure any damage that ruptured the Tengu's cockpit wasn't fatal, Ronin was quick to be on the case of the sloppy fighter elimination. The Misshu fighters and craft between them and their target wasn't too thick, but even if it had been this was one pilot who had experience. The man had the radio directly in his ears, a soft bump of some sort of archaic music pumping within his cockpit. But that was nowhere near as powerful as the bump that a ship flanking Alex in the three-dimensional warzone known as space experienced. Specifically, the shoulder weapon of one of the earliest models of Origin machinery lived up to the hype and punched a hole through the nose and cockpit of the gunship. Even if it had been somewhat operational it didn't last long, the Tengu's thrusters firing upward and backward, arcing him in a curving loop beneath it as he strafed the ship's underbelly.

"Fucking squids," the flash of light in the void silhouetted the machine as it finished a bizarre backflip and began lighting up another fighter that had been rushing forward. It wasn't enough to deal a deathblow, but the craft veered off heavily thanks to the suppression of nuclear warhead-tipped giant bullets.

"Push on the carrier, greenhorn. Ditch the extra weight. Origin made these things to fly, not to hide! We have the element of size and covering fire, just focus on dodging the big volleys and you'll be fine."

 

[Samanthia]

Queen Slave // I'E System

After the jump into the I'E System there wasn't much she could do, except to keep the Queen's Slave moving on an erratic course to make it harder to get weapons lock on the Freighter she was flying. Errowyn kept the Queen's Slave behind the Bigger warships of the Necromancer, yet be able to see the battle unfolding before them. She was nervous and tighter than a wound up clock.

She missed being with '5', her Kawarime and in the middle of the fray with deadly energy, projectiles and what ever else thrown in the mix. And of course her sisters.

~~ "Looks like a celebration out there..."~~ The one that rarely spoke and having accepted her fate.

Errowyn gave a chuckle / snort that sounded a bit insane as she maneuvered the Queen Slave to another vantage point.

~~ "You should've told Uso to stuff it and stayed with your Kawarime." ~~ One of the bolder sisters spoke up

"And miss all this? Best seat in the house?" Errowyn muttered softly as worked on the egress ftl jumps course incase they need it.

~~ "Your insane kitten. Too much fresh air and sunlight." ~~ Another spoke up.

Errowyn laughed out loud, "I didn't hear you complaining about it." Glancing off to the side as if looking at a person, but only thing was there was a computer mainframe with light flashing in random patterns.

~~ "I was with the Kawarime. Making sure nothing happened to it!" ~~ Same one replied.

Errowyn jerked the Queen Slave out of the path of a stray missile that ran out of fuel, but still just as deadly if it impacted with the lighter armored Freighter.

~~ "I'd say the soft living caused you to loose your touch." ~~ the 4th Sister spoke up. The one that acted as her EWO when she was with her Kawarime and flying.

"It was the same way with the Heiten between battles." Errowyn smirked finishing her course plotting.

A moment of silence except for the chirping and clicking of relays in response to her flying.

 

[Rhysis]

Watchkeeper

Marcus smiled as he jumped directly to the edge of the I'ee system with a pair of drones Craig's team had managed to get together. The Watchkeeper was designed as an escort ship to protect Equilibrium's long range shipments from any potential danger. It was set up, from the initial blueprints, for speed and maneuverability. He made sure Craig built the two drones to match that capability. Doing so mandated a reduction in firepower with as much of a rush job as they were forced to do, but it meant the drones could match the Watchkeeper's ability to avoid being hit by enemy fire.

