Jump to content

The Death Merchants


Guest Shingen
 Share

Recommended Posts

Guest Shingen

Please limit to RP posts only.

[RP]

23:05 April 16, 3030

Tarean, Alpha Canis

A Empirian LRT broke the light of the Alpha Canis Star sending a long shadow dancing across the mountainous terrain of the planet's surface. The dark shape skimed and played along the rise and fall of the landscape, until it finally came to rest in a vast pit of desolation.

A ship had crashed there, sending vast amounts of debris scattered throughout the area. Inside the hole, a Battlecruiser MK3 carrier lay shattered and broken. It's hull melted and pited from uncontrolled planetfall. There was no life in the vicinity, only gutted earth and fallen trees laid out in the circular radius of the blastwave.

The Empirian LRT hovered above the crashsite and slowly descended until finally it came to rest 02km from the wreakage. The thrust of the descending transports engines spawned tornados of dust and debris. They ran away from the ship picking up broken components and decaying bodyparts. Finally, the LRT came to a halt and powered down.

Outside the transport, energy crackled and coalesced, restructuring DNA and rebuilding genetic information until three figures stood on the barren landscape. A small Empirian, and two MIM Kandorian mercs.

They were here for the salvage.

[/RP]

[ 10-10-2004, 09:35 PM: Message edited by: Shingen ]

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...
Guest Shingen

[RP]

12:16 April 17, 3030

UCV-Deathstrike

Mars, Sol System

Deep inside GalCom Territory

Raiders are a strange brew. They live on the edge of life and death. Allied to no one except a small few, they raid and terrorize for profit and sport. They are the last of the true pirates of old Earth. Though raiders come from all worlds, all races, they all follow the same code. To live and die for the kill. To seek glory and death in the hunt. To ask and give no quarter, no compassion, no remorse, and when the ends is certain, to take as many enemies as they can into death... and lastly, to help and support those of their caste..no matter what the costs (as long as it's worth it).

They all, collectively, call themselves The Devil's Hand...and Satan rides shotgun on their shoulders.

The UCV-Deathstrike was in serious trouble! The day had been profitable, bagging several terran transports loaded up to resupply Starpath SS in the Mars region of GalCom space, but now things had turned for the worse. Starpath decided to launch a flotilla of fighters and cruisers, 10 fighters and 2 super and 1 heavy cruiser, all to take out one lone raider. It seemed the Deathstrike's reputation had preceeded it.

"Fighters inbound! Bearing 120 by 356! Looks like Defenders and Corsairs! Also reading two Garids and a Sunflash heading this way!" yelled the TO.

Shingen sat in his command chair and smiled. It had been a profitable day, but it had also been damn boring as well. Now it was time to crank things up a bit, and have a little fun.

"Target the flux and jump. Arm the leech and program mother to deploy in the 3D crucifix inverted pattern. If the fighters make it there before we do, we got problems." Shingen stood up and walked over to the flight officer. "Put our path dead-center of the flux field. If we're lucky we can use the interference to jam thier targeting sensors for a few seconds."

Shingen walked back over to his command chair and punched the ship-wide comlink. "Playtime is over you buncha sons-a-*****s! It's time to git down to business! All hands, battle stations!!

[/RP]

[ 10-10-2004, 09:37 PM: Message edited by: Shingen ]

Link to comment
Share on other sites

[RP]

11:47 April 17, 3030

UCV-Tokuyama

Saturn, Sol System

Within the asteroid ring

Deep inside the outermost asteroid rings of Saturn, a lone predator of the stars waits hidden from sight by rock and debris and by the ominous shadow of the giant itself. Latched onto one of the larger asteroids, the UCV-Tokuyama, Commander FoxÔÇÖs vessel, my vessel, slowly orbits around Saturn as it gradually becomes blessed with a sunrise you could only witness on the high orbit of Saturn, bringing the metallic tones and shades of black and red of the ship to life as they shimmer and bristle, revealing the full splendor of its hardened surface with caresses of the Sun.

Commander on the bridge! The officers on duty inside the bridge quickly stood up and saluted me as I walked in. My Flight Officer, Jackal, was the first to greet me. Odd man he is, treats me as if I was his own brother... Good morning gentlemen. A small cough was heard from the Tactical console. And ladies For a strategist, you're not very subtle, are you? The tactical officer replied with a mischievous grin. Its your fault, oh mighty Commander Fox. Now, before you say anything and send me to the brig, I took the liberty of preparing you the morning report. Among a few minor events, nothing worth waking you up: The shuttles we sent for the mining operations came back with very little. Atlas, Calypso, Dione, Enceladus, Janus, etc, we checked all the moons, only gas and some raw minerals. Also, the traffic slowed down, with the local patrols just left the area, in direction to Earth, leaving it completely unprotected. Could work on our favour. Her face expression changed from teasing to sheer pride.

Our Tactical Officer is a very young girl, cute to the point of being a nuisance and very dangerous if you let her command a small fleet, she's the daughter of a good friend of mine, now deceased, who was a high ranking officer in EarthCom. I cant argue about her ability as strategist, but why her father sent her to serve with me under a pirate flag as his last wish, is anyones guess.

I gently took the report from desk next to her console and walked to my station and kept thinking about why those patrols left the area knowing I was still around. ÔÇ£ThatÔÇÖs still strange,those patrol ships shouldnt have left. We really could take advantage of that, but IÔÇÖm not risking my ship out of the safety of the belt until we know whatÔÇÖs out there. Do we still have the probes we deployed last week?ÔÇØ

With a single touch. the communications officer displays the information from the probes. Probes 1 and 5 stopped relaying information for a while now. Probes 2, 3 and 6 reported normal activity around the Sol system. Probe 4 now entering Mars sector receiving telemet oh fu Commander!!!

I nearly jumped out of my chair, with my heart racing knowing there was only one thing I could do and very likely only one outcome after what I saw on those Vid screens. Commander, thats the Deathstrike, Commander Shingens ship. She looks in trouble. Commander? Orders? I admit that for a moment I faltered, all I wanted was to close my eyes and ignore it, pretend I never saw what was happening, but despite my less than lawful trade, I still have a heart and some sense of honour or duty. I know, I know! We have to help her somehow. Weapons: I need weapons check and arm our heaviest missiles and set them on dumb fire. Tactical: Arm the PTA system and set it to 50%, I want anti strike craft coverage. Combat: Get your men ready to repel any boarders. Engineering: Try not to blow up the reactor, ok chief? And make sure your men are ready to tend to our future wounds. Navigation: Set us a course to Mars. All hands: To stations, prepare for combat. We are going to battle.

My crew acknowledged and proceeded to carry out my orders, they were too busy to be scared. But as my ship entered Hyperspace I couldnÔÇÖt stop worrying. It was MY ship. My men. My own life. All I had was being put on the line against overwhelming odds to rescue a complete stranger, only bound to me through a code not many even care to follow. I was terrified.

[/RP]

[ 07-09-2004, 07:10 PM: Message edited by: MadFox ]

Link to comment
Share on other sites

[RP]

04:52 April 17, 3030

UCV- RESOLUTE

Tramis, Alpha Centuri System

Commander, I must protest! whined chief engineer Kendricks as he watched smoke drift up and into the bridges central ventilation system. Smoking isnt allowed on the bridge! The smoke travels up into the air ducts and that same air we use for our air conditioning system also feeds into our circuitry cooling system. I spent over two hours installing and rigging up that Empirian auto-pilot system to work with our Terran navigations computer and and an.

Commander Ockham removed the lit cigar from his lips and exhaled. He rubbed his temples to try and sooth his pulsating headache.

ÔÇ£God, what is he complaining about nowÔÇØ thought Ockham to himself. ÔÇ£The auto-pilot system? Ugh, why is he worrying about fixing something I never even use. This guy is killing me.ÔÇØ

Kendricks continued in a high pitched mater-of-fact tone, and if you spew cigar smoke into fragile tech like that cheap Empirian auto-pilot system, there is a significant possibility it will fail or behave unpredictably! I cant be expected to

Ockham calmly returned his cigar to the ash tray next to the arm rest of his captainÔÇÖs chair and stood up. He then retrieved a small steel rod from beneath his chair and a combat knife he kept on his belt. Kendricks stopped talking, took a couple steps backwards and watched the Commander nervously. With a quick stabbing motion Ockham used the rod and knife to brace his navigational flight stick in its current position.

ÔÇ£Auto-pilot engagedÔÇØ Ockham sarcastically snarled back at Kendricks. ÔÇ£I need to use the head. Tommy, youÔÇÖre in charge.ÔÇØ

ÔÇØAye Skip!ÔÇØ Tommy shouted from across the bridge.

Paul Resnig the combat officer smiled and laughed to himself as he watched the Captain walk off the bridge. He had seen the ol rod and knife auto-pilot trick a hundred times before but it never seemed to get old. Resnig quickly went back to cleaning his wrist laser and monitoring his company of marines on the PERSCAN computer. Man this new chief engineer is a real prick, Paul thought to himself.

ÔÇØHas it been over 48 hours since I last slept?ÔÇØ wondered Ockham as he washed his face in front of the mirror within one of the ships nicer washrooms.

Meanwhile on the bridge.

ÔÇØSo what do you think Moran?ÔÇØ asked the shipÔÇÖs flight officer Tommy Brooks.

ÔÇ£About what?ÔÇØ replied the ships tactical officer Kara Moran. ÔÇ£About why weÔÇÖve been shadowing this merc ship from Tau Ceti to Alpha Majora and back again?"

Kendricks could be heard muttering under his breath as he made adjustments to the ships systems from his engineering terminal. Obsolete second generation bootleg system software just not compatible and the Captain expects the Drodian hardware to connect to the Empirian peripheral systems and those systems to be able to communicate with our Terran software and when the entire house of cards falls apart its Kendricks this and Kendricks that

Tommy continued his conversation and replied, ÔÇ£Ya, this isnÔÇÖt like the Captain at all. First of all, IÔÇÖve never seen the Captain follow a ship for this long without attacking, period. WeÔÇÖve been through Drodian space, Empirian space and now it looks like weÔÇÖre headed into the Sol system. WeÔÇÖve kept our profile low, our radar passive and our radios silent for days now. This is some serious cloak and dagger covert op stuff. And where the hell did the Captain learn how to shadow a ship this well?ÔÇØ

ÔÇØDonÔÇÖt worry yourself Brooks,ÔÇØ Moran replied calmly. ÔÇ£Enjoy the change of pace.ÔÇØ

ÔÇØIÔÇÖd enjoy things a whole lot more if I could see how weÔÇÖre going to profit from this,ÔÇØ said Tommy with a slight hint of sarcasm.

