Cosmoteer Official Forum

Brank
The cruisers, upon the detection of the star destroyer, move to put themselves between it and the scanning vessels. The battleship moves between the sccanning vessels and the Vaiaelon vessels. The battleship opens a channel to the star destroyer, and all of the warships begin warming up their weapons, just in case.
"This is the NGSS Albatross, of the Neu Gamilas empire. May I request that you Identify your allegence and reason for being here?"

Brank
The bridge chatter ceased for a moment. The crew stared bewilderedly at the holo display, before bursting out into laughter.
"Oh no, it's the ID! Careful guys, they might ram us with a tug boat!"
"If we don't stop them here they'll try to 'liberate' some primates!"
"Um, sir?"
"What is it Larxir, you find some angrily yelling mining vessel?"
"One Liaison two Leisure, confirmed on VP Sweep."
"...Cut line."
The transmission went dead as the 'Lon warships spurred to life.
"Level 1 battlestations! Fire ASM batteries and arm the guns! Evasive function 12B!"

A flurry of long range pre-emptive missiles streaked from the pyramidal hulls. The nacelles dotting the hulls of all unfolded and the triple mount turrets folded out. The ships themselves began B-lining for the ID warships, meanwhile the freighter turned the opposite way, conveniently headed towards the Legend and still unaware of its presence.

//TQM, VSA Dreaded Dance, encryption Level 7, follows//
"Darkfleet high command this is Captain Vi'Quihap. Code Chipped Blade, I repeat, code Chipped Blade. Request backup."
//Message concludes//

Soundbust11

As the line is cut, the captain chuckles.
"They arent taking us seriously. That means we have already won. But be vigilant people, you all know too well the 'Lons always have something up their sleeve. Open a line with the Unseen Legend."

"Greetings, Captain Jaco, Orland reporting in, what can I do for you?"

"Report on the status of the Infiltration squad."

"They are on vector and the freighter is heading straight towards us, yet they dont see us yet. This will increase the chances of a mission success by quite a margin. The squad's trajectory has them set to hit the freighter in a matter of minutes..."

"Copy that. I'll handle the fighting, you take care of acquiring the asset. Jaco, out."

"Understood."

The ID fleet's Engines flare up as they pick up the pace, heading towards the VWP ships. Guns flare up as shells begin to fly, railguns firing an initial volley while point defense swings around to fire at the oncoming missiles. The Radiation along the spine of the Moonlight Dancer flares to a maximum before...

WHOOM

The Spinal and Subspinal particle accelerators fire their first shot straight towards the VWP destroyer, the thin white beams going at near-relativistic speeds...

Soundbust11
Due to not reciving the messges between the two ships, the captain of the Albatross views the Unseen legend as th attacked party in this "Dispute, and launches missiles to intercept the Dreaded Lance's missiles. (Detontating infront to cause a detonation of the enemy missiles)

Brank
The particle beams impacted the aft of the upper panel, ablating several turrets clean off, and damaging others. The armour itself held strong, and the blast doors around the affected turrets sealed, preventing a chain reaction of ammo detonation. The railgun rounds were only able to penetrate when they hit the turrets, the highly sloped hull resisting any direct impacts.

The VSA vessels responded in turn, hundreds of guns in dozens of turrets lit up, spewing deadly ordinance through the vacuum. In what little modernisations the ships had received, included among them were APFSDS-R rounds, in which the penetrator contained a Rax'Thal alloy. Any successful penetration would corrode and toxify the area it landed, so it was a good thing they were out of effective range... for now.

A small squadron of Taroka launched from the aft of the Destroyer, 6 units. They spread out around the ship formation, closing the gap to the ID ships to make use of their more advanced ASMs.

ZendikaroftheWest
//Transmission Start//
"This is the VSA Dreaded Dance to the Neu Gamilas Empire vessels, we are not the aggressors in this situation. The Infinite Dominion is an enemy of the Vaiaelon War Pact, and has arrived here with the intention of capturing our aforementioned sensitive cargo. We ask that you do not interfere on their behalf, but will not stop you assisting us. That is all."
//Transmission End//

Soundbust11

Moonlight Dancer - Bridge

Jaco hastily turns to the comms officer and barks out an order-
"Pull up a comm link with the Gamilians."

-to which the comms officer follows through with, opening the comm link and responding
"Yes sir!"

