[M]Galactic Empires ::IC::
Somewhere, a woman was screaming. Gunshot, silence.
His father is kneeling on the marble floor, next to him. An Internal Security Soldier holds him down, on his knees, with a carbine pointed at the back of his skull. He had clawed and kicked as they dragged him out of bed, until they had split his lip and blackened his eye. He could feel his face swelling already.
“Perhaps, now, with your sons life on the line, you are willing to discuss the deals you made with the Terran Directorate, selling state secrets?” Asks the knife faced man with the jagged scar that twitches his lips into a permanent, cruel smirk. He is hauled to his feet and behind him, something clicks.
His father looks at him, and then back to the ISS officer. “Go fuck yourself.”
“Wrong answer.” Knife-face nods to the soldier behind him. The barrel shifts down and there is an explosion of pain that cuts through his stomach. Blood sprays across the marble floor and onto the rich, imported fur rug that dominated the central space of the main hall of his families mansion. He slumps forward, in agony, but he does not scream. Only girls scream.
“This one has some spine, it seems. Like his father.” Offers Knife-Face. “If you tell me what you told the Terran dogs, I can save him.”
He thrashes on the floor, trying to hold in his guts. His eyes meet his fathers.
“Its on my personal computer, hidden in a writing desk in the study. Just twist the ink well to the left. The password is Misericorde.”
“Right answer.” smirks Knife-Face. He snaps a gauss pistol into his hand and fires twice. Once in the head, and once in the heart. “Traitor.” Knife-Face looks at the pistol, and with a tut, flicks the safety back on and re-holsters it as his father slumps bonelessly over, blood pouring from his wounds.
“Though you did make good weapons for us.” Knife-Face then turned his gaze to him. “So boy, do you want to live?”
Its all he can manage to spit a gobbet of blood at his pristine, black boots. Knife-face laughs.
“Spine and spirit. Excellent. You know, my wife and I have been trying for a son for years. I think you'll do just fine.” He turns to the soldier. “Ice-box him immediately for medical evac. I want him alive and restored.”
“Yes, Commander Shraplen”
Shraplen. He thinks. Shraplen is the man I must kill.
Years pass in a blur of torture. Mrs Shraplen, her two daughters, all despise him, torture him when the Commander is not present. They starve him, beat him, humiliate him. He nurses his anger, his hatred, his rage. He beats it down and forges it into something white hot, dense and dangerous. He enters military school, passes with honours despite his bionic organs. He enters officer school, and passes again with honours. His two 'sisters' do nothing but waste their lives, rejecting marriage proposal after marriage proposal. His 'mother' becomes a fat leech, worthless. Knife-face is the only one who attends the ceremony to see him raised to the rank of Second Lieutenant, and the pride on his twisted face makes him sick.
Years pass in the military. He becomes known as the 'Iron Wolf' for his savage attacks on the Charabidians. He is known for flaying the animals alive for information, then decorating his quarters with their pelts. He rises through the ranks, over the bodies of his rivals if need be. His flesh, still weak from that first traumatic injury, is chopped away by the butchers of the Lyran Armed Forces for more metal, more plastic. He is a monster, and the men are terrified of him, but he does not care. As long as they serve him, fear will serve in place of loyalty.
Finally, the Night of Shadows. Civil strife rocks the Lyran homeworld, and he claims control of the ISS for himself, in the name of Warmaster Dominic MacIntyre. MacIntyre, in return for this loyalty, raises him to the rank of Admiral, in charge of the ISS own war fleet, and millions of ISS soldiers, informants, agents and more. He is ready.
It is the dead of night when the VTOLs sweep in on his second home. His men, loyal to him through terror, smash through windows and kick down doors, and gather up, at gunpoint, frightened servants to be interrogated, mind-wiped, then turned into combat cyborgs. His 'Mother' and 'Sisters', those he gathers in the dining room.
Knife-Face and him watch as they are torn apart by dogs. He drinks wine as he listens to their screams, the tearing of flesh from bone. Finally, he turns to his adoptive father.