The bridge crew watched their instruments carefully, as the ship drew closer to the main portion of the NMX fleet. The comm officer continued to relay targeting information to Uso's fleet as the NMX ships adjusted their positions. The moment they were within weapons' range, it was obvious. The ship started off its attack immediately. The tactical officer used the targeting information he already had and let loose with the two pairs of positron beam weapons on either side of the main cannon onto the closer of the two Carriers. Their frequencies automatically adjusted every nanosecond to most effectively eliminate the enemy shielding. At the same time, six rockets were fired from either side of the ship. One second later, the ship's weapons' officer fired off a volley of rounds from the rear cannon at the closest Pillager class ship, which both drones also went after. Then, it was time to show why the entire vessel resembled a giant assault weapon. Aimed directly at the engineering section of the carrier whose shields were now drained, the main gun fired off a giant cylinder of tungston containing an aether reactor...and a detonator. The projectile traveled at 0.9C and slammed into the engineering section of the NMX carrier, and then exploded...at least that was the plan. The detonator failed. The explosion didn't happen.

"Wonderful..." The captain of the ship murmured.

="Phase one has not been completed, sir. Recommend you remain on board."= A voice spoke to Marcus over his comm unit.

="Thank you, Captain."= Marcus answered, and then launched from the ship aboard the solitary fighter craft the Watchkeeper held, at the moment, leaving the crew to their own expertise in maneuvering and attacking.

 

[Dumont]

Arccos not feelin' it:

As the main fleet jumped in, the single largest vessel available seemed to hang back as a whole. Normally something that big would take up a rather prominent position in the main line of battle, but this was a mothership. The great double-pyramid hulk of the White Lament remained nested safely to the rear of the USO fleet. Its Entropy's Shroud unit working at peak performance to make it invisible to sensors as a whole, and warp space to make it unclear outside exactly where it was.

Nothing fired, it just hung there as Arccos did. But it made a point of keeping itself in a set position. Directly keeping the I'ee vessel helping them in the middle, doing offset counter-phase emissions to also cloak that ghastly Gut-Stripe's vessel from being picked up immediately.

Inside it was a different matter. Having picked up a new crew, the Lament was busier than ever. A host of organics and automata flooding the decks, and filling the local polysentience with noise. Everything nominal. Everything drifting about on the sent-waves was jokes and song so far. Arccos hung in the communication's core which may have been the closest thing to a bridge that the Lament had, suspended above the server stacks in a hammock-seat of reclaimed cargo netting. As a fistful of other 'spacers monitored all the feeds to all systems, Arccos mulled over the faint awareness that she was worried.

Something had to go wrong sooner or later.

Negotiations Successful:

As the drones took the first wave and did their duty, a crack of light split open in space by the USO fleet. Offset a careful distance behind, below and to the right of the entire fleet came the promised backup from Uso's would-be corporate overlord. Eight vessels materialising from the void of space, and accelerating. By the looks of them they were contracted out from at least two or three different mercenary companies, if their paint jobs were any indication.

If they were mercenaries, they were top shelf. And very well armed. Their attack immediately commencing and going off like clockwork. Two escort carriers deployed their small fleet's complement of fighters and mecha before peeling off to fall behind the line of battle established by Uso's fleet. Mechs latching on to the outer hulls of the two leading ships to join the spearhead. Their entire formation began to accelerate, turning in a wide arc to flank 'below' the Misshu formation.

Everything they did seemed to move with a clear pattern. Fire main weapons on isolated Pillagers, deploy area denial torpedos to push the swarm of battlepods towards a central formation. Pound their formations with fire from turrets. Rather than deploy their frames to act as fighters, they instead supported the real fighters as they moved around to kill stragglers, scarcely leaving the safety of supporting fire from the mechs which used the bulwark of heavy ship shields to protect themselves. As they got in close, half their mech squadrons dramatically leapt from one ship hull to another, forming the vanguard for deployed boarding parties in power armor. Landing with streaks of sparks from their feet on the singled out pillagers, commencing fire to cleave turrets and engines from their hulls as they made a beeline towards the enemy bridge.

"We'll be supporting your formation from the flanks," Daniels' voice came over the comms, sounding like he'd done this a thousand times before. "You'll need to press the advantage on their Pillagers to prevent them from swarming you with their battlepods and escaping to regroup. They'll probably consider the carriers a more acceptable loss since they tend to care less for pod pilots than the Captain's chair their tentacles rest on."