Kendricks ceased his muttering as he heard the Captain stagger back onto the bridge.

ÔÇØSo how about it CapÔÇÖn?ÔÇØ asked Tommy as he watched Ockham sit down in his chair. ÔÇ£We gonna raid this merc ship or follow it to death?ÔÇØ

Ockham relaxed in his chair and relit his cigar. Kendricks poked his head up from his computer terminal as if about to say something, paused and sunk back into his chair.

ÔÇ£Ok, hereÔÇÖs the story. ItÔÇÖs not a merc ship,ÔÇØ replied Ockham. ÔÇ£ItÔÇÖs a Terran Raider ship.ÔÇØ

As Ockham let out another puff of illegal tobacco smoke everyone on the bridge suddenly seemed very interested in how the Captain was going to justify secretly following a fellow raider like this for days on end.

ÔÇ£DonÔÇÖt worry,ÔÇØ Ockham said reassuringly, ÔÇ£weÔÇÖre not going to steal any kills, or raid this guyÔÇÖs cargo. The ship is called the UCV ÔÇô BLACKBURN and the Commander goes by the name of Alvin Hovis. Hovis is applying for membership in The DevilÔÇÖs Hand.

ÔÇ£Oh, so weÔÇÖre doing a background check and a little recon on Hovis for Fleet Commander Shingen before he is accepted?ÔÇØ asked Kara Moran.

ÔÇØYes and No,ÔÇØ replied Ockham as he removed the rod and knife from his flight stick and assumed control of the ship. ÔÇ£Hovis isnÔÇÖt going to be joining The DevilÔÇÖs Hand. Hovis is a piece of sh#t. The only reason people consider him a raider is because heÔÇÖs unemployed at the moment and attacks cargo ships to make enough credits to pay the rent, so to speak. HeÔÇÖs a career mercenary and a slick character with connections in the Insurgency, GALCOM and numerous underground crime syndicates. You catch my drift?

ÔÇ£I donÔÇÖt know Captain,ÔÇØ questioned Tommy, ÔÇ£with all his contacts and experience maybe Hovis could be of use to The DevilÔÇÖs Hand?ÔÇØ

Right now Hovis wants the protection of The Devils Hand so Im sure he would be a great asset that is, until GALCOM or whoever makes him the right offer and he decides to sell us all out. Ockham said harshly while staring into his Vid screen.

ÔÇØAnd how do you know all of this?ÔÇØ asked Kara Moran skeptically.

OK, Remember yesterday while we were passing through Tau Ceti? asked Ockham as he looked up from his Vid screen. We saw that Drodian LRT that was shipping STS missiles? The UCV  BLACKBURN must have picked it up on radar. All it needed to do was make one extra hyperspace jump, destroy a defenseless cargo ship and bingo an entire cargo pod worth of STS Missiles. Raiders do NOT pass up this kind of opportunity.

ÔÇ£I was wondering about that myself actually,ÔÇØ said Tommy. ÔÇ£Think heÔÇÖs headed someplace in a hurry?ÔÇØ

ÔÇØYou didnÔÇÖt answer my question,ÔÇØ replied Kara with a curious look upon her face. ÔÇ£How do you know this guy and why canÔÇÖt you just prove all of this to Fleet Commander Shingen? I donÔÇÖt understand why this is such a complicated issue...ÔÇØ

Ockham sighed and stretched out in his chair. It adds up like this explained Ockham. Ive run into Hovis in the past. It was a particular piece of history in my life Id since buried and done my best to forget about. Anyway, I dont have a single shred of evidence to back up these claims. Usually Shingen would take my word for what its worth and not give a guy like Hovis a second thought, but as everyone here knows The Devils Hand is stretched thin right now. We can always use more ships and we need more resources. Hovis must have made Shingen quite a generous offer.

ÔÇØSo we just keep shadowing UCV ÔÇô BLACKBURN until we figure out if Hovis is up to something or until he violates The RaiderÔÇÖs Code?ÔÇØ asked Tommy to double check if he understood the Captain correctly.

ÔÇ£Oh, donÔÇÖt worry,ÔÇØ asserted the Captain, ÔÇ£I already know Hovis has to be up to something. No independent ship travels this distance this quickly without a damn good reason. WeÔÇÖll get some answers soon enough.ÔÇØ

ÔÇ£Besides,ÔÇØ commented Ockham, ÔÇ£if we prove he is or has been working with the authorities, as the leader of the new Subversion Wing of the DevilÔÇÖs Hand, it would be my duty to kill the traitorous son of a b#tch.ÔÇØ

ÔÇØAnd while weÔÇÖre at it we could probably liberate his cargo holds and cannibalize his ship for spare parts and weapons, right Brooks?ÔÇØ said Ockham with a smirk.

ÔÇØHey, it would only be fair,ÔÇØ Tommy Brooks concluded with a smile.

[/RP]

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest Shingen

[RP]

12:20

Mars, Sol

UCV-Deathstrike

The Solnar heavy cruiser exited hyperspace in the midst of battle. Enemy fire cascaded off it's shields as 4 defender-class fighter moved in behind the Deathstrike. 3 Corsairs vectored at right angles, in an attack formation, and the remaining fighters held back to support the incoming GalCom cruisers jumping from Starpath.

The Deathstrike rolled on it's axis and let loose it's PTA systems. F.A.T.A.L. systems programed and targets acquired. Within seconds Vagrants flew to the left and right, each locked onto it's prey.

The solnar flew straight into the shimmering energy of the flux-field and yawed 180 degrees. It then began to lay it's mine field. Within 30 seconds, 5 mines had been laid, shoved out the mine launch bay as fast as they could be loaded. Two Corsairs flew into the trap and were instantly disabled. 3 Defenders had totally lost all shields from the barrage of PTA fire and had disengaged, but the Deathstrike had problems of it's own.

"Shields at 35%! We've got damage to the primary life support systems, and reactor is at 65% and falling!" shouted Mariko, the tactical officer. Her fingers flew over keys and readouts and she fought to figure out some way through this deathtrap.

Suddenly the entire ship shuttered, throwing everyone, violently to the hard metal floor. Blood flowed from the brow of the Deathstrike's commander. Shingen stood up to a cascade of white light and brilliant colors. He shook his head and staggered back to his command chair. The neural interface was shredded and torn, so he grabed the mass of wiring and ripped it out of his view.

"We've just lost the launch bay! Commander, we can't stay here any longer!" Mariko scaned the readouts from the logistix computer, wiping blood out of her eyes.

"3 fighters left! 3 disabled, 4 toasted and 3 on our ass!" screamed Ur'gin the flight officer. "Cruisers will be hot in 35 seconds!"

"Status on hyperdrive?!" Shingen shook his head to clear the fog and took out a cigerette from the flightvest. He lit it and yelled, "Dammit, I said status on the jumpdrive!"

"95% goddamn it! I got freakin' fighters on my ass and you want me to babysit you?!" yelled back Ur'gin.

"Target the first thing you hit and jump, ya damn lowlife! I ain't gonna die with no damn Kandorian half-assed flight officer! Get us the hell outta here!"

[/RP]

[ 07-11-2004, 05:56 PM: Message edited by: Shingen ]

Link to comment
Share on other sites

[RP]

12:19

Mars, Sol

UCV-Tokuyama

After several short jumps without incident, I was ready to take my ship through the last warpgate, straight into Mars and into the battle around the Deathstrike. A quick pre-combat check was issued and my flight officer gave me a hard look, waiting on my signal to go through that gate.

ÔÇ£Initialize the EMD, we donÔÇÖt need missiles to see us as a big target.ÔÇØ I took my hand to my chin and paused for a moment. All kinds of thoughts crossed my mind: would this be worth it? Why am I doing this? What will be the outcome? All sorts of questions kept popping up for what it seemed hours when only a few short moments were by.

ÔÇ£Alright Jackal. Its time to see if youÔÇÖre flight skills are worth what I pay you. Get us in there.ÔÇØ Jackal replied me with his usual sarcasm: ÔÇ£What? Do you mean I actually get paid?ÔÇØ

ÔÇ£Do you mind? Fly the damn thing!ÔÇØ

The engines quickly climbed to full performance and pushed the nearly 400 meter long ship through the gate and into the Martian space battle. My crew was quick enough to assess the situation.

ÔÇ£Commander! We have the Deathstrike on sensors. Several fighters, three cruisers on hyperspace closing fast on the Deathstrike.ÔÇØ

ÔÇ£Elaborate.ÔÇØ

ÔÇ£Three fighters harassing the Deathstrike, all the others are nothing more than debris. There is a Heavy class cruiser and two Super class. The Heavy is about 30 seconds from the Deathstrike.ÔÇØ

ÔÇ£Jump to the Deathstrike! NOW!!!! Keep tracking that heavy.ÔÇØ We immediately jumped to warp just as a battle plan began to be traced. ÔÇ£Helm: As soon as we complete the jump, get behind the cruiser and stay there. Weapons: Fire when ready and fire often, hit that heavy with all we have. Keep the PTA system on the figthters. I donÔÇÖt know what Shingen will be planning, but we do have a few moments before the two supers get to him. Assuming the heavy wont reduce the Deathstrike to cinders, we might get him well before it gets us.ÔÇØ

ÔÇ£Fifteen seconds to complete jump, Commander.ÔÇØ

I felt all my muscles tightening. This one was going to be close.

[/RP]

[ 07-11-2004, 03:11 PM: Message edited by: MadFox ]

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 3 weeks later...

[rp]

3:45 09/27/3019

Tarean/Alpha Canis

GCV Shimmer (MK3 class Battlecruiser)

Commander's Log:

At 0017 hours, SC2 launched to the surface of Droia (Vega Eridani) to extract HAV1 after a successful trading mission. What the Commlink Computer failed to log was the retrieval of three special objects found deep under a dead volcano. SC2 completed the extraction without incident and the GCV Shimmer proceeded here to Tarean....

Commander Joel Erikson paused and looked up at Tactical Officer Sylvia Peterson. "What is it?" he asked.

"The LV 125 jumpgate is about to flash...." The reply from the Lieutenant was uncertain. "Two enemy cruisers and one armed Hacker transport have entered the region."

"Red alert. Halt and cloak the ship."

"Cloaking system activated. It's too late Commander;" she looked up, "they've targeted us."

3:46

--------------------

3:45

UCV Thorn (Zel/Hac Tarin MK1)

"Incoming transmittion from the lead cruiser."