“Anything to say?” he rasps from bionic lungs, his birth ones rotted away years ago.
Commander Shraplen is in his nightclothes, handcuffed to a fine wooden chair. Old Knife-face turns to look at him with tears in his eyes.
“I have never been more proud, my son.”
He stands, smashing the table aside with a sweep of his monstrously strong augmetic limbs. He snatches up a gauss pistol, his true fathers personal weapon, and jams it into Knife-Faces gut. He fires twice.
“How about now?” He whispers as the light fades from Knife-Faces eyes.
“I. . I Love you.” Knife-Face whispers, and goes to his grave with that same, sardonic smile etched on his face.
They firebomb the house on their way out. The mansion burns. A fitting pyre for the man who raised him.
Commander Shraplen was dead. Only the Iron Wolf remained.
++++++
Four fleets stand ready, across the galaxy. His has a special mission in this carefully assembled first strike, hastily appended. A mission entrusted to him and him alone by Warmaster Dominic MacIntyre. The Iron Wolfs orders where simple, to not only blast the homeworld of the Kel-Cyre into radioactive rubble, but to snatch the prize of the collectors ship from their hands for the Lyran Empire.
He stood on the bridge of the experimental Dreadnought Purity, watching and waiting. Around him the bridge crew managed feeds hacked directly from Kel-Cyre communication and weather satellites, providing them with up to the minute information on the near orbital space of the elves homeworld. It would be a devastating surprise attack. In fifteen minutes, his fleet would attack. At the same time, fleets would assault Charabidia, Server 001 and even Terra. Four simultaneous decapitating strikes, in planning for months but accelerated to today because of the prize of the collectors ship.
“Update on the Octavian Maiden?”
“Still impounded, Admiral.”
How long until that fool Quentin talked, and ruined everything? That traitor, turning down the chance to join her people in scouring the galaxy clean of filth. Then, what did he expect of a half breed? Too soft. Too weak. Too afraid.
“Sir, energy spike from Objective Alpha!”
He watched, alarmed, as alien engines flared to life and energy readings climbed.
“Is it slipping its moorings?” he growled, his voice distorted by the replacement larynx.
“Unknown!”
He snarled, thumping a carbon black fist into the command chairs arm. “If we lose Objective Alpha, months of planning will be wasted. All fleet units, attack!”
“But, the other fleets, we are operating dark! The other homeworlds could realise what is happening, and we can't accelerate the time table!”
“Thats a problem for someone else.” He rose, stalking towards the deck officer who was defying him. A long cloak of Charabidian hide trailed over his shoulders as he thudded towards the man, who was now shrinking away. “Launch. The. Attack.”
++++++
Vice Admiral Yinlynn was aboard the Kel'Cyre Dreadnought. 'The Dawn of Light' and observed several ships of each species that had come to the meeting on her homeplanet. She was surprised they had all come quickly to discuss the matter of an ancient ship that had been recently discovered. Normally, it took months for the Concord to decide anything. Her crew where on alert, but they where still functioning as glorified customs officials, tracking the orbits of visiting ships from not just the Core Powers, but dozens of minor races. The Lyrans where represented by a single impounded vessel, the Octavian Maiden, held firm in docking clamps by an orbital station, after they had withdrawn their embassies and withdrawn from the Concert.
Though that changed when one of her officers spoke loud and clear and shot up from her seat. "Admiral! Multiple wormhole signatures!"
The Vice Admiral gasped in shock and then, gritted her teeth. The sensors showed dozens of opening vortexs, each one recklessly close to the planets gravity well. Immediately the screen filled with contacts, and hundreds of fighters backed by squadrons of destroyers poured through the snarls in space. Behind them came the big ships, Cruisers, and Battleships, flanked by Frigates. An entire Lyran battlefleet, roaring in hot. At the centre of the fleet, screened, was the largest Dreadnought she had ever seen. While most Lyran ships had a certain recognisable layout, this one was different. Even as she watched, the vast ship unfolded like a bird about to take flight. . .