On their own they were managing to easily keep the bottom flank of the Misshu formation busy, four Pillagers disabled or boarded in the opening moments of their assault, and they were taking to the battlepods like a reaper man to a harvest. Whatever, or whoever Uso did to get these guys on side was seemingly worth it.

 

[Alex Hart]

Alex is in The Zone

Alex followed behind Ronin's mecha for a moment, before pulling ahead. Spiraling and dodging around the enemy fire, the few hits that he took were glancing blows, not even enough to break his shields. When he was alerted to an incoming barrage of missiles, he detonated them with his head mounted point defense laser.

Noticing that one of the mercenary mecha was in trouble. It had been caught by an unexpected barrage of missile fire from a group of battlepods. Stopping a moment to fire off a volley of missiles at the offending pods, Alex watched to make sure that they detonated, distracting them long enough for the mercenary to regain their composure and destroy one before regrouping with their team. Alex shot off a quick salute to the mercenary before continuing into the fray.

Alex continued to dodge fire, and detonated several missiles on some of the mishuu fighters as they launched out of the hanger.

 

[Amaryllis]

Deciding to fight the way he was used to during his time in Yamatai's military as space infantry, Akemi showed up in a GIRTH which was actually a solid deep red painted Nepleslian EARTH with some personal modifications to improve it. To increase his odds of a decent showing the Neko had enhanced its engine and put on additional armor plates that were of a higher quality than the standard ones. He also sported the FIRE's Positron Beam Cannon and an Assault Ordinance Projector packing GREEN rounds. Seeking safety in numbers Akemi decided to hang with Werner's fighters while he looked for Pillagers to hit with his antimatter laser and missiles. At the same time if he saw a carrier looking like it might give one of their ships trouble he'd turn his attention to it.

"Hey Daniels, are Ash and Kiri up here too?" Akemi asked. "I'm the dude in the GIRTH." While the former soldier looked for juicy targets he let his pulse laser arrays handle any missiles coming his way or towards nearby hired help. He also had two forearm Plasma Chainguns from a FIRE and one mounted on his backpack as well as a shoulder mounted Extended DART Rack to assist him in taking out light enemies. Plus there were the EARTH's standard ARROW micro-missiles.

 

[Ametheliana]

The Pumpkin Eater
I'ee Space

Outfitted in a space suit, Aashi had made the jump into I'ee space, playing her part of the leap frog attack they were to carry out against the NMX occupying the territory. Initial force had been put on the enemy perimeter fleet and now it was time for Aashi to step in with the missiles aboard her ship. She immediately found her place in the lineup and guided the Pumpkin Eater close to where a grouping of unassaulted Pillagers, carriers, fighters, and bombers were located.

"I'm handing over piloting controls to the ship and manning weapons systems, 46!" Aashi relayed to the gynoid. "I want you to watch the controls and see what the ship does. Learn from it and step in if necessary. I'll be here to guide you through it! This is going to be fun!"

It had been months since a space battle had taken place in the Iromakuanhe's life and it was breathing life into her.

"Weapons online. Locking on..."

She felt the adrenaline pump through her body and her thoughts sped, unencumbered by anything and focused on the mission at hand.

"I've targeted them, firing now!" With a volley of shots fired at a Pillager, she changed her attack to another, fired, then another and fired. She went after a carrier next. She fired along it, going across its belly. She watched the aftermath and fired a few more missiles into the same positions, to be sure.

 

[Perilous Siege]

Jason's having the Best/Worst day

This was going to be it. It was finally go time, the moment he had spent his entire, remarkably short span of life waiting for. After innumerable hours of simulated combat back at the program, and the proverbial roller coaster that had been his first week or so on working for a fledgling empire he was finally about to pilot his mecha in a real battle. It was an even better "first blood" then he could hope for considering that he was being given command of the rest of the U.S.O's Frames and would be leading the mission to extract some very important cargo from a disabled enemy carrier. All in all, this should be the happiest day of his life so, bar none. Even more than when he had finally being taken out of that hellhole called the SSI and given some semblance of a purpose. It was perfect.