"Let's see it." The display on the bridgeviewer changed from the newly spotted Terran carrier to the bridge of the UCV Redeye (Kan/Rai Starcruiser). Zelon Commander Tsurg wasn't the type to be pushed around. "Yes, yes; I know. We have completed the data transfer," he said.

"Good," came the quiet but confident reply from the Kandorian Commander. After skimming another report she continued. "If this new virus of yours works to my satisfaction, you and your crew will be entitled to no less than one fourth of all inventory we recover from the Terran ship."

Tsurg brought his left hand from behind his head and pointed at the bridgeviewer. "You will not be disappointed. End transmittion."

3:48

--------------------

3:49

GCV Shimmer

The UCV Redeye and the escorting Man/Cri Solnar completed their jumps. [Hostile launch detected.] the main computer calmly stated. Shifting his gaze for half a second from the bridgeviewer, Erikson pointed to Flight Officer Jack Eastman. "Range?"

"Range: 8km to the Solnar; the others aren't far behind." His response was almost as calm as the computer.

"How does that guy do it?" Joel whispered to himself. "Activate the EMD and shield. Don't touch the weapons or the cloak will be compromised."

"EMD jammer activated; shield strength modified." Sylvia turned to the Commander. "Sir fighters are prepped and manned."

"Not yet." Erikson said holding up his hand. "Jack, jump to the Sarien jumpgate. This isn't our territory and we haven't been fired upon yet." The position of the GCV Shimmer meant that such a hyperjump would take the craft directly through the Tarean planet.

"Yes sir. Inputing navigational coordinates. Engaging hyperdrive profile." The Starion turned toward Tarean and leaped into the dazeling HJ bubble. "Commander, I don't understand it." The Nav Officer frowned. "The hyperdrive conduit is fluctuating three times more than usual." The bridge crew looked in horror at the viewscreen as the ship approached the planet at 78000km/s.

3:52

--------------------

3:53

UCV Python (Syr/Pol Firestorm)

Commander Senn entered the bridge from his ready room reviewing the Python's hourly inventory report. "Has the Galcom vessel engaged the hostiles?"

"No, Sir" the Tactical Officer replied. "It attempted to exit the region but crash-landed on Tarean in a heavily wooded area! Nothing is left of it."

"I don't believe it!" Senn moved quickly to his command chair. "Observe Tarean on the bridgeviewer and replay what you saw."

A light breeze spread over the tree tops of the beautiful forest on the western hemisphere. Suddenly, 14km in the distance, a small hill erupted in three fireballs before revealing a new crater. Senn was dumbfounded. "Uh... Research Engineer, report."

"Yes, sir. Probes 3 and 5 detected the transmittion of a virus from the hacker transport to the Terran vessel. It must have destabilized their hyperdrive interface, effectively, shutting it down in midflight."

Senn's eyes widened with anger as he realized the Python was on patrol in the Alpha Canis starsystem for another week and a half. "De-cloak the ship! Attack the transport before it leaves the region. Launch all fighters with orders to terminate both cruisers. Surrender is no longer an option for any of them."

3:56

--------------------

4:30 09/27/3019

Tarean/Alpha Canis

Ter/Ins Alpha Prime (Type 2 Starstation)

Tactical Operations Center

The battle lasted 28 minutes. All three hostile craft were destroyed by the UCV Python, which then limped through the Sarien jumpgate with 889 armor units, 77% integrity, and two remaining fighers. Chief Executive Officer Roland continued to stare at the dedicated TacOps viewscreen long after the Syrion Firestorm left the region. He inhaled slightly. "... Vector our nearest asset to commence salvage operations. Let's find out what those Raiders were after."

4:33

[/rp]

Shingen, I have sent you a PM about the info above.

[rp]

12:26 04/17/3030

Earth/Sol (planet surface)

Baltic Sea

91km off the coast of Poland

After hundreds of years, the basic design of the Terran/Earthcom Naval Gunship remain largely unchanged. The this crew of two had been on station (in shifts) for two and a half weeks. Despite the inactivity, Marine Corporal Jacob Boyd rarely tired of the scenery of the European coastline.

"Incoming transmittion from the ODS!"

The other man nearly jumped out of his chair. "Really? Is it for us?"

"No it's a broadcast, redirecting transmittion to our mothership."

12:27

--------------------

12:28

Gulf of Alaska

209km east of Kodiak Island

ECV Victoria (Naval Carrier)

Commander Mark Wilson read the transmittion. "Recall all fighters; have them prepped and loaded with STS missiles."

"Yes, Commander." Combat Officer Nick Forest replied. "Issuing appropriate RTB orders."

Wilson reactivated the communicator at his command station on the bridge. "Message received and understood, Corporal Boyd. Send the following reply to one of the Garid super cruisers: The Victoria, Warsaw, Pitcairn, and Nimrod naval carriers are holding 64 space-capable fighters on standing by. Do you request assistance from Earthcom's Navy?"

12:30

[/rp]

Looking good, guys. But we need someone from Galcom to RP the forces attacking Shingen.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 3 weeks later...

EDIT: Pardon, I put Luna instead of Mars...

[rp]

TIME: Unknown

Place: Mars, Sol.

GCV Galaxius

"Break away from Martian Gravity successful," the navigations officer stated. "We're clear for a hyperjump on your mark.

Suddenly I heard the combat alert klaxon blair to life.

"What the hell?" I snapped.

"Several large ships have engaged in a melee at bearing 310 mark 12. The tactical officer replied. "At least one confirmed raider and several galcom ships are engaged in a massive firefight.

"Scramble the fighters, but keep them close to us," I ordered. "What's the firefight like out there?"

"Several fighters have engaged one raider and multiple hulks are detected. There's an unknown making an intercept hyperjump to the current location of the raider in combat... Confirming the first raider as UCV-DEATHSTRIKE. Unknown looks to be, UCV-Tokuyama."

"Shingen..." I muttered. "We meet at last..."

"They're jumping, trajectory shows they're heading for the... flux point? Sir that flux leads invariably directly into a black hole." Tactical stated.

"What's he planning? Do they know we're here yet?" I asked.

"Seems not sir," came the reply.

"Good," I stated. "Tsun Tzu teaches it is always better to give the enemy as little as possible to work with. Cloak us, and prepare to intercept the Tokuyama. Order the fighters to move out to the deathstrike, but keep a good distance away."

"Cloaking device online."

"Use the end of the Heavy cruiser's jump point for our vector," I added. "Not the Deathstrike or the Tokuyama, no telling what deathstrike dropped before it jumped, and I don't want to jump in that close to the Tokuyama where they would see the jump signature."

Moments later, the fighters made a vector jump out to the fluxfield, but immediately turned and scattered.

Galaxius made its jump, in 90 seconds, it would drop out of jump fifteen K from the Tokuyama.

I was right to target the end point for the Heavy cruiser's jump point. A fighter from the station arrived late, choosing to follow to the spot where the Deathstrike had last been... it came out of jump right into mines and got ripped to shreds. The heavy cruiser's jump point however, was twenty three K aft of that position. The Tokuyama came out of jump, ten seconds ahead of the cruiser, and they began engaging each other in a firefight. The smaller ship quickly dropped in on its tail.

"Emerging, from hyperspace."

We dropped in slightly off the original point, eighteen K instead of fifteen. But I wasn't going to let it bother me.

"Manual control to me," I ordered. I quickly punched in and hauled the nose of my Violon around. Most commanders treated anything bigger than a Generis like a slow moving turd. On the other hand, I was always in the thought that if it could fly under its own power, it could move like a fighter. We closed to Ten K, I kept the throttle to max and kept my ship's nose pointed at the leading marker, maximum closing speed... seven K... I switched the main guns to decouple and prepared to drop the cloak. Five K, there was a brief burst of static from the cloak, but their EMD was on, hiding it. At three K, the heavy cruiser, shields buckling, pulled hard up attempting to avoid certain destructing by dodging the enemy fire. The Tokuyama chased it right on the tail.

I was presented with a sight any commander in a close range engagement knew as 'crossing the T' ... the one position no commander EVER wanted to find himself on the recieving end of.

"BEGIN TRANSMITTING!"

All at once, subspace was flooded with music, an old Earth song by the long dead Red Hot Chili Peppers, called Higher Ground jammed all communications traffic, and I dropped the cloak as the electric guitar kicked in.

I let loose with the main gun at full power. Deadly ion bursts ripped out across the now mere two kilometers between me and the wide belly of the target in front of me. I raked the guns back and forth, the shields collapsed in seconds, and several shots smashed right through the hull. At this range it was impossible to miss. Several more of my main gun's shots slammed into the hull, and then an explosion of decompressing gasses greeted a hull integrity breach. My next shot punched right through the ship, passing through it and ripping a hole into the void. I saw the lights on the vessel go out. We were still closing at high speed, so I quickly recoupled the guns and took the Galaxius across the aft of the Tokuyama... Then the ship shuddered from something.

"What happened?" I asked.

"Tokuyama has ejected their reactor core," the tactical officer stated. "It seems the main cannons did the job."

"Order fighters to leave the deathstrike alone, and prepare to render emergency medical assistance to the crew of the Tokuyama."

"Sir?"

"I'm a warrior, not a barbarian," I stated. "I don't have to reduce that ship to ash to win."

"The Heavy Cruiser's thanking us for the assistance," the comm's officer stated.

"How'd they get around our jamming?" I asked... My communications specialist merely held up a Nokia 3000.

I then turned to the Tacops computer... it was time to sit back and watch what move DEATHSTRIKE had up its sleeve.

"Keep me informed if anyone pops up in the system and tries to sneak about," I ordered. "I don't want the same thing we did to Tokuyama to come bite us in the @$$."

Galaxius began flying in a happhazzard pattern around the dissabled Tokuyama...

Higher Ground played on.

[/RP]

Yeah, a bit heavy handed. But when you cross the T in UC, it's over as far as your opponent is concerned. I've eaten AI alive when I cross their T... since AI seem to be stupid and turn to present their belly when you get to about two K or closer. Combine that with Decoupled guns so I can track when one tries to fly out of my firing cone... Well, maybe now you guys can continue this little RP.

[ 08-23-2004, 01:12 AM: Message edited by: Shingen ]

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest Shingen

[RP]

12:23

Mars, Sol

UCV-Deathstrike

Raiders do not fear death. In fact, they court it. Death, it is the spice of life, the elixir of breath, the only thing worth living for. Raiders are the Merchants of Death. They'll sell death to anyone and everyone. For a profit, they'll kill just about anyone who crosses their path...and if they die in the transaction, other Raiders will take up the cause...