Those fins are radiators. . .
“EVASIVE MANOUVERS!” She screamed, and held onto the rail as the Dawn of Light hauled around. She couldn't tear her eyes away from the monstrous super capital. It was twice the size of her own command ship, and built around a single, huge, gun. Even as she watched, the energy readings from the command ship climbed of the scale of their sensors.
Around her ship it was anarchy. Defence systems opened fire, warships turned to face the charging battlegroup. Then the Lyrans fired. Frigates and destroyers, picket ships and carriers died in barrages so accurate that she swore someone was calling the shots for them inside the defence perimeter. Then the Dreadnought fired. A brilliant, blinding beam, visible from the surface of her homeworld. It punched through the orbiting north polar habitat, tearing through the facing shield like gossamer and out the other side, coring its reactor in one shot. Near orbital space was instantly reduced to chaos as the station detonated, raining debris across the northern hemisphere.
“All ships! Defensive formation!” She was sweating. “Don't let them get any closer to the surface!”
The following hour of naval combat would go on record as the most harrowing in galactic history. Using their capitals as a battering ram, the Lyrans smashed aside all organised resistance and quickly scattered the visiting alien ships, before taking pot shots at fleeing civilian craft and bombarding the surface of Kel-Cyre. Shielded habitats where smashed one at a time by the massive beam weapon of the Purity, each shot releasing titanic energies. Eventually, Vice Admiral Yinlynn, alongside the visiting Princess from the Charabidian Enclaves, Admiral Janessa Daysun-Shen, would be able to marshal an organised resistance. The Dawn of Light and Wrathful Hand led a counter attack that drove the enemy off, but not before they took their prize.
During the fighting, Lyran marines stormed the orbital dock holding the Collector vessel, powered up its engines, and absconded with it as a prize.
++++++
The news flashed around the galaxy at different speeds. It got to the Charabidians first, mainly because they spy on everybody. Rather than wait for confirmation, they moved the homeworld fleet to full alert. When the Lyrans attacked, bare minutes later, they found the Royal Fleet ready and waiting, and a massive brawl broke out over the homeworld that lasted for six hours. Despite taking heavy casualties, the Royal Fleet was able to almost completely destroy the invading Lyrans.
Around 001, the Sentinax where forewarned by the sudden loss of contact with units on the Polar Habitat. They activated previously unheard of interdiction systems that meant the Lyrans could not establish a stable jump point, and the attack was called off. Rather than waste the trip, the Lyrans split their fleet and attacked 002 and 003, destroying war-vital fuel refineries, ship yards and orbital factories before retreating, hounded all the way. They would demolish several other facilities on their way out, ironically doing more damage to the Concerts future war effort than any of the other attacks.
Around Earth, the warning came in time for the Lunar Fighter Defence Force, who where able to interfere with the initial waves, heroically sacrificing their fighters in suicidal ramming attacks against the larger capital ships when their ammunition ran dry. With the Lyrans thrown into chaos, the forces stationed over Earth would rally and drive off the attackers, who in spite as they retreated, blasted Luna's surface, opening colony domes to hard vacuum.
Across the galaxy, millions died to that first attack, many of the them civilians. First came shock. Then, rage. Decelerations of War and promises of assistance travelled between the four powers, and they began to mobilise.
++++++
For the Kel-Cyre, the shock lasted longer than the rage. Their beautiful homeworld had been savaged, and so many had died that their traditional funerary practices began to become overloaded. Crematoriums worked round the clock as over-stretched rescue teams combed through radioactive rubble for survivors. Plague and famine returned to Kel-Cyre for the first time in nearly a thousand years. Aid missions from other worlds were hampered by the debris clogging near orbit. Kel-Cyre had been smashed back into the dark ages, and their empire was paralysed, the head cleanly lopped off, their entire government dead in one savage attack, the command structure of their armies and navies shattered. While this damage would heal, it would take time.