ZendikaroftheWest
ID Comms - Hailing Neu Gamilias
"Greetings, this is captain Jaco of the IDS Moonlight Dancer, we have heard that you are an ally of the German Space Regime, and thus an ally of ours. We are here on a mission to retrieve an asset located on that cargo ship, we currently have an insertion team en route. It would be greatly appreciated if you continue to assist us in this battle. This current combat is to mount a distraction against the 'Lons. You have no obligation to stick around if you do not wish to."

@Soundbust11
Infiltration Squad

The team is seconds away from landing as the comms remain dead cold, only minimal, important chatter going through.
"Bravo, Charlie, to my left. Delta, Echo, to my right."

The squad forms up, the small rcs thrusters on the EVA suits shifting into the place as they prepare to land on the hull of the freighter
"Brace for landing."
"Copy that Alpha, bracing."

The small thrusters flare up as the squad angle their feet to the craft, quietly landing on the front underside of the ship, the mini reactors in their suits firing up as the batteries charge back up, nonvital systems powering back on for the EVA suits. The weak electromagnets in the boots of the EVA gear barely hold the marines to the ship, but getting knocked off would be easy so they still stick close to the hull, searching for some sort of opening along the belly of the cargo ship...

Brank
"Of course, any ally of the German Space Regime is an ally of ours."
The Albatross sends a message to the scanning vessels, and they begin to warp out, one by one. They will return here later, with a different escort.
Soundbust11
Having received the message from the Moonlight Dancer, the fleet prepares for battle. The cruisers turn, and streak toward the frigates, using their high speed to close the distance quickly. The battleship turns its bow toward the destroyer and opens fire, its 440mm positron beams blazing from three triple mounts. It also warms up its secondary weapons, four dual 330mm positron cannons. The two cruisers then break off, firing six torpedoes each.

Soundbust11
The point defense net is strained indeed, popping missiles one after one as what seems like a wide, spaced out wall of flak and plasma form between the forces, detonating and melting missiles as they come on. But the wall isnt enough. Where the APS fire lets up to allow allied fire through, a handful of ASMs are able to slip through, too close for interceptor missiles to take care of, they thud into the hulls of the Moonlight dancer, cracking outer layers of armour and taking off a couple smaller point defense turrets. One ASM that gets through crashes into a dorsal railgun turret, melting the barrel and side to where it becomes dysfunctional and has to be evacuated and sealed off from the hull as the turret itself, being unrepairable and unusable, is ejected off the hull of the Dancer, the connection to the hull being severed as it floats off.

But this doesnt stop the second volley of railgun rounds, and now that the two fleets are in MUCH closer engagement range, the new volley of fusion cannon bolts. Due to this new engagement range the VWP rounds begin to get too hard to dodge and much harder to intercept, the close range CIWS blurting off insane amounts of bullets, but still failing to catch some of the rounds...

A shell slams into the side of the IDS Follower of Sin, one of the two frigates, sending a handful of turrets careening through the void as the hulls below the turrets are automatically sealed by the AI of the ship. The Coilguns on the Follower of Sin and her sister, IDS Deed of Good, fire off HE rounds at the smaller VWP ships, the crack-crack-crack of their automatic fire rate sounding within the walls of the ships.

Infil Team

"Move in and check your corners, we have the entrance."

The team slowly moves in, checking their corners with guns drawn as they move farther into the airlock. Once all of them are in they shut the airlock and go through to other side, into the main body of the ship...

Brank
The hail of HE rounds dealt a fair number on the shields of the VSA ships, fragments of hardlight splintering off and decaying amidst the vacuum. The ID railgun rounds started punching through the now fractured shields with relative ease, having small success in piercing the hull armour. However, the sheer amount of redundant systems built into the legacy models ensured that it took a large amount of saturation on an area to noticeably degrade its fighting ability. A second volley of ASMs launched from the armour seams, now much further within the defensive grids. The Taroka also launched out another volley, taking advantage of the confusion where they can, even squeezing out a few cheeky autocannon strafes at their lumbering targets.

From what little the infiltration team knew of Karrashta, they were able to make out the rough direction of the cargo hold. Getting there proved to be another matter, as they began encountering technicians and crewmembers milling about their tasks. They weren't noticed yet, but it was starting to look like only a matter of time.

ZendikaroftheWest
The armour is considerably less resistant at this range, turning white hot and even melting away some layers in places. Some of the volleys of shells and missiles are redirected towards the Gamilas ships.