The UCV-Deathstrike was in trouble. Serious trouble. She was about to enter hyperspace, to avoid a major burn-out, only to have her primary life support systems fail. Trying to enter hyperspace, her hull began to buckle...

"I don't think we're going to make it.. it was nice knowing you all..." chided Mariko, the TO for the Deathstrike.

"Hull at 45%, shields still dropping! We've got a new target! A Raider! UCV Tokuyama! She's sending a hail, but we can't recieve! Com is dead and we're gonna have to wing-it."

Shingen shook the blood from his eyes again and thought. He pounded the comlink to engineering.

Out of the blue Mariko screamed. "We've got a distortion field detected! There's a cloaked SOB in system, the freakin' coward! Heads up all! It's dead center to our vector!"

Shingen jumped into command chair and went to work. "Mariko, can you get a fix on that distortion? Where's the damn thing exactly?"

"It's firing on the Tokuyama! Stand-by!...Tokuyama is out...major damage..she just dropped her warp-core! Damn bastard is still cloaked and we're heading right for it!"

Shingen thought for a second and punched engineering. "Smitty, you there?!"

"Roger that."

"What the status on the mine launcher?"

"She's toast! You couldn't get a greased turd though that shaft!"

"What about the probe launcher?"

"No damage to those tunnels..whatcha got in mind?"

"How long to rig a mine charge to them damn probes? We've got about 60 seconds before we're knee-deep in death!"

"Stand-by!" Goddamn, you want me to part the phuckin' Red Sea as well?"

The UCV-Deathstrike readied for the assualt, shields fell and alarms rang. Outside, her shields flashed and sparkled, PTAs fired at empty space and dead air. The cloaked enemy circled and prepared for the final kill.

"Shields at 65%! Life support is gone! We're on aux power!" screamed Mariko.

Suddenly, Smitty cut in. "We've got 5 class A probes armed with mine charges!"

Shingen rose out of his command chair and flew towards navigation.

"Riko, where is that distortion?"

"Bearing 130 by 152!"

"Roll to position and launch!"

The UCV-Deathstrike rolled on her axis, taking heavy damage, and launched her payload of

rigged probes towards the attacking distortion field. Within seconds explosions began to erupt in space taking down the carrier's cloaking field.

"She's hot, GCV Galaxius, we've got a target!" screamed Mariko.

"All guns bearing on that ship! F.A.T.A.L. her ass!" yelled Shingen.

The Deathstrike entered battle against the GalCom carrier and reduced it's shields and hull as best she could. The carrier began to disengage from combat and retreated several hundred KMs from the Deathstrike. The Deathstrike broke off her attack, tractored the UCV-Tokuyama and tryed to jump out of the Mars region. However, main-power stalled and both the UCV-Deathstrike and the UCV-Tokuyama were left floating powerless, in open space, drifting to towards the fluxfield.

[/RP]

[ 08-31-2004, 01:37 PM: Message edited by: Shingen ]

Link to comment
Share on other sites

[RP]

"Status report." I stated.

"Records show they used everything they had just to take out our shields."

I put my hand to my chin. 'Shingen' nice shooting.

"All systems back online," my Chief engineer reported. "Turns out a stray hit took out the main cooling system to the reactor, that's what activated the autoshudown and emergency SOS signal."

"Fighter status?" I asked.

"We left them a nasty present," one pilot came over the comm.

"Thing they always seem to forget about foolishly engaging a carrier with their battle damage, is four fully armed and hardy fighters." another seemed to chuckle.

I had to smile at their antics.

"What did we give them?" I asked.

"Oh just a little something I cooked up," the Pilot stated. "What happens when you put six missiles into their hull, but they don't detonate?"

"Something nasty," I chuckled.

"I just happen to have the remote detonator right here," the Pilot beamed over the com.

"Send Shingen my reguards," I stated.

"Rodger,"

There was a flash in the distance, and everything picked up the explosion near the jump gate.

"Several explosions have just been detected from the Deathstrike," Tactical reported.

I brought up the Tacops, and there the Tokuyama and Deathstrike were, and they floated right into the jumpgate... and were gone.

"I don't think the deathstrike was ready for that last one," Tactical stated.

"They won't be harrassing anyone anytime soon," I stated. "What could you get on them?"

"Their reactor failed, auxilary power critical, hull about to crumble around them, armor all but paint chips... Sir I'm surprised they could take our shields down with the weapons their way they were. A fighter could fly right down the main gun tube and take what they could dish out."

"It was those jury-rigged probes they had. The mine blasts did most of the damage. In fact, only the mines and missiles actually DID anything," I informed. "Their PTA's just burned my paintjob in the state they were in. Dammit, I just had this thing waxed too."

I turned to helm.

"Set a course for GHQ, we'll drop by, get some of the heavier damage dealt with, and head out. What's the status of the Package?"

"Secure sir," Tactical responded. "The Package is still deliverable."

I smiled. Our mission was still a go. GALAXIUS hopped to the earth jump-point, and was gone.

It matters not night or day, some how, some way, it's time to play. Roll your dice but listen to what I say. No matter how thrilling, crime does not pay. Watch your back, and run when you see. The chase continues, no escape from me. Kill the rich and trick the poor. Win a little, beg for more. The game is on, we're through the door. Your luck won't last, against the Art Of War.

[/RP]

What is the package? IS shingen and crew okay? Where is Resnig? WHO CARES?! Find out in the NEXT EXCITING EPISODE!

Of Dragon BARF Z!!!!!

[ 08-31-2004, 01:33 PM: Message edited by: Shingen ]

Link to comment
Share on other sites

[rp]

Intelligence work is a delicate mix of misdirection and careful planning. Virtually none of it is James Bond kind of stuff. The best agents are those whose successes are unknown because their enemies must never know they lost the battlefield because they lost the war in the shadows.

"Has the Galaxius left the area?"

"Yes sir, they're headed for the station."

"Any surprises left behind?"

"No sir, we're operating under complete systems baffling and there are no active signals in-system except for the internal comms leakage from the Deathstrike."

"What's our cloak status?"

"We've got two and a half minutes and medibay is prepping for a complete radiation scrub, we've got thirty seconds sir."

"Good, let's get it done."

The Deathstrike listed in space, leaking reactor fuel and oxygen. Internal crews raced to stabilize the craft. Their numbers had suffered tremendous attrition, and theirs was an uphill battle over the shimmering mass of the fluxfield.

Five ships launched from a point in the void. Four elite fighter craft took up flanking positions around the Deathstrike, and the mark one shuttle took up a towing position. The tractor beam gained a solid lock, and the Deathstrike slowly began to take on the shuttle's velocity.

"Go," came the order from the invisible carrier's bridge, and five ships engaged jump engines to points unknown.

"Their navigation sensors are down?"

"Confirmed sir, they're blind. If they have anyone over there who can navigate on constellations, star charts, and a migraine's worth of math, then they might figure it out, but we're blacking their viewports and sensor systems just to be sure."

Commander Marlowe's preparations had paid off. The raiders had attempted to make their raids appear random, striking seemingly without pattern or premeditation. They would have succeeded too if Marlowe hadn't taken a special interest in the raider situation and turned pattern-matching algorithms on the raider attacks and run them through CIOPS' encryption-breaking computers. The results had paid off, to within forty-three seconds.

"Bet they're still wondering how those GALCOM warships landed on them with no warning and a ninety second reaction time from the first distress call," Marlowe's second in command was enthusiastic and sharper than anyone he had ever seen. Could do tensor equations in his head and could beat the navigation computer at chess--on a good day.

"No time to gloat," came Marlowe's terse reply, "let's do business."

The Deathstrike and her escort listed in the sensor shadow of the fluxfield. The GCV-Saratoga had dropped cloak and her crews had secured her for battlestations. The Megaron-class cruiser's second mark one shuttle launched with four aboard and came to rest in the launch bay of the crippled pirate ship.

"Here goes nothing," said the man in commander's bars. The bulkhead opened and he and his three attendents stepped into the belly of the beast.

"Take me to Shingen," he said to the wall of bedraggled marines who were not too banged up to hold the four CIOPS men firm in their ZSU sights.

[/rp]

[ 08-31-2004, 01:49 PM: Message edited by: Shingen ]

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

Raiders come from all walks of life. Some where high ranking officers of one navy or another, some where simple men trying desperately to make a living. It is this odd mix of characters, personalities and experiences that provide raider ships with their unique resourcefulness in face of dire adversities.

[RP]

Under the flashing red lights, sparks and smoke, someone regains consciousness. Feeling confused and dazed Commander Fox opened his eyes to see his medical staring down at him he could also saw what once was the bridge of his ship, his home, his only place in the galaxy where he was truly welcome and appreciated.

Me: Ooooh aaah ow OW! That stings! Arent I hurting enough for you? I groaned feeling myself now the broken commander of the Tokuyama.

TO: ÔÇ£I can make sure you feel worse afterwards. Now stand still! You have a nasty cut in your forehead. You are very lucky your thick skull protected you.ÔÇØ

Me: ÔÇ£Awww, gee doc, I didnÔÇÖt know you cared. How is everyone else?ÔÇØ

MO: ÔÇ£We have quite a few injured but fortunately no casualties. Medical Bay is functional. The ship medics and the Medical CorpÔÇÖs marines are there looking after things.ÔÇØ

Me: ÔÇ£And the ship? HowÔÇÖs the ship?ÔÇØ I was in the brink of panic. If I lost my ship, where else would I go? IÔÇÖm a raider, so is all of my crew. If we are captured we will be court marshalled and probably executed or worse. Afterwards I practically cried for my TO.

TO: ÔÇ£Commander! Are you alright sir?ÔÇØ

Me: Im fine Hows the ship?

TO: Er not in the best shape. The structural integrity is severely compromised but holding. Life support works. Communication array works but its being supported by a single wire. Shuttle bay is functional although the external doors are jammed shut. All mechanized assets are intact as well. Our power resumes itself to solar panels and at this angle we can only scoop about 42% power. Without our reactor, most systems wont even start up. We also nee

Me: ÔÇ£ThatÔÇÖs enough, thank you.ÔÇØ I stood up with my medical officer supporting me. My MO went by the name of Daniel Shettland, also known as Stitch. He came aboard my ship when due to some ÔÇ£awful mistakeÔÇØ his wife took over his office where he practiced, took over his life and even falsified records to incriminate him badly enough for the G.Police wanting him behind bars. I was one of his clients and at the time he had no idea of who I really was. I decided to give him a chance to survive. He had to abandon his career, his home, his friends, his children. Life is unfair at times. Really unfair. ÔÇ£How many injured do we have?ÔÇØ

TO: ÔÇ£According to StitchÔÇÖs report, all ship officers are alright, except for our ship engineer who got some severe burns on his left arm when he tried to decouple and eject the reactor core all by himself. One of our medics is hurt, so are eight of our marines. Both our flight engineers are hurt. One of the system engineers is took a bump in his head. ThatÔÇÖs it.ÔÇØ

Me: ÔÇ£WeÔÇÖre not that bad then. You two, follow me to the shuttle bay. And lets hurry, before we have a boarding party on top of us.ÔÇØ

After hastily travelling across half a ship, going around caved hallways, tubes and malfunctioning lifts, Commander Fox and both his Medical and Tactical officer arrived to what was left of the shuttle bay.