It was this Kel-Cyre, beaten, bloodied and nearly broken, that the fleet gathered at. Charabidian scout cruisers had shadowed the Purity and its battlefleet. Now all that remained was deciding amongst the commanders how to proceed.
++++++
The cell was spartan and bare. Quentin was unsure what ship she was on, as she had been transferred several times, but her jailers had stopped being Kel-Cyre marines and had instead become Charabidian Royal Clan security agents. She had been questioned, politely but firmly. She had been fed, watered and allowed to clean herself, and the lights in the cell had dimmed to a predictable twenty five hour cycle. They had even provided some books. Pretty trashy romance novels from the Enclaves, but still, enough to keep her from going completely mad with boredom. She mostly ignored the books having no desire to read them, instead she exercised. Her jailers had taken her sword belt, regular belt, shoes and uniform coat. Anything that could be used in a suicide attempt, they had even scanned her for poison capsules not finding any. That was a cowards way out and Quentin always refused them when issued. The cell had an exposed pipe that she was currently using for chin ups.
Finally, the cell door opened and she was escorted not to a witness room, but down a new corridor. After a short elevator ride, she found herself in an observation deck, looking out on the surface of Kel-Cyre. Sitting on a couch, looking intently at the view, was a Charabidian officer, from the braid on her shoulders, an Admiral at least Quentin had been a civilian too long and couldn't quite place the rank. Standing off nearby was another female, wearing subdued dark colours Quentin would expect from a servant.
The two guards removed her manacles and gestured for her to sit. Cautiously, she did, and found her gaze drawn not to the officer with her sternly set face, but to the world outside the window. It looked scarred, bruised. Her keen eyes drifted across the scene, picking out bright flashes of metal that must be wreckage. While the ship had been impounded she had been isolated from all news, but this looked serious.
“Currently, the remnants of the Kel-Cyres government is calling for your head on a plate.” the officer turned to look at her with a sardonic smile. “This is a culture that hasn't executed anyone in six generations, let alone a foreign national. You might be asking what you did to deserve that special treatment.” She leaned forwards again, her cats eyes narrowing as they fixed on the injured world spinning below. “48 standard hours ago, the Lyrans launched a massive attack. Thanks to computer viruses carried into the local data system by your vessel, planted there we believe by the Lyran ISS, the first strike that fell here was brutal and overwhelming. Down there, nearly a billion people are dead, injured or missing, most of them civilians. At my homeworld, I lost three brothers, six sisters, and my genetic father in one of the largest naval engagements our Clan has ever fought. Our casualties ran to the thousands, all military personnel, thank the spirits. The leader of the attack here jumped the gun we believe, so many worlds were forewarned” she stood, brushing her trousers clean of some imaginary dirt. “But the damage, to Throneworld, to 001, to Terra, is still severe.” She paused, before turning to Quentin. “And yet, and yet you tried to warn us. I want to know why.”
"One of my technicians found the software. When he brought it to my attention I had no idea it was there. Shortly after I received a encrypted communication from the ISS with instructions to leave the software alone. My technician had already identified the virus. I tried sending out an alert but found another virus attached to my orders from the ISS had jammed traditional communications. I had to get creative but I managed to send a message on an outdated system. " Quentin said, her eyes drifting back to the carnage below unable to pull her eyes away. "Why you ask? I haven't been in the military for four years, I was placed in the reserves. Thanks, to my family ties there is no official record of this but my removal from active duty was not voluntary. As my superiors say, I have an attitude unbecoming of an officer. My step father blames it on my Terran father. I don't share the opinion of my people, the Lyrans believe themselves to be superior and want to control the galaxy. It's a fools errand that will never happen. We need to integrate with the rest of the galaxy or we will be destroyed in our attempts. That is why I did it."
Admiral Janessa refixed her eyes on wounded planet below.
"The commander in charge of this atrocity had one main objective. He stole the Collectors ship. The fleet command vessel had technology we haven't even begin to figure out yet. I think we'll need you, and your inside knowledge, before this is over."
She turned on her heels and fixed Quentin with her gaze.