On the other hand, not too long ago he had been told by a man that had fought in every major conflict since the Second Elysian War that the skills he been forced to cultivate since he was born only stacked up to the job of cannon fodder, and the day was still young. Plenty of time for calamity to strike and turn the spoils of victory to ash.

Alex was the first of the squadron to sortie as most might expect from him, barely waiting for the initial trap and Alpha Strike before he rocketed out of the hanger towards their objective. Mindware sending news of their departure at the speed of thought, the rest of the team weren't about to let his call for backup go unheeded, and Jason followed his comrades into the ether right after Ronin's relatively ancient machine disembarked. The scene outside of his cockpit was a scene of desolation and disarray, which was an ironically heartening given the circumstances.They had largely lost their fleet of drones in the initial exchange, but in exchange, a fair amount of the battlegroups escorts had been rendered to scrap and it's flagship while luckily still intact had definitely seen better days,given how a large chunk of it was all but slag. Meanwhile, an aurora of lasers, swarms of missiles, and barrages of relativistic rounds tore the surprised, disorganized battlepod wings apart.

As many of the pilots made the move to fall back and regroup around their crippled but still intact mothership, despite advancing under the covering fire of the Necromancer., his squad weren't without defenders to bust through, and fastest on the team it was long before he would be amidst them. Under the belief that he was best served by imitating what had gotten them into his position, in the span of a second all four of his missile pods spat out over two hundred Guided Antimatter rockets once he was sure no friendlies would be caught in the carnage. Between the far faster speeds of the mini missiles, the "knight fight" distances they were working with, and the huge explosive radius of their munitions Jason didn't need it's guidance them to overwhelm their ability to evade or shoot down, or even deny them a chance to retaliate as the M5's pristine form attested.

Zipping past the dozens of obliterated hulls that made up the bulk of the defensive screen between the team and it's target all 8 kirin feathers deployed around him, the Seraphim's AI keeping them close to defend the origin mecha from rebuke. Faster then even the battlepods he was up against and possessing incredibly small structures despite their firepower, they had little trouble assisting Jason's anti-missile systems or keeping out of the firing arc of the the battlepods dual turrets. Those vengeful Mishhuvurthyar who thought to pursue on his six invariably found themselves either swarmed, overwhelmed by the Kirin Feathers or torn to shreds by Jason's gauss weaponry while distracted by them.

A low whistle escaped his lips as Ronin's latest kill, the veterans slick moves overwhelming the gunship. His brothers taste for theatrics wasn't lost on him either as he saw the young man, having abandoned it's makeshift shield at Ronin's urges flit around their enemy, meting out death as he did so, finally stopping for a moment too....was that a salute?

"All right people, time to do what we came for. You should already have the layout and I have likely locations for where their keeping the cargo marked. Tear through the hulls, just start chucking out containers like we;ve been told, the fleet will recover them afterward. We need to be careful, but the ships are tough and time is a factor. Vier, their hangers shields seem to be down, so if you can send some Junkers that way I can clear an initial beachhead so we can get some forces inside.

 

[Alex Hart]

Boarding Action! Or, Alex Doesn't Realize That He is Being Theatrical

Alex was the first one to hit the deck, entering through the launch bay closest to his group. As he hit the deck of the hanger he spun in a circle as he skidded forward, his wrist mounted guns spitting rounds, chewing through the unprepared Mishuu left unprotected from his assault. The rounds tore into the many fighters and small craft waiting for pilots, disabling them. At least a dozen, maybe more, of the gunships and fighters looked easily salvageable, but were inoperable for the moment.

He then used the head mounted laser to melt the doors to the hanger, preventing the crew of the ship from sending reinforcements. He then began to shove the cargo containers and disabled ships out into the void where they could be reclaimed by the USO.