If anyone was watching the outer edge of the system, if they even had sensors capable of picking it up, they might have noticed another ship Qswitching in. The ID Platinum-Class immediately detected a new radar signature approaching; the sheer speed led the computer to classify it as another missile, yet the apparent size seemed more in line with a fighter.
"This is Disband. Targets sighted. Engaging."

Soundbust11
The Wall of Flak and Point Defense fire focuses upon the incoming missiles as they still swarm in, the sustained fire straining the grid even more as increasing amounts of missiles slip through, shields being forced to fire up small walls of plasma to try and protect from the blasts while CIWS send of their bursts of fire. A small swarm of missiles slips through the grid from the numerous ASM volleys being fired out, the missiles crashing into the side of the Moonlight Dancer as the armour it hits singes and buckles, cracks forming on the outer protection layers as deep dents form, even bucking supports in some areas.

In the core of the Moonlight dancer its Spinal and Subspinal mounts begin to slowly build their charge back up, the stores of particles being loaded up as they begin to come online once again. Railguns; Coil-Autocannons; and Fusion Cannons alike across the fleet all continue their firing sequences, focusing mostly on the VSA Destroyer and trying to aim for the most damaged spots where possible. Meanwhile interceptor missiles flare up in their housings as rockets burn, sending volleys of the missiles streaking towards the Tarokas in a bid to remove them from the combat.

IDS Moonlight Dancer - Bridge
"Prepare Interdiction to come online! An FTL sig just dropped out on the edge of the system and need to stop anything else from showing up!"
Captain Jaco commands the bridge as people rush around, clicking at holographic keyboards and physical ones alike, sending out commands to their respective districts of control while the frigates receive their orders...

Escort Frigates
Having seen the signature Qswitch in quite some distance away the frigates fire up their spinal assault interdictors, one prepping to send a corridor of anti-FTL towards the direction of the yet to be identified qunit, while the other aims to block the freighter from leaving. The silent and invisible energy shoots out, manipulating spacial gravity in the area as to mess with FTL of most kinds, the slight distortion of gravity throwing off any and all calculations needed to get FTL drives to work in that small corridor of space...

But the Qunit is still on approach and needs to be identified and dealt with soon lest it tear the fleet apart...

Infil Team
"Alright Squad, move to secure the asset."
The Infil team rushes around corners and avoids sightlines to the best of their ability, almost getting caught multiple times as they finally make it to the room with the holding cell...

"Bravo, try to get a good look at the room, use your cloaking and use the sparing seconds it gives to get what info you can."

"Roger that Alpha, moving in."

With a slight shimmer the experimental device covers Bravo with a field of wavy and shaky 'invisibility', allowing them to remain unseen so long as no-one looks in that direction for too long and they stay still as possible. Bravo moves around the corner slightly and tries to take in the sights of the room...

Brank
A transmission is sent from the battleship, in a tense voice.
"You have your asset yet? We may have a problem here, and I dont want to stick around for too long. Anything we can do?"

ZendikaroftheWest

"Roger that, asset has been located and the team is preparing to engage extraction soon, we will inform you when they have made it off-ship. For now try and disable the engines on the Freighter while we keep the VSA ships distracted."

Brank
"Of course. Ghale Gamilas."

Soundbust11
As the commander spots the signature his eyes widen.
"Bashuk! No no no no no."
He then turns and shouts orders to the crew.
"We may have an Eater type craft, turn toward her, arm the missiles, and prepare for impact."
_The battleship turns and opens fire on the craft, desperately trying to shoot it down. _

Brank
The railgun rounds finally burst through the thick hull of the destroyer, right through the area still sizzling from the Gamilas' attack. Turrets in the area buckled for a moment, shortly before the ammo cookoff began and their burning husks shot out hurtling into the void. The armour itself blasted outwards in other places, plumes of incendiary gas forcing their way through. Despite the no doubt critical damage, the rest of the ship almost entirely ignored the proceedings, continuing its relentless barrage of railcannon fire. The only real acknowledgement was the ship turning its now damaged face away from its adversaries, still able keep two thirds of its guns within firing solutions.

Taking advantage of the split attention, the corvettes moved closer to the Dancer, unloading their own railcannons at max RPM into the shields. The Tarokas use the opportunity, flying behind the defensive areas the corvettes projected, CIWS sniping the interceptors out in no time.

ZendikaroftheWest
Whatever the craft was, it speedily zipped between the positron beams shot at it. Turns so sudden and drastic were taken that, were there a human pilot on board, they'd be little more than mush. Strangely, the radar signature seemed to start expanding, apparently ballooning out to the size of a small warship, before it abruptly disappeared altogether. All the sensor officers could do was stare at a blank screen in the deafening silence of the dozen empty seconds that followed...