Me: ÔÇ£No damage, hmm?ÔÇØ

TO: ÔÇ£Just a few debris, both pads and loading bays are functional. Why are we here anyway?ÔÇØ

Me: ÔÇ£Our shipÔÇÖs computers are dead, but our sensor suit works. So, IÔÇÖm going to link the shuttle computer to the ship sensors. Hand me that spanner.ÔÇØ

TO: Sir I dont think we can even do that

Me: ÔÇ£Can you even blaming me for trying?ÔÇØ

MO: ÔÇ£I think he hit his head harder than I thought.ÔÇØ

Me: Hey! I heard that! A loud click was heard, followed by the sound of a few bolts being tightened into place. There. Lets give it a try. I was trying hard to sound optimistic and cheerful, but I was worried. I was scared of finding out what was out there. Ok batteries are on, computer system is on lets see. The UCV-Deathstrike is dead in the water like we do. Fine rescue this turned out to be. And about to be boarded. Damn it! I was now furious out of frustration. I slammed my clenched fist into the console, which was harder than my fist. OW! Aaargh. Good gods

MO: Easy commander

Me: Ok I need to think. Where are we anyway?

TO: ÔÇ£Unknown. The shipÔÇÖs navigational array is worse than I thought. There is nothing wrong with the computer.ÔÇØ

Me: Ok, to the medical bay. Everyone is there, right? Ok I have a plan. Lets hope is insane enough to work.

Again, the trio rushed to the Medical Bay After a quick greeting to all the present a plan began to be drawn. In the middle of the groans of pain, a hint of hope was arising.

Me: Heres what we will have to do. I will need two SF Marines you and you. Get your gear and some demo charges. Go to the shuttle bay and set them on the external door. Alright, now, two medics move to Shuttle 1, along with all the wounded. Comms officer, navi officer and you Jackal, go with them. You are to fly them to the nearest neutral outpost to both get help and get the injured to safety. The rest of us are going to meet in the transporter room. We have no power to make it work properly, so heres what we will do. We will split into two groups. One is to going to bring and link all the batteries from the APCs and CAVs to the tranporter power and control systems. The other is going to bring as many repair, medical and combat supplies as possible. After we get those to work, we will all transport into the Deathstrike. We are going to help them repelling intruders, tending to injured and performing repairs. Right after we transport, you two SF marines, blow the doors open and let SC1 out. Then you go to SC2 and try to tow the Tokuyama into some place safer. An asteroid field, a nebula, anywhere. Any questions?

Unnamed Soldier: ÔÇ£This is suicidal, isnÔÇÖt it?ÔÇØ

Me: ÔÇ£Yes it is, and the assurance policy doesnÔÇÖt cover it either.ÔÇØ

Unnamed Soldier: Oh. Alright Im up for it.

Me: ÔÇ£Anything else? Good. Lets go!ÔÇØ

Shuttles were not meant to carry so many people, not like that. Neither are transporter systems made to use the energy cells from combat vehicles to transport almost thirty men and a wide assortment of supplies with a poor lock on target. But it was done all the supplies that could be moved from the cargo bays were brought, soldiers, officers and even non combatants armed themselves with as much as possible. We were all desperate and with nothing to lose. We were all raiders.

After a couple of attempts, all we managed at the transporter was to make it blow quite a few fuses, it really was not meant to use those power cells. But we finally got it calibrated. All we had to worry now was if we were going to be on target. Just in case, we all had our armour suits on. The non combatants as well, they used the ones from the poor wounded soldiers. I gave the go for the marines waiting at the shuttle bay and flicked the switch to the tranporter I felt my body burning, my eyes boiling. I wanted to scream but I couldnt. It lasted a fraction of a second, but it looked like a whole hour. Probably a side effect of using an improper power source. When the pain was gone, I found myself as well all of those who left with me in an unknown hallway. Everyone was alright, dazed but alright. I looked around to study the hallway. Cables were severed, pipes broken, plates off the walls. On one of the walls there was a flashing schematic of the ship we were on. We were right on target, we were aboard the Deathstrike.

Meanwhile, the two shuttles left from the Tokuyama to perform their missions. SC1 left the system safely SC2 began tractor operations.

Now it was time it was time to reach Shingen. And for me, it was the first time I was going to meet him in person. I hoped he wouldnt meet me at the end of an assault rifle.

[/RP]

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest Shingen

[RP]

12:42

Mars, Sol

UCV-Deathstrike

Shingen rose into pain and blood. He wiped the blackness from his eyes, and looked around. Everything was chaos and explosions, and he was pissed! He stumbled to his command chair and pounded the comlink,

"Smitty! Dammit man! You still breathin'?"

Sweat and blood poured into Shingen's eyes as he waited for the response.

Mariko pulled herself up from the floor and dived for tactical.

"Goddamn it! We're dead in the water!"

"Where's the Tokuyama?"

"She's starboard, but she's worst off then us! We'd better do something now, 'cause we've got a carrier bearing 001 by 026, and the damn thing is 265km away!"

Shingen shook his head and tried to think.

"Carrier is bearing off...heading for the Earth gate...what a minute..I'm getting another reading..crap!" "We've got another cloaked ship! It's closing...dammit..she's decloaking...she's on us."

The GCV-Saratoga decloaked and stood off the UCV-Deathstrike. Shuttles flew out of the carrier, and one flew straight for the Deathstrike's docking bay.

Shingen pushed in the magazine, slide back the bolt and armed the ZS10. "Hold the bridge at all costs! If I'm dead, the ship is yours and you're on your own!"

"Commander! The Tokuyama's energy is spiking. She's just beamed over to us! Deck two, aft corridor!"

Shingen slung the weapon over his shoulder. "Get on it! Get someone over there to see if they are friend or foe! Friend, send 'em to me, Foe, shoot on site. I'm going to meet our GalCom friends. They must want something or we wouldn't be here."

[/RP]

Link to comment
Share on other sites

[RP]

Almost exactly the moment Shingen barked those orders... another flash signaled the jumpgate going hot. And out of it appeared...

Galaxius?

"I wish you had told me sooner that we didn't have any major damage to worry about?" I muttered to my CE.

"Well sir." he began. "I did say the only problem was the collant system. Otherwise, a few scortches."

"This is interesting," Tactical suddenly cut in.

"What?" I snapped. I knew we had just left the system... but I didn't expect anything else to happen.

"There's activity around the Deathstrike, seems emergency power is back online for them, they must have a miracle worker for an engineer. Tokuyama's dead in space... running on solar power only. There's another carrier right off Tokuyama, GCV Saratoga," Tactical blathered.

"All stop, silent running, prepare to cloak at the drop of a hat," I ordered. On that order, all active sensor sweeps were ceased, comm traffic silenced, and engines cut off. We were emitting next to nothing, and only an active scan in our direction would pick us up. It was the next best thing to being cloaked.

"Any other data on the Deathstrike?" I asked.

"Damage of the Deathstrike is total. The ship is next to unsalvageable... and according to the last sweep, I was getting abnormal temperature readings in their reactor... I have the feeling their cooling system is destroyed and the shutdown sequence failed-"

"GOOD GOD!" I snapped. "Deathstrike's going to do far worse than a simple damage core breach!"

"Estimated temperature's rate of rising show the core will melt through its housing in roughly thirty minutes. After that, it will take out the ship, and anything withing a twenty kilometer radius." Tactical stated.

"Why is that?" my less informed Medical Officer asked.

"Because," I began. "Unlike a core breach, which is just damage breaking the core open and blowing the ship up... A Core MELTDOWN is the core going out of control, and building up several hundred times the energy of safe operational status and simply melting its way through the housing. When it does... it goes off like several bungor OTS weapons."

My medical officer's jaw hit the floor.

"We're staying right here... AWAY from the Deathstrike," I stated. "Put in a tightbeam commline and warn Saratoga of the threat... and launch some shuttles for the EVAC. Raiders or not, we got to get them off that thing!"

"Why are you helping them sir?" my Tactical officer asked.

"I have a certain respect for a hardened warrior,' I answered. "So I can't leave them to get blown to smitherines outside of combat."

And the countdown began...

[/RP]

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Why becoming a Raider? You are constantly outgunned, outnumbered and outclassed. Still, so many embark in such endeavours. Why? Because they are free. They are not bound by political or economical pressures. Raiders donÔÇÖt have to respond to anyone except their own leader who themselves appointed to that position. To be a Raider, is to do what you think itÔÇÖs right.

[RP]

Commander Vitor Fox and his team of survivors began an inventory check. Several crates of equipment, medical supplies, weapons and even food were brought into the UCV-Deathstrike. As some helped themselves with canned food, weapon and ammunition distribution was prioritized. By all means, they were in a hostile environment, in an unknown situation, facing an unknown enemy. By all means, the ship could have already been taken by GalCom. They could be the last Raiders aboard the once proud and vigorous ship. Still they pressed onwards.

Hand me that SP911, will you? I asked a marine right next to me as he took a HK9000 shotgun from the crate in favour to his standard issue assault rifle. He released the safety and handed me the pistol. Nice shotgun I didnt even know we had those on board. He stood there looking at me, I could imagine his mischievous grin under his helmet.

Another marine ran towards me and handed me a DIE unit. He was distributing those to everyone. Well thought of, actually. We were going to spend some time on dark corridors and they would definitely come in handy. I was tired. Defeated. Bitter. I mounted my DIE and sat on an crate.

Medical Officer: Hey Fox. How are you feeling?

Me: How do you think? Hmm? I feel as if I was travelling in hyperspace and the moment I drop to normal space IÔÇÖm gunned down by an enemy carrier. Oh wait! I was!

MO: Funny. Seriously, how do you feel?

Me: Im fine, Im fine I just feel hot thats all.

MO: YouÔÇÖre not the only one. Its actually getting warmer inside.