 

[ArsenicJohn]

Necromancer Moon Pool

Corgan stood in the moon pool of the Necromancer in his newly upgraded Impulse armor. He had painted it dark red and put a black logo of some kind on the chest. Twin pistols crossed over a human skull. This Impulse was the best money could buy for non-SAoY personnel. On the outside, billet nerimium armor, climate controlled polymer weave with mesh and foam padding, even a moisture-wicking liner and a ballistics-reducing insert on the inside. He even had a FATE-A Consort AI installed.

The AI was still learning how to interact with him. He had chosen a husky female voice for the AI. "As soon as they're in, we make our move, Wendy. Those Frames can take a beating, but we won't last five minutes in open space." He said to the AI.

"Affirmative." She replied woodenly.

So far, she only seemed to be one of only two responses to his attempts at conversation. It seemed she would have to observe his interactions and learn to develop any personality. He sighed and shook his head. Even that was easier with the upgraded armor. It moved as easy as if he wasn't wearing a PA thanks to the military spec nanomuscle. He had never worn such high tech armor. Right now Corgan was feeling nearly invincible.

The HPAR33 with UMD round launcher he held by the "big boy" grip may have contributed to that feeling. A bandolier with six soda can size extra red warheads on one side and six blue warheads on the other side. He had a small pack with a few extra drums of ammo for the HPAR33 attached to the back hardpoint he'd freed up by getting the Space backplate. He was ready to kick some squid ass.

 

[Navian]

Uncertain Allies

The Shravana Hive fleet had arrived. Three Nomad-class corvettes, six Phantasm gunships, and the SHS Nirvana in all its glory. In formation, and ready for battle, they were a sight to see.

They were not in formation, nor were they ready for battle. Sight unseen, Nirvana supposed. Nirvana Nirvana One-One 8114-4500 was a Type V Freespacer synthetic intelligence, and for all practical purposes, the SHS Nirvana, which housed it and incorporated its brain the same way the bodies of its organic crew did their own. It had been chosen to command the Hive squadron for its loyalty, bravery, vast mental processing capabilities, and to no small extent its compassionate pacifism.

To many, this would seem an ironic trait to select for an acting commander. But, for those who mattered, it seemed just, and to Nirvana One-One, it simply was. The chaos the fleet found itself in after they exited FTL was, however, even more. It was time for One-One to start doing its job, which had apparently regressed to organizing the task force, rather than simply commanding it.

"We are late," Nirvana began, speaking to the Hivemind on secure channels. "The ambush has been sprung. Our 'first pass' tactic will lose merit by the time we gain order and are up to speed. Assume Vee formation and begin long-range bombardment." The three corvettes and their crews--of the Rohirri, the Hasta, and the Jessitha--were more than content to cease their panicked attempts to meet the needs of an impossible plan, and assume their positions in front and behind of Nirvana.

The gunships, all of which were operating without crew at the moment, were another matter. They were untested, and never before had they been in a position to rain death on an enemy, unchecked, and with no concern for the safety of others. The very nature of the Phantasms' propulsion systems made it all too easy to shed the reality of the situation, and there were six of them. The more parts, the more vulnerabilities, as Nirvana itself knew too well.

Three gunships accepted the suggestion of a cautious approach with the main formation. Two flew out to engage with their Red Mercury Blasters, having no such concern. One appeared to have decided it'd had enough of waiting, and closing in as fast as it could to aim and launch its torpedoes, in an effort the first Mishhu fleet's failing battle line, one gunship against a swarm of battlepods.

Harrumph, is what One-One would have thought, if it thought in such terms.

Groundbreaker Eight-Four sat in what had once been the captain's chair, many years ago, when the Nirvana had such a position, in its past life. Though imposing, its console had little use, which suited all involved just fine, as Eight-Four would have nothing to do in her specialty this battle unless an unidentified class of vessel appeared on the sensor scans. "Is this part of the plan?"