It eventually re-appeared just as quickly as it had vanished, but instead of relief this only brough panic. The craft was streaking towards one of the ID escort frigates at speeds in excess of 6km/s, and was a mere 21km away. Before the CIWS and other defensive measures could even bear on target, the signal split into a dozen more, the resultant confusion lasting just a moment long enough to close the gap. Entirely unknown and anomalous projectiles cruised through the Frigate's shields in less than a heartbeat, continuing on to carve through the armour like a hot knife through butter, piercing all the way through and out the other side of the hull.

The largest of the signatures identified slammed into the hull itself, and weapons systems began blinking offline at several by the second. A brief glimpse of whatever it was got caught on an external camera, before it too went offline. Another Taroka, the design radically different to its contemporaries, and ripping off one of the primary railguns by the barrel with its claws.

F13Y1 smiled to herself from within the cockpit. The entire attack had lasted barely 8 seconds.
"Disband. Target neutralised. Proceeding."
Her custom-built Taroka leapt from the hull of the irreparably crippled frigate, and rapidly began accelerating towards the second. The anomalous projectiles curved around, apparently unphased by the impact, and followed behind.

Blissfully unaware of the chaos outside, Bravo gets eyes on target without a hitch. A large metallic box about the size of a studio apartment sits in the center of the room, accented in industrial red and fastened down to the floor. A squat but wide mechanical door is set into one side, electromagnet locking mechanisms apparent. A holographic interface is located next to the door, currently displaying what one can assume is a camera view of the box's contents; a lone Vaiaelon female sitting in the center of an otherwise white room. Bravo gets an odd impression from the video feed, as though he was seeing several clips randomly stitched together, given how the girl seems to teleport around the room and into different positions.

A pair of thoroughly disinterested guards sit just in front of the door, some sort of board game sat between them.
"Dolta wa pronehiis?"
"Te vfase, dolta wa waaroi tur biiva."
"Hmph! Te reitak."
They haven't noticed Bravo just yet.

Soundbust11

IDS Moonlight Dancer - Bridge
"Sir, Plasma Reserves at 30%, after that we cant set shields anymore!"

Captain Jaco Holds his head in his hands
"Fire the Particle a-"

Blaring Alarms go off as the projectiles launch from the new taroka, explosions blasting out on the Follower of Sin as it is ripped to shreds...

"FOLLOWER OF SIN HIT, CRITICAL DAMAGE!"

"GET ME EYES ON THAT ENEMY CONTACT NOW! GET FIRE ON IT NOW!"

Jaco is enraged and distraught, one of his escorts gone in a flash...

Overall battle

The Follower of sin is torn to shreds, explosions ringing off as debris begins flying, ammo racks hit and causing a massive explosion after the Qunit shredded through it. The Two remaining ships try and get a lock on the contact with missiles, interceptor and antifighter alike, launch in attempt to ward it off as CIWS and flak begin to focus on it. Meanwhile the Dancer and Deed continue sending streams of plasma out as walls of shielding between them and the VWP fleet, the plasma burning and slowing shells while setting missiles off prematurely, shells then being shot down by CIWIS. But the shields will only hold for so long. A Handful of shells from the Corvettes slip through and crash into the Dancer's armour, shearing off plating and crushing corridors as bulkheads seal off the small holes in the hull...

Infil Team

Bravo looks over the scene and pulls out their rifle, seeing an opportunity...

The Rifle is an M1-Empyria, Outfitted with a custom black paint job, then equipped with a barrel suppressor, Small red-dot holo sight, and a forward grip.

With this they quietly flick the safety off and turn the gun to 3x burst fire, aiming at the closest of the 'lons and signaling for Alpha to also get their gun out. And thus they do waiting for Bravos shots before they turn the corner...

Bravo pulls the gun to their chin, and then a quiet, but not unheard, crack-crack-crak! sounds out, three bullets flying towards the first 'lon as they both turn and let out yells. But its in vain, as the three bullets crash into the First lon's head, killing him instantly. With that Alpha turns the corner and unloads two bursts of fire from their gun, the first burst crashing into the second lon's chest, throwing him down against the wall, then the second one hitting against his neck and chin, killing him as well. Then the whole squad jumps around the corner and clears the room, promptly releasing the Electro-mag locks and opening the door to Y12F2's Cell...