Me: Could be the life support failing. We should get a move on then.

MO: I agree. We should use our helmets at all times, we never now when we might run into a hallway with no proper breathable air.

TO: Actually sir, we might have a tiny little problem

Me: Define ÔÇ£tinyÔÇØ.

TO: You know how reactors work at high temperatures and need a cooling system so they donÔÇÖt go boom?

Me: Yessssss?

TO: Well I was checking the computer and it seems the Deathstrike kind of lost its cooling system. The reactor will go critical any time soon. I cant be sure of when.

Me: Tiny problem? Tiny? AAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH!

I groaned and yelled in utter frustration. Everything was going from bad to worse. And from worse to plain hellish.

Me: Fine, fine no panic. Hey! Systems crew!

A trio of fully armoured pseudo soldiers rushed into my presence. They greeted me with a difficult salute. They were not used to wearing heavy body armour.

System Engineer 1: Yes sir?

Me: How are we of ship supplies, can we dig something to repair or even replace the cooling system on this flying coffin?

System Engineer 3: We a few parts and some repair materials.

System Engineer 2: And we could salvage some parts from the ship itself.

System Engineer 3: True. We can fix it. But IÔÇÖm not sure in time. Not to mention it will get increasingly hot and thus harder to fix it.

Me: Are you willing to give a try?

System Engineer 1: Do we even have a choice? Come on team.

Me: Wait take two EF marines to escort. And take your side arms.

With a salute, they went off to work. Each one of them picked up a crate and went off into the bowels of the Deathstrike in hopes to prevent it from becoming a raging fireball. Now all we could do was to muster the rest of my men and move to the shipÔÇÖs bridge. Time was short. We all knew sooner or later the GalCom would break in, violently. As I was deep in thought all I can hear all of the sudden is a metallic voice shouting ÔÇ£FREEZE!ÔÇØ Two marines from nowhere pointed the assault rifles at us. Instinctively, my own marines put themselves in front of me and returned the gesture. A typical standoff.

Unknown Marine 1: Identify yourselves!

Me: Hold your fire! Commander Vitor Fox, UCV Tokuyama. These are what is left of my men.

Unknown Marine 2: Whew that is a relief. We are here to take you to Commander Shingen, sir.

Tension was high, but in that short moment we all felt relieved for seeing a friendly face in such a hostile environment. I asked the Deathstrike marines to inform Shingen of my system engineers and of the problematic reactor which they probably already knew about. All was left was to walk with them towards the legend himself. Shingen.

[/RP]

Link to comment
Share on other sites

[RP]

Near saratoga and the crippled and soon to be a hundred million degrees Deathstrike, a group of fighters suddenly popped out of hyperspace and took up escort positions for the four Mk III shuttles that followed a second later.

Onboard the leading shuttle, I watched as we manuevered for a docking position with the Deathstrike.

Why was I here? Because I wanted to... but also, because my sixth sense told me that returning and finding this situation was more than it looked at first. My combat officer had insisted I not go right into a potential suicide coffin. But I had just checked the chamber on my Thunderstar and left the bridge.

My Thunderstar is a custom made weapon. It was a slightly largish hand gun, with much more punch than would be associated with it. It had been made by an expert technition a year ago. It combined standard powder charge ammo of most normal handguns, non-laser, and then coupled them with an extremely compact linear accellerator. The result was that a round that might have done a mere 400 MPS... was now launched downrange at an astounding 1500 MPS. It was a pistol that hit with the force of a fifty calibur sniping rifle. And I ALWAYS loaded the armor piercing anti-material rounds. The first intruder on my ship to enter my bridge discovered how useless marine ceramic armor was against the round... so did the man behind him. That incident had the rest of a group of ten surrendering right there. The weapon was by no means legal. But my superiors thought nothing of just ONE gun, as well as knew me well enough. They pretended the Thunderstar Lightning MC-12 didn't exist.

The shuttle finally docked, and we lept into the sparks flying interior of the deathstrike. Two marines took up positions to shield me with their bodies. My goal was to make it to the bridge and convince the commander to abandon ship before we all had our atoms scattered across the cosmos. The tricky part was getting there in one peice. I hoped for the sake of all that was our time, that I wouldn't need to show Shingen how quickly one man could plow through a ship of marines.

Time was running out, a quick scan or my portable tacops showed the Deathstrike's reactor was going critical, and the tempurature was begining to climb at exponential rates. IT had begun to chain react... in two minutes, nothing would even slow it, and from there, it would be about ten minutes before it melted the housing and sent us all straight to hell in blazing glory...

[/RP]

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Over the passed 6 months I have teamed up with a band of mercenaries that I believe to be loyal to me. A few of the tech guys I knew from school joined and my life long partners in crime have finished their classes and are ready to assist me in commanding a ship. The day we have been waiting for has finally arrived. Today we set out to steal a Warmonger from the shipyard on Earth.

We infiltrated the shipyard by posing as engineers. The mercenaries proved themselves quite deadly and effective in cleaning unarmed tech guys and painters out of the ship. We fired up the reactor and broke the atmosphere. My first command was setting a course to Mars. We all met on the bridge and had a few drinks to celebrate our new ship, the Vampire Warmonger. Just as we came out of hyper jump a police cruiser locked on to our position and entered hyper jump to our location. I ordered full thrust to the Mars system. The plan was to enter Mars and destroy the police cruiser as it emerged from the warp tunnel. As soon as we entered Mars system our radar lit up with ships. The Galaxius was a shocking sight for my crew. It appeared to be waiting on us when we came out of the warp portal. I could not get a target lock on the Galaxius so I uncoupled the main guns charged full thrust at the Galaxius. I quickly noticed that we were coming up on the rear of the ship. Just as they turned to engage us I opened fire and stoped my ship. The Vampire almost split the Galaxius in half. By the time I released the trigger the ship was disabled and had never been able to shoot. I turned quickly to meet the police cruiser coming out of the warp portal. We engaged each other with guns blazing and PTA systems locked. Each pass damaged our shields more and more. The police cruiser made a wide turn and I hit full thrust, my main guns quickly chewing through his shields and in to his hull. He charged in with no shields and was disabled. I moved in close and lined up with his viewer. I looked him right in the eyes and thought for a moment. I unclupled my main guns and slowly squeezed the trigger. The explosion was quite invigorating. We turned once again to the Galaxius and and noted that it was badly damaged. We engaged hyper jump to the two disabled raider ships. I was hoping this would be a good time to lend a hand to the raiders, being that they were probably the only group that would take me in. The problem however was that the Vampire was labled as a Terren Military ship. I did not know how badly damaged the Raider ships were and I did not want to jump right into another battle with hopeful allies. I was trusting that they saw the battle with the Galaxius and the Police Cruiser. We came out of hyper jump, scaned the ships and tried to make contact. They were both badly damaged with most systems down. I contacted the towing shuttle and briefed the police on my intentions and was informed of the battle that had just occured. I was not about to deploymen in a ship in that condition so I made a hologram and teleported it to the bridge of the Deathstrike. *Hail Commander of the Raider ship Deathstrike. I am Lord Malice Commander of the Vampire. I am currently escourting you and wish to offer any assistance you may require. Your reactor is in very bad condition. I will continue to escort you until it becomes too dangerous. I will transport the hologram back in ten minutes and will review your orders and take appropriate action.*

Link to comment
Share on other sites

[RP]

"GOD DAMMIT!!!!" The CE on duty for Galaxius snarled. "I just got the cooling system fully repaired and they go and blow holes in it again. Tactical! What the hell is going on up there!?"

The tactical officer pulled himself up off the ground and ran to the comline, engaging the cloak as he jumped up.

"A terran Military Warmonger came through the jumpgate... I thought it was fine until they ripped into us with disruptor fire!!! I'm gonna give Tigerclaw a call!"

===

"WHAT?!" I snarled. "The package! HOW'S THE PACKAGE?!"

"-ackage -ppears to -e ok-y." The Tactical officer replied. "Th-y ma-aged to hit the -ooling system -gain. -on't kn-w ho- they keep d-ing t-at."

"Fine," I stated. Then I adjusted my com.

"Alpha flight, this is Darkness Rising. We have a HobGoblin on approach, your instructions are to... TRASH THE MOFO with EXTREME disreguard for overkill!"

---

"Did I hear the commander right?" Alpha one stated.

"Yep," the copilot said. "Someone's got a ship they shouldn't have... now we gotta go bust it up."

"They seem to be ignoring us as of late." Alpha three's copilot stated.

"I know," the pilot said. "We barely get any screen time in these roll plays."

"Then let's teach them why they shouldn't ignore fighters!" Two's pilot continued. "How fast can you zortch a Warmonger?"

"Faster than you!" Four grinned over the com.

"Alright guys, let's focus," One commanded. "Inverted V formation, and take vector one six seven point five five."

The fighters had been hidden from the Warmonger by the sensor shadows of both the nearby ships, and the Fluxfield's distortions. Against a normally crewed Warmonger, fighters weren't the best choice to pull off an attack. However, this wasn't a very experienced crew and were also highly understaffed, and they never expected the fighters to already be in flight. When the four small, well armed, and lethal FCs came up and over the Deathstrike on a direct course for the Warmonger, there was very little time for the ship to react before a swarm of missiles smacked through the shields and the laser fire damaged the main guns. The fighters shot past, staying close to the hull as they split around it to prevent the PTA system from tracking them. The warmonger turned to engage them, however, they were too fast to keep them in the PTA zone at such close range. Laser fire pitted the hull of the cruiser, damaging the ship more and more as each shot penetraited the armor. At a loss for anything better to do, the Warmonger began to move clear, going for a vector to jump as soon as the Hyperdrive would recharge.

"He's going to jump!" One shouted. "Don't let him have a clear vector!"

"I'll be f*cked with an ugly stick if he goes ANYWHERE!" an enraged voice shouted.

Suddenly, directly ahead of the Warmonger, the Galaxius decloaked. Instinctively the Warmonger's commander went for the main guns... which sparked slightly, but otherwise did nothing. A large bead of sweat appeared on the side of the cruiser.

"Oh, now you can't shoot eh?" the voice shouted into the comlines. "WELL TAKE THIS!!!!!!"

The Galaxius' still healthy main guns blazed to life, ripping white hot energy into the Warmonger. Although a superior warship, and generally in better shape than Galaxius, the Warmonger was doomed.

"He's breaking up!" Four shouted.

"Get clear!" One ordered.