She smirked at nothing in particular, which could easily be interpreted as a smirk at Nirvana One-One. It did not dignify the question, just as it hadn't about twenty others in as many seconds. Queenie drummed her fingers on the arm of the big chair for a few more, before the mechanical, musical voice of the local Codetalker spoke up, without her head. "It's not. Sraveena says we should follow."

"That's not how this works," Stargazer Five-Seven chimed in plaintively, shaking his shaven head.

The Groundbreaker addressed the ship once again. "In your own time, Nirvana..."

It wasn't an order. It wasn't even a full sentence. Still, the meaning was clear. Hurry up and act.

 

[Zack]

Operation Bright Venom: T+ 10 Seconds

NMX, Second Unit Carrier

It had only been 10 seconds since this enemy force had shown up.

Almost instantly Fhion had felt the electronic tug in her mind indicating that the Commanding Officer on the first unit carrier had been killed, followed by more than a third of their fleet strength.

And she had just become the ranking officer.

The brown skin neko clutched the hilt of her sword tightly, her mind racing to think to think of how to react, there were so many targets, so many options, so many things to consider. Missiles were already impacting her carrier's shields.

~Stop~

She focused her mind, start inward, work outward. Make the problem small. Even as she started speaking her digital mind was already uploading action plans to the rest of the fleet.

"All ships, take this course. Focus point defenses on these ships and follow my targeting assignments."

The remaining bits of the NMX fleet headed right in, the remaining pillagers and carriers flying right towards the I'ee's would be saviors. In moments USO's combat drones were ahead and slightly to the left, while the mercenary ships were ahead and slightly to the right.

The first volley from the small turrets on the Pillagers would bracket in one of the mercenary ships, the fire pattern missing more than half its shots, but leaving the target ship no where to evade to, shredding it apart in seconds.

The second volley headed in the opposite direction, quickly collapsing the shields of one of the attack drones, slamming into the drone in one massive wave that left little behind.

This was before the main guns on the pillagers got their turn, their barrage joining the guns of the NMX carriers as the larger ships fired in both directions. These large, bright, bolts all arriving at their targets in a perfectly patterned volley, another mercenary ship being vaporized instantly along with three more of the attack drones.

"Launch Torpedoes, My Target."

The pillagers all fired at the same time. The formation staying together tightly, the well drilled fire teams co-ordinating their strikes. The torpedoes heading out and towards the enemy fleet....

... only to harmlessly scatter off into space.

Fhion only allowed herself a moment to figure out what happened... Space ship, powerful emissions, subspace-radar seekers on the torpedoes. A plan was already forming in her head, she wouldn't let ECM work twice. She was already forming a plan for that.

"Launch all remaining battlepods,

Of course, the carriers didn't need to be told that. Their remaining battlepod started to launch, along with those still on the pillagers, nearly a dozen of the small fighters joining the fight every few seconds.

Fhion's attention then turned to buying some more time while she figured the rest of this problem out. The Nepleslian ship was back... she didn't so much as see it as she felt it. The shape, the emissions, all sensor data being fed to her that her mind processed and digested in was that she wasn't always consciously aware of. This whole attack stunk of the old man, Spacers, Drones, The nepleslian ship and FTL shananagins...

Luckily she knew he was very hesitant to throw people away...

"Battlepods belonging to the First unit, break off your defense of the carrier and target the I'ee ship."

That should buy them some time...


NMX First Unit Battlepods

The mecha team had certainly managed to kill off many of the battlepods, various small fighter craft of all types swarming around them, trying to make sure their path towards the carrier was clear... for a moment it seemed like they would have a hard time fighting through the dozens of mass-produced battlepods, and then a few seconds later they were all gone, all turning towards the White Lament and heading towards it at full speed, leaving the carrier alone!