"Can you follow orders? Can you, and your crew, fire on your countrymen? My orders are to get that ship back, using any means necessary. If the answer is yes, I am authorised to release your ship from being impounded and incorporate it into our strike force."
"The crew will follow my orders, Captain Klien shares my views on our people. As much as it pains me if fighting my countrymen is what it takes to save my people then I will do it." Quentin said, looking at the woman before her knowing by the way the woman carried herself she was a skilled commander and no doubt would choose her words wisely. "Release my ship." She paused the words processing through her mind thinking what she would do if their positions were reversed. The Kel-Cyre viewed her as the cause of all of this, a mass murderer. The way the woman before her spoke made Quentin think her fate wasn't set in stone but there was no way the Kel-Cyre would tolerate her going free. "But not me."
"Very honourable of you." a ghost of a smile passed over her features. "Very well. I'll keep you close as an advisor, on the bridge of the Wrathful Hand so you can advise us as we fight. And your ship can fight alongside us. And that should be enough to prove to the Kel-Cyre that you are innocent in all this."
She passed a data pad to the woman.
"Make a note of everything you'll need, and any staff you'd like transferred to work alongside you. I will be briefing the joint commanders shortly, and I expect you to be there.
"Klein won't believe it from anyone other then me. I'll need to speak directly to him." Quentin said tapping away at the data pad. She mostly put down a list of some of her personal belongings, some civilian clothing, and a few books of better taste, knowing they wouldn't let her have much more. She really wanted to get out of her uniform, if she wanted to prove she wasn't in league with the Lyrans it would help to not be wearing their uniform and she never was a fan of the dress uniform she much preferred her fatigues when in uniform. " I don't suppose I could have my shoes back? I assure you I have no desire to kill myself. And there is the matter of the virus on my ship. My tech guys are good but they aren't experts. We'll need to make sure it has been scrubbed from the ship's servers."
“Shoes can be arranged, as can some techs to help with making sure ships servers have been scrubbed.” She took the pad back and scanned the list, before handing it off to the woman waiting in the shadows. “I'll have the items brought to new quarters on the command deck. But now, we have a meeting to get too.”
+++++
"Sons and daughters of Lyre, your destiny beckons. Stand with your brothers and sisters, stand with me, and together we will be undefeated. The past is our faith, the present is our strength, and the future... the future is our birthright! Sons and daughters of Lyre, the path toward a better tomorrow stretches out before us. Toward a future that is golden and eternal. But our journey together must cross a wilderness of hatred and bigotry, a landscape of lies seeded by the venom of our old enemy. Our foe knows us. He fears us. But we must not underestimate him. The Terrans, while they cower and snipe from beneath their veneer of civility and freedom, are soulless and hollow. They make their pithy, mewling claims of liberty and righteousness, and all the while, the aliens look upon the face of true humanity with loathing and disgust. The enemy sees us as abominations, mutant freaks fit only for killing. To the foe we are less than alive, but they will learn their mistake, my people. We will show them the iron and steel beneath Lyran flesh. We shall cast them against the unbreakable rock of our collective will. We will make them realize the truth that the children of Lyre know in their hearts: that our race, the Lyran Empire, is the next step in the evolution of mankind. When we came to Lyre we were lost, a broken collection of the defeated, without hope for the future. At first we thought our new world would poison and destroy us. How wrong we were. Lyre saw what was in every one of us, our strength and our indestructible spirit, and made it manifest. This great change was the rebirth of our people. A people fit to stride the stars and shatter our enemies. Sons and daughters of Lyre, you are the embodiment of that glorious legacy, the inheritors of the victory that we fight for every day. You alone are fit to forge the future and the destiny of our species. History does not long entrust the care of freedom to the weak or the timid. We shall not suffer the irresolute and spineless men of the Terran Alliance to dictate our path! When you granted me the privilege of your leadership, I, Dominic MacIntyre, willingly sacrificed myself to the engine of our nation. My only goal to bring our people