The Galaxius had ceased firing, but explosions continued to rock the warmonger... for thirty seconds it pitched around belching blasts into space. Then it ejected a cargo pod. A second later a single point of light collessed near the rear, and then the Warmonger vaporized as it exploded into a white hot ball of radiation. The cargo pod was caught in the blast, and sent flying.

"WOW!" One stated. "I thought Galaxius was dissabled. How'd you get her-"

"Simple," Unknown voice stated. "I bypassed the damaged coolant system and juri-rigged the reactor to be cooled by something just as effective. Jell-O has its uses."

"After that," Tactioal cut in. "The Chief Engineer here decided to hijack our ship, jump in close, and sneak up on that Warmonger, despite the fact that our shields are offline, we have fifty percent armor, and the missile launch systems are malfunctioning."

"NO ONE MESSES UP MY BABY!" The CE snarled over the com. "You can court martial me later, but I wanted his HEAD!!!"

---

"What's in that Cargo Pod?" Tactical asked. Behind him, the CE, Mark, was smacking a very large crescent wrench in his hands like a cop would with a nightstick.

"There appears to be fifteen human life signs in it." One came back. "I'm not surprised. Those pods are build to survive some tough stuff, but they won't last long, that thing will freeze with them in it within' the hour."

"I'LL KILL THEM!!!!" Mark snarled as he tried to smash the viewscreen with his wrench. Two marines had to restrain him to prevent further damage from being done.

"Just fix the ship mark," Tactical sighed. "I know you get get us back to fully operational within' an hour. How's it look to you guys out there?"

"Well," One came back. "The ship's in good shape except for one section where the Warmonger's guns ripped a verticle line of damage across the hull. Almost cut the ship in half, but the bulkheads look to be in tact. The superstructure's not compromised, so the ship will handle flight stresses just fine."

"Good," Tactical nodded. "I'll inform the commander... and then we'll see about those pesky ship thieves in the cargo pod."

Of all the times in his career for the ship to get jumped... The Tactical Officer could only sigh.

"This just isn't my day," he muttered.

[/RP]

Do people always ignore the fighters?

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Lord Malice = Alright, teleport the hologram here on my count Ten, Nine, Eight, Seven, Six

Tac = SIR!!! We have 16 missiles locked and closing!!!

Lord Malice = Where the f*ck did they come from? Turn the damn EMP on and jam the damn things!

Tac = They are to close for the EMP Sir! Brace for impact!

Lord Malice = You S.O.B where are they coming from?

Tac = IÔÇÖm scared Sir.

13 of the 16 Missiles hit despite the Emp. In a few Earth shaking seconds the shields went down and the worst sound anyone could imagine forced the crew to cover their ears. The ship was mortally wounded and it was known to all. It sounded like every joint in the ship had been ripped apart. The crew stumbled to there feet and all looked at Lord Malice

Lord Malice = Every one get in SC1 NOW! *com on* Mercenaries! Report to the cargo bays and launch all of the cargo, then proceed to the SC1!

Med Officer = No! You canÔÇÖt eject the cargo. I have been working on those monkeys for there entire lives.

Lord Malice = ENOUGH! It is our only chance of escape! If they see cargo pods I am sure they will be interested to know whatÔÇÖs in them and pay less attention to the ship.

Chief Eng = Sir we canÔÇÖt go into the shuttle bays with out space suites they have blown the doors off.

Lord Malice = Suite up!

Combat Off = Sir there is only one Pod that can be launched, the other cargo launch bays are destroyed.

Lord Malice = Launch it and abandon ship!

Combat Off = Yes My Lord!

Laser fire ripped through the hull of the Vampire and sent the reactor to a critical state. The Mercenaries launched the cargo pod and broke into a full sprint to the shuttle bays to suite up for a space walk. The unknown ships continued firing on the Vampire until it was on the brink of exploding. All of the crew fit snugly in the shuttle. The Tac Officer was however charged with manually undocking the shuttle. As soon as the shuttle was free Lord Malace thought for a second about what kind of bind he was about to leave the Rader ships in, Shook his head and engaged the hyper drive. The hyper drive instantly twisted every bone in the Tac Officers body in two and with a flash of light the shuttle was gone and the Vampire Warmonger was no more. Every one on the ship let out a breath of relief as they came out of the warp portal. The shuttle continued on and little was said. It finely entered the Saturn, Sol System and opened Coms with the Raider ship BLACKBURN.

Lord Malice = Hail! I am Lord Malice Commander of the recently destroyed Vampire. The Raider ships Deathstrike and the Tokuyama are disabled and being escorted to the Galcom HQ. They are in grave need of your services. I request permission to dock.

Combat Off = My Lord! They have missiles locked on us!

Lord Malice = Commander I ask you to lower your weapons. We do not fly under a Terrain Military flag. This ship was hijacked with the Vampire. I ask you check the Galcom database for a Warmonger stolen from the Earth ship yard.

Lord Malice and his crew wait for a reply from the BLACKBURN. There heads filled with thoughts about what the Commander of the BLACKBURN was going to do. Lord Malice had an expressionless look on his face. In one day he had every thing he ever wanted given to him and taken away. A friend he had spent his whole life with cowered in fear as the Vampire was under attack. The hologram sent to the Deathstrike was never retrieved and that almost surly marked his name with the Raiders, and to top it all off he was trying to convince a Raider Commander not to blow him to hell and back for being in a military shuttle.

*Lord Malice looks up at the viewer screen*

Link to comment
Share on other sites

NOTE: Good show Malace. I applaud your creative escape.

[RP]

"Hey two," Four asked over the comline. "Am I seeing things, or for a second there, did you see a shuttle hyperjump from right out of the docking bay before it went up in a fireball?"

The pilot of FC Two checked his data, on the scope was one craft, with a small signature.

"I think you saw it happen," he stated back. On the screen, the small signature reached a jumpgate and vanished. "But it doesn't matter now they're gone. Anyone know what we just trashed?"

"Data comes back as the Vampire," One stated. "The craft was stolen exactly thirty minutes ago. Right out of the shipyard."

"Talk about Grand Theft Starship," Four stated. "That must be a new record for shortest command carreer ever."

"Don't worry," One came back. "The Warmonger was inssured. They wouldn't have gotten far with that thing without support anyway. As it turns out, there were no missiles, and about a hundred units of reactor fuel onboard. The thing was still being painted when it was launched unauthorized."

"What I don't get," Two stated. "Is why they took a stolen cruiser, and jumped to MARS! I mean, there IS a Galcom Military Station here as well as at earth."

"Lack of knowledge of stellar cartography," Three cut in. "Inexperience in what is out here got the best of them, and the worst of Galaxius. Obviously they had never been off planet before. They pulled in FAR too close to the Tokuyama and Deathstrike, allowing the damaged ships to block a good portion of the sensor systems. They were totally un-prepared for us to pull the Sygmind Popup manuever on them."

"Cut the chatter Three," One's copilot stated. "We're better off in lurk mode. No need to have a running commentary on flight tactics. We got them because they didn't know we were here. So maintain comm silence for the moment and watch out for any more surprises that might come our way."

"Roger that," Three replied.

[/RP]

Anyone starting to like these pilots? They're some funny characters... I should isolate their characters a little more and make them into some funny guys...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

/rp

Four GALCOM men stood fast in a ring of rifles. The cripped Deathstrike's docking bay shuddered with the echo of the ship's deeper wounds, and two of the GALCOM men adjusted their instruments to take in the full measure of that woe.

Shingen arrived. Tense and precious moments followed while the GALCOM officer and the pirate surveyed one another.

"Shingen, my name is Zane Marlowe," began the GALCOM officer in command stripes, "Your ship is wrecked, and your reactor will go critical in ninety seconds. Your reinforcements have been sent packing by a non-aligned merc, and you must now decide the fate of your crew.

"My proposition is this: we'll beam your crew off this deathtrap and set you down in a non-GALCOM region of your choosing. In exchange, we want information related to recent thefts from GALCOM. Whether or not you did it, we think you know something of value and we're ready to pull your bacon out of the fire here to make sure that knowledge doesn't perish with you. Now if you're wondering what guarantee you have of our promise? None we could prove in the margin of this moment, and certainly none you'd believe beyond doubt, but what I can guarantee is that your odds are better with us than with a million-degree-and-rising reactor."

The commander checked his watch, "you have forty seconds to decide Shingen, make them count because we're beaming out of here at T minus five which is the last moment possible to execute the hyperspace jump that will save your life."

The newcomers presence had not gone unnoticed by Saratoga's command crew, and within moments of the Vampire Warmonger and Galaxius' entrance to the system, Saratoga's cloak was reestablished. GALCOM's most advanced sensor equipment picked every detail from the surrounding space. Hyperdrive vectors were pre-cached, the jump engines warmed almost sympathetically with the rising temperature of the Deathstrike's critical reactor, and Saratoga's weapons were ready to sing with a fire of their own.

Four fighter craft circled the region, dangerously close to the critical distance inside of which a reactor explosion would cause inescapably fatal harm. Galaxius' shuttles stood by for rescue evac, while their mothership licked her wounds after the furious battle with the reinforcing raiders.

The whole region held its breath in the last moments before the storm let loose by the Deathstrike's critical reactor.

/rp

For what it's worth, there is somewhere this is going that's not self-glorifying, so if people will allow, it would be nice not to have a "miracle" turns of fortune that render the picture drawn by the previous descriptions of engagement and damage completely irrelevant to present ship and crew capacities.

Also, I SERIOUSLY hope no one decides to post rp with my ship doing anything I haven't described it as having already done.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

I need everyone to start using a time stamp in your RP posts. This is so we all know where everyone is in the timeline, relative to everything else going on. Also you can move through the timeline to better suit events happening.

I'm assuming that everyone is several minutes ahead of me.

[RP]

1:15

Mars, Sol

UCV-Deathstrike

Engineering

Smitty was drowning in his own sweat. His vision blurred and salt stung his eyes as he wrestled to get the final fuse hooked into the power relay for the Reactor's cooling system. The access was too small for the big Kandorian to get all the way in, and there wasn't time to get another engineer. The core tempature was rising fast, and if this power relay didn't kick on the damn cooling system, they were all fixin' to get a whole lot smaller... quick!

He clicked in the final fuse and tripped the reset button. The crystals came to life as thousands of volts of power flowed through the circuit.

Smitty raced to the engineering terminal and began playing with the settings, coaxing his ship back into life. The core tempature of the Deathstrike's Main Nuclear Reactor began to stabilize, then, gradually, it began to fall.

He then did a quick Vital Systems Check, and began ordering engineers to the shield generators.

