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 Post subject: Stars Without Number
PostPosted: Fri Mar 07, 2014 9:09 pm 
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He had to admit, there were worse places to deal with the Dominion's lackeys. Commander Kor Aresh, commanding officer of CMV Intrepid took in the sights of the Altair Nebula as he made his way to his vessel's conference room. Outside, swirls of purple and gold gases and dust danced in the multicolored starlight of the Yarat Sector--a hologenic vista that would take away the breath of even the most seasoned spacer. Aresh's armored boots thudded dully on the frigate floor, his gait that of one who has spent most of his life in zero- and low-G. He wore the traditional military garments of the Confed officer cadre: a black armorweave tunic with simple golden epaulettes marked with his rank insignia, along with similarly arrayed pantaloons and boots. A bloodstripe ran diagonally from his right shoulder to his left hip, the sole battle honor he ever deigned to wear in his time as a shipmaster, awarded in a campaign that happened years and years ago.

Aresh briefly slowed his stride to give a passing crewman a nod of greeting before entering the Intrepid's conference room. Standing within were a number of holograms. As one, they turned to greet him as he stepped into the broadcaster field.

'Commander Aresh,' rumbled a Terran in ambassadorial dress, 'good day to you.'

'Likewise, Wordsmith,' Aresh responded, standing at attention. 'My apologies for my lateness. Seems these old bones can't walk as quickly as they used to.'

'No matter,' said the Terran, his visor awash with soft greens and blues--the colors of placation, in the Terrans' parlance. 'Now that we are all assembled, we may commence this summit.'

Aresh stood quietly as the roll call was taken. Many of those present were his fellow Confed shipmasters, all of whom likely stood within their own ships' conference chambers as well. One was Admiral Tesh'k La'r'o, the 108th's overall commander and the moderator for the discussion to come. Half of those present were not Confed at all. They were Dominion ambassadors, here to broker terms of settlement within Neutral Zone 1138, one of the currently unsettled border areas between CAS and Dominion space. The tension was so thick Aresh could cut it with a vibroblade.

Cold War tensions were at their peak, no doubt thanks to the arms and settlement race between the two powers. Aresh silently hoped that both parties would maintain their decorum and tact, but he knew it would devolve into yet another ineffectual shouting match, such as the predictability of these sorts of proceedings. And then the proximity alarms sounded.

Aresh muted himself and opened a comm channel to the bridge. 'Commander to bridge. What's set off the alarms?'

'Unknown signatures, sir,' said his first mate, the mechanical Terran tones distinguishable even through the low quality of the channel. 'I've already ordered the crew to battle stations.'

'Very good, Mister Four-Zero. Stand by. I'm on my way.' He closed the channel and returned to the conference, offering a hasty apology before departing. He reached the bridge soon after, taking his place at the captain's chair. He reached behind his head, plugging in a datajack into the seat's neural link port. The cold rush of data infeed filled his head as diagnostic, targeting, and sensor readings ran down his retinal implants' display. A ceiling-mounted hololith lit up, projecting a sphere of light dotted with myriad icons. A large blue dot marked the space station on which the conference occurred, surrounded by a defensive sphere of the 108th's cruisers, while hundreds of kilometers away, dozens of small frigate groups were arranged in a looser, larger sphere. Several large yellow dots--designated as unknowns under standard battlesphere settings--were rapidly closing in on the blue dots marking Intrepid's position.

Aresh grimaced. Next to the battlesphere, four holographic faces manifested, bearing the likenesses of the frigate shipmasters under his direct command. 'My young devils,' Aresh said, 'we have multiple unknowns on our sensors. Assemble on the coordinates being uploaded to your navigators now and ready your weapon crews.'

'Pirates, sir?' asked one of the captains, a Ch'tarr named Lieutenant Ak'ch'arr.

'Possibly. They're too far out for us to tell at this time,' Aresh responded. 'The nebula's particulates are playing hell with our long-range sensors. Regardless, I want all of you on full combat readiness.

Aresh turned to his comm officer. 'Hail the unknowns.'

'Aye, sir,' she said before turning to her instrument panel. 'Attention unknown vessels, you have trespassed upon Confederate space. Please come to a full halt and identify yourselves. If you do not do so within one minute, you will be fired upon.'

Aresh noted on his datafeed that the vessels had entered short scanning range. The leader bore the shape and size of a Dominion Grand Cruiser, while its escorts revealed themselves to be a flotilla of frigates of varying design. Another hologram appeared, this time displaying someone most definitely not from Confed. It was a Urem warrior bearing the markings of a captain, bearing a lopsided, white-toothed grin, which looked all the more unsettling given his hairless dark gray skin.

'Ah, Khur-Commander. It has been so long, yes? While you retain your rank, I have been promoted since our last meeting.'

'Tagore,' Aresh rumbled. 'We were not expecting Dominion warships. Explain yourself.'

Captain Tagore of the Urem Dominion kept up his predatory smile. 'Be at ease, Aresh. We are merely here to ensure the well-being of our diplomats. So tell me, old friend. What new things have you learned to kill?'


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 Post subject: Re: Stars Without Number
PostPosted: Mon Mar 10, 2014 12:13 am 
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As one of the closest capital ships to the sudden intrusion by the unknowns, the CMV Triumphant had an obligation to respond. Whatever it was out there, the frigate screen was unlikely to be able to hold it for any length on time without heavier support. As the battlecruiser's business end rotated through the emptiness of space to line up with the contact mass Commander Azka Valinto, the ship's skipper and not quite Captain, made her way from the Command Bridge's access door to the aptly named 'Hot Seat', settling herself into the chair and quickly bringing up her own personal displays.

"XO, can you tell my exactly why I had to be called away from the conference?" Short and to the point, as was expected from a ship's captain in what could potentially become a combat situation. The XO himself, a Terran by the name of Seven-Three, was already prepared for the question.

"Unknown contacts