the absolute and deserved mastery of their destiny. I am humbled by the magnificent example that you my people have set. The workers and artisans among you who toil and ask not for a claim, but accept the honor of your leaders. The soldiers and warriors who burn with cold fire and unyielding resolve never flinching before the guns of our adversaries. The teachers and commissars who hold the very soul of our people in their hands, shielding it from the lies of the treacherous and disloyal. You seek reward in service alone. Each of you shares in the greatest glory of them all. You are the true Lyrans! Ruthless to those who oppose us, masters of those we defeat, unflinching in the face of adversity. I pity all those who were not born beneath our banner, for they will never know the touch of greatness as we do. And yet, there are some among our community who do not march with us. Voices raised in dissent and opposition. Soft minds that take the words of the Terrans for truth! To those who bear the seeds of rebellion in their hearts and question the way of the Lyrans, I say this: Would you have us embrace the very thing that rejected us? Would you make us lay down our rifles and surrender our armor, stark naked before a force that wishes only death for us? Peace is something we all desire, but the Terrans would make it the peace of the grave! Shattering our nation's spirit and burning us to ashes! Beware the puppets amongst us, sons and daughters of Lyre! Know them, and spite them! Give them no succor or shelter! If any one of you doubts the fidelity of another, be it neighbour, brother, parent, or child, speak! It is the sworn duty of my commissars to isolate and re-educate these misguided souls. To bring them back to our fold. Expunge their weakness for the greater good! Our victory is imminent. With our hearts tempered in the fires of war we strive forward and take the fight to the foe. Let us never forget the duty that we have taken upon ourselves. Our enemy is tenacious and bold. The Terrans and alien filth dared to turn their weapons upon that which we hold dearest. Our cradle, our homeworld, our... Lyre! This invasion will not go unpunished. This criminal act unleashed the whirlwind of our wrath! Our guns never tire, and we have beaten back the foe! Sent them... running! The path we have chosen is not an easy one. Struggle is the father of all things and true virtue lies in bloodshed. But we will not tire, we will not falter, we will not fail! In the blood of our warriors comes the price we must pay. Blood alone moves the wheels of history. And we will be resolute! We will fear no sacrifice and surmount every difficulty to win our just triumph!"
Janessa turned of the transmission with a grunt of disgust, and the frenzied face of Warmaster MacIntyre disappeared from the screen. For a second she stared at the floor, before raising her eyes to look over the gathered commanders in the ready room aboard the Wrathful Hand.
"Its war. The Lyrans tricked us all, it seems. They are even lying to their own people: claiming the Charabidians launched a surprise attack with Terran help on Lyre. But that is not our primary worry."
She clicked and brought up two images, a map of Kel-Cyre with a series of red lines crossing from Lyran space deep into Kel-Cyre space, and the missing collector ship.
"Target Bravo was stolen 72 standard hours ago. My scout elements have been shadowing the fleet that stole it, and have found a chain of deep space recharge stations. Like leaving a cache to cross a desert, these recharge stations allowed the Lyrans to sneak fleets right into the central territories of each Core Power. Several Clan forces back home have found similar stations. Strangely, they haven't been destroying them as they retreat. Our mission is simple, get the Collector Ship, Target Bravo, back by any means necessary."
She flicked the screen, and the mysterious Dreadnought appeared.
"This was the lead attack ship, and has been classified as Target Alpha." She frowned as the ship appeared, and shots of it, and its sister ship involved in the attack on Charabidia, in combat played on the screen. "As you can see, its main linear weapon, which we have nicknamed the line gun can penetrate any static projected shield and armour is no defence. Further, it is protected at all times by a shield, something we thought was impossible, even on a ship this size. Target Alpha is the main obstacle to the successful retrieval of Target Bravo, and we currently have little intelligence on this monster."
She looked over the pirates, mercenaries, and rival captains arrayed around the table as her aide, Iroci, handed out dossiers with print outs of the available information. They where distressingly slim.
"At this point, ladies and gentleman, I am open to suggestions."
Bookmarks