Suddenly, two MI marines came barging through the doors, followed by five other people, Smitty had no clue about. They looked to be sys eng from some other ship, and now they were running around his engineering bay!

"Damn Smit, you look like you just got outta the swamp!" smirked one of marines. "These guys are from the Tokuyama. They're screamin' something about a core breach, but I tried to tell 'em, ol' Smitty's got it handled." The marine grined real big and hit the Kandorian engineer on the shoulder.

Smitty turned from his console, towering over the marine.

"These capacitors don't look like they'll hold for very long" One of the new engineers said as he poked his head into the access door Smitty had just left.

Smitty punched a few buttons on his console. "There's a box to your left..on the second shelf. I rerouted through a different junction, so when you get it set in there..."

"I know, re-route it back through and synchronize the flow pattern."

Smitty grunted and watched the small Terran engineer for a moment. He turned back to his console and punched the internal comlink.

1:25

Mariko scanned the readouts on her display. The bridge of the Deathstrike was in complete disarray.

Ur'gin, the flight Officer, was head deep underneath the helm, trying to reroute the power from non-critcal systems to navigation control. "Alrighty then, that should do it." The Kandorian pulled himself out from the mass of wreakage, uprighted his chair and reinitialized the helm controls.

On Mariko's station, the internal comm-link flashed. "Tactical." she said to the monitors.

On the other end, the static distorted Kandorian voice answered. "'Riko, we've stablized the main reactor down here...it was just a blown fuse array... Thanks be to the Lord and Devil both...whichever saved out asses! I've also got a few engineers from another ship down here! What's up with that??"

"Copy Smit. They're from the Tokuyama, another Raider ship that was dumb enough to get into the action! She's currently disabled and most of the crew are on the DS now."

"Well tell the rest of 'em to stay the hell outta my bay! I got enough headaches without having to babysit people I don't even know!"

"Copy Smit."

"Alr--ht th-n. We're goi-g af--r m-in life supp--t next and th-n we'll g-- to the hull int---ity."

"Negative! We need propulsion and weapons first! We're knee deep in hurt here and we need to exit stage left!"

"C-py th-t! We'll get o- it, b-- I ain-- makin'g n- fr--kin' pr-mises."

"Just make it happen! We need to get the phuck outta here!"

Mariko closed the com and hit her perscan display. She watched as her commander walked straight into the forces of the Tokuyama clustered into deck two. She punched the personal comlink for Shingen.

"Heads up commander, you're heading for the Tokuyama intruders, bearing aft of your position." Mariko staggered for a moment as nausea overwhelmed her. She shook her head, wiped the blood from her eyes and went back to work.

The distorted voice of her commander came over the comlink. "Ro--r th-t 'riko. Has Sm-t got a handle on our re--tor?"

"He's got her stabilized from what he said! I told him to concentrate on propulsion and weapons next!"

"R--er t--t!

Mariko cursed at the reception on the comlink and began rerouting signal-paths. "Say again Shin!"

"I said Roger that!"

"OK, you are coming in clearer now."

"Keep a monitor on me at all times! We may need to do a blackout!"

"Roger that! Mariko out!"

1:46

Deck Two, Mid Corridor

UCV-Deathstrike

Shingen entered combat mode. Standing in front of the aft corridor's access door, he threw his weapon to Strider (an MI marine and his close drinking buddy) and cleared his mind. Life and Death are the same...do not think, do not fear, just react. No mind...No fear...No hesitation...

He drew a final breath, and walked into the door's activation scan. The access door to the aft corridor of Deck Two flew open. Shingen was confronted with one of his own MI marines. Instinctively, Shingen dropped to a "horse" combat stance, grapped the throat of the MI marine and applied pressure.

"Stand down Commander! I'm one of yours!" screamed the now, frightened marine. Life and breath were quickly escaping the marine, as Shingen drew back from the brink and released his prey.

From behind the gasping marine a shadowed figure approached.

"Dammit Shingen! You're killing one of your own!" Commander Victor Fox of the UCV-Tokuyama yelled.

"Who are you and what the hell are you doing on my ship!"

"I'm Cmdr Victor Fox of the UCV-Tokuyama! A Raider craft! Pull your head out of your ass! We're here to help your sorry butt at the cost of my goddamn ship!"

Shingen shook himself back into the present...back into life. "Stand down your freakin' weapons and prepare to be boarded!"

"Boarded?! What the hell are you talking about?! Pull yourself together man!"

Slowly, the red bloodlust subsided from Shingen's view and his conscious mind took control. He was himself again.

[/RP]

Sorry guys, I ran outta time...will update ASAP! Please PM me comments, revisions, ideas, ect.

[ 09-12-2004, 10:34 PM: Message edited by: Shingen ]

Link to comment
Share on other sites

[RP]

1:50

Deathstrike, Subdeck, forward end of ship...

"-ppears you're a little safer -or the time being." Tactical stated over my com unit. "The reactor was about to go into point of no return overload when it started to cool again."

"I heard near legends of the Deathstrike's Chief engineer... I did think this bucket was doomed, but from what I hear, he's pulled a miracle from his Kandorian ass." I replied.

"Any instructions sir?" Tactical asked. "Want to evac now that the reactor is stable again?"

"No," I replied. "I came this far, I'm not turning back... Not until I've had a chat with Shingen and find out what the hell is going on. Something just isn't right about all this. Have the fighters keep their eyes on the Deathstrike. If their engines so much as look warm, send a few laser blasts down the exhaust nozzles. But keep the Deathstrike in THIS area!"

"Understood sir," Tactical responded.

With that, I closed the comline and motioned to my marines pulling defensive perimeter to fall back to our group. There were only seven of us, six marines, and then me. Docking our shuttle on a hatch instead of any bays was a more reasonable course of action, given the situation. Now we stalked along the partially lit S-Deck.

However, even badly damaged, this ship was far from dead. The Kandorian marine couldn't be missed as he rounded a corner and spotted us. However, assault rifles and shotguns don't take aim nearly as fast as one hand gun does. The lightning fast armor piercing round fired from my custom gun shattered his shotgun before he could haul it around for a shot. Surprised, and stunned, he backed up a few steps as if deciding on another weapon he might have had. I wouldn't let him do that, he would be too useful.

"Go for another and the next shot will pass through your throat and take your head off!" I warned. He seemed to contemplate it, then decided not to chance it, giving value to a further extended life span. His hands slowely went into the air, showing he wasn't armed with anything else. I lowered my weapon to a half raised position as two of my marines quickly frisked him for his side arms and grenades. After that, I walked up to the large Kandorian.

"Take me to Shingen," I instructed the marine, and then I added- "Please."

Being polite can get a person far, even among mortal enemies.

[/RP]

Link to comment
Share on other sites

[RP]

1:52

Aft Corridor

UCV-Deathstrike

Cmdr Victor Fox wasn't a happy man. He'd just risked his life, and the lives of his crew, hell, he had even lost his goddamn ship, all to rescue someone he had never even met! Life sucks that way.

He stood in the darkened corridor, glaring at the ominous figure before him. The leader of the Raiders, and for a second, doubt and fear plagued his mind.

His escort quickly took up positions behind him, readying for combat and death. Cmdr Fox raised his hand, putting his people on standby, and watched as Shingen slowly came back to life.

"So it's true." Fox said. "You are Gammulan after all." He stared at the darkened figure of his "leader". Dark, evil, red eyes focused on him, inset inside a demon's face.

Shingen was smaller then him, but Fox never doubted Shingen's potential to kill, swiftly.

"Half Gammulan, actually. My mother was Terran." Shingen said, finally regaining his composure.

Shingen stared at the force confronting him. He then, made a decision.

1:56

Sub-Deck

Cmdr Zane Marlowe, of the GalCom's ISS, followed the hostile marine, worried that time was quickly running out. There just wasn't time for this! The target was moving, but GalCom couldn't be sure where it was moving to! They needed the contacts of this Raider, and they needed them now!

The group of Raiders and ISS personnel finally reached the turbo-lift to deck two and entered. After several minutes, the door opened to reveal the decimated corridor of the deck two. Smoke and dust filled the atmosphere, and wiring hung down around them.

The turbo-lift doors slide shut and they proceeded towards the bridge of the Deathstrike, in hopes of finding her commander still alive. Walking through the Aft corridor, the party suddenly found who they were looking for.

The lead MI marine stood before his commander as the aft access door slide shut. "Commander." the marine smiled.

"Shingen, my name is Zane Marlowe," began the GALCOM officer in command stripes, "Your ship is wrecked, and your reactor will go critical in ninety seconds. Your reinforcements have been sent packing by a non-aligned merc, and you must now decide the fate of your crew.

"My proposition is this: we'll beam your crew off this deathtrap and set you down in a non-GALCOM region of your choosing. In exchange, we want information related to recent thefts from GALCOM. Whether or not you did it, we think you know something of value and we're ready to pull your bacon out of the fire here to make sure that knowledge doesn't perish with you. Now if you're wondering what guarantee you have of our promise? None we could prove in the margin of this moment, and certainly none you'd believe beyond doubt, but what I can guarantee is that your odds are better with us than with a million-degree-and-rising reactor."

The commander checked his watch, "you have forty seconds to decide Shingen, make them count because we're beaming out of here at T minus five which is the last moment possible to execute the hyperspace jump that will save your life."

Shingen stared at the man in front of him and smiled. "You people are either damn brave or just plain stupid!"

With that, Shingen tapped his com-link twice, and the corridor was instantly reduce to total darkness. On cue, the squad leader of the Shingen's marines walked into the blackness, threw a flash granade into the center of the corridor and shut his eyes. The resulting flash blinded every person in the darkened room that had not closed their eyes, or had not been prepped for the "blackout".

The DS marines, switching to infa-red on their DIE headsets, took out all of the opposing ISS marines, and the ISS commander. No one who wasn't from the Deathstrike, or from the Tokuyama was left conscious.

Shingen tapped his commlink again, and the lights of the corridor came back on.

"Put 'em all in the brig." Shingen said, taking his ZS10 back. "'Riko, what's the status on the other GalCom intruders?"

"They're on the sub-deck, heading your way."

"Roger that."

Shingen took back his ZS10 weapon, checked it's ammo and smiled.

[/RP]

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

Sorry guys, I almost have a major update finished for this RP, that will bring everything into focus and up to date!

Thanks to everyone for the help and your patience.

Please add any comments or suggestions here.

[ 09-24-2004, 11:10 PM: Message edited by: Shingen ]

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Please sign in to comment

You will be able to leave a comment after signing in



Sign In Now
 Share

×
×
  • Create New...