The pods would zip forward, and then all start slowing down just a bit, turning twisting, and some firing, before re-orienting themselves and again heading towards the I'ee ship. Each few seconds the pods would have to stop, re-orient, and close in on the White-Lament, the heavy jamming seriously disrupting their subspace radar, forcing them to switch to thermal imaging... and then having to wait for the light-speed lag time to 'catch up'.

There were nearly 2 dozen battlepods in flight, all starting to fire as they closed the distance.

NMX First Unit Carrier

The Carrier was done for... but no one had yet been able to inform it's crew. With no one commanding the ship, the entire carrier just continued forward in a very slow, lazy, corkscrew. The underside guns were starting to come around, straining to take aim at the Nercomancer, waiting for their opportunity once the ship had spun enough.

The Junker drones launched off of the Necromancer followed shortly behind the Mecha, unit, slowing themselves down before slamming against the Carrier's hull, arms and cutting torches starting to disassemble the exterior of the ship.

On the inside of the carrier, the flight crews preparing battlepods for launch would all start making a dash for something to hide behind as Alex's mecha slammed onto the deck, damaging doors, and sending people scattering. His bullets were easily enough to damage the battlepods on the launch catapult, and the one directly in front of him had its central optics smashed, smoke balling up around it as the gravity on the flight deck failed, allowing metal fragments and tools to start floating up...

of course, the battle pod was still on the launch catapult. Though the one directly in front of Alex was clearly dead, and the others nearby couldn't actually turn to shoot at them. The flight crew could still launch them!

With a dull 'THUNK' the catapult switched on, sending a line of battlepods hurling towards Alex!

Even before they finished launching, the crew was readying another line of battlepods for launch, doing their best to ignore the intruders.

Behind them, the floating NMX types were busy boarding shredder gunships, going through the startup process despite being stuck behind a large bulk of battlepods, cargo containers, and tool lockers.

And even behind that, there was another craft that Alex hadn't seen, and certainly wasn't in their briefing regarding what ship types to expect.

 

[LittleWasp]

Swatting Flies with a Lance

"The Misshuvarthyar send their small craft to us," Gut-Stripe broadcast, again openly to all present. "We require assistance in destroying them, as they are too nimble for our cannon. We now fire." At Gut-Stripe's word, the corvette's cannon fired again, sending another orange particle 'bubble' soaring towards the carrier.

 

[Amaryllis]

Not wanting to risk drawing any more attention from nimble battlepods than he inevitably would, Akemi decided to let the others deal with the I'ee and looked to see what he could do to the nearest new carrier with a one-two punch from his Positron Beam Cannon and Assault Ordinance Projector. Or at least he would assuming there were some fighters on his side to continue flying with towards it. Ideally he would aim for engines but since it'd still have its shields up he figured simply flying along one with evasive maneuvers as far away as he could from the smaller turrets while firing was good enough.

If battlepods gave him trouble he'd fire missiles and plasma to try to get rid of them but he wanted nothing to do with them until he was forced to engage them.

If there was little to fly with towards one the Neko would aim at pods going after the I'ee instead and try to conserve his ammo and only target enemies that looked like easy kills or that appeared to be in a prime position to kill one of their own fighters.

 

[Dumont]

Tactical Defensive Ship Snuggle Formation:

From the perspective of the battlepods, the Lament's lagtastic detection rate had started to paint a rather odd picture. It seemed to be turning to accelerate one direction, then after their first volley seemed to be listing to the side as if having suffered a major hit. This information was quite incongruous as it didn't take an idiot to realize that it was highly likely they missed their first volley. Yet, their thermal targeting indicated otherwise as the Lament seemed to drift almost drunkenly through space and smash directly into the I'ee ship, emitting a burst of radiation which would normally indicate two ships crashing and breaching reactors.

Something funny was definitely going on.

In actuality, Arccos had pinged a vote on a blind bluff maneuver. Pulling it off on local polysentience to have the Lament's new Wayfarer pilot pull off the drunken swerving to feign ship damage, and fly towards the I'ee ship. What looked like an explosion was just Arccos spoofing it using the ECM suite to fake a ship crash, the junkers ejecting some slag from the automanufactory and fragments of the old reactor rods to have irradiated debris picked up on radar.

From the perspective of the battlepod pilots, they'd killed two birds with one stone.

From the I'ee perspective this was a very different happening, as about all the warning they got was that the Dragoon received a short message: "Prepare for docking maneuver."

A second later, Gut-Stripe's Dragoon found itself being scooped into the open maw of the Lament's manufacturing bay, held in place by a dozen mechanical arms in a ship to ship hug-maneuver. One which still had the I'ee craft's main gun pointing to space through the open doors. The arithmetic was simple, in its own way: The Lament was a hulking mass of armor and reinforced ship architecture with some limited shielding and no main gun. Gut-Stripe's vessel was a delicate craft with a strong main gun but weak armor and no shielding. By their powers combined, Gut-Stripe's little vessel was now far more protected than it had ever been and could fire with impunity.

"We'll synch up sensors and give you firing data. Pop open doors when you can fire, but keep you covered between shots. Tell us what you want to shoot at and we'll get you the angle..." Arccos said to Gut-Stripe over comms.

Mercenary Mambo:

As one ship was shredded, and another was vaporised, the mercenary fleet fell back. Which was to say that they kept accelerating to pass underneath the Misshu fleet, and swerve upwards. Completely moving around behind their formation, to create a two front battle. Remaining ships in the spearhead of his assault drifting apart just enough as to keep it difficult to focus fire on his part of the battle, turning to drift at an angle where a majority of fire would begin to glance off their shielding rather than score direct hits. Incredibly fine maneuvering, indeed as he pressed the counterattack to the rear, the main guns lancing beams of light to strike across the stern of the second fleet pillagers which were focused upon the drone craft.

With luck, their controller would return the favor. It seemed that Daniels considered that their enemy's main advantage in this fight would be the more overwhelming main guns held by the pillagers, as opposed to the battlepods being launched. And they weren't even being launched at his part of the fleet!

While his ships did their maneuvering, his mecha and fighter wing did their job. Somewhere out there a mercenary would for a split second observe their life being saved by a distant Alex. While they were too far away to return the salute, they were thankful for... Whoever it was that did that. Indeed, that mercenary went on to cleave into the torpedo bay of another Pillager, which was foolishly built by Misshu engineers into the engines of such a vessel. A rippling explosion coursing through the wing of the craft, causing it to list and lose its ability to effectively maneuver.

The mechs continued their leapfrog assault. Already having covered the boarding teams, their job now was to act as a debuff on their enemy, so to speak. Bursting from one vessel's hull to another to prevent fire being focused upon them, at least not without severely damaging the vessels they were boarding to assault. Firing to cleave off turrets, and explode torpedo bays. Their fighter cohort keeping fire on themselves to cover the advance of the mechs.

From the site of those first two boardings, however, came a dirty trick indeed. As the battles within the decks commenced and was traded back and forth, from both vessels started to come a stream of captured enemy soldiers. Misshu and nekovalkyrja alike starting to float out of hull breaches and open airlocks, nested in little bubble shields able to contain atmosphere, and outfitted with little transmitters to make them ping on sensors. Able to be picked up later for capture.

But, both of those boarded ships started to come back to life, as within the boarders which had targetted engineering and the bridge for first locations started to gain control of the vessels. The two pillagers turning to lock their main weapons on one of the carriers in the Misshu rear fleet. The two commandeered ships accelerating towards the carrier, opening fire with every turret still active.

While one of the two had on-board enemy fighters still conscious enough to blast off one side of the ship's engines to avert course and send it tumbling uselessly into space, unable to steer; the second commandeered pillager kept course long enough to smash into one of the remaining damaged carriers in the Misshu rear fleet, firing off its main cannon at point blank.

At the last second, the mercenary armored boarding teams evacuated ship. Leaping out of their vessel and accelerating to rendezvous with the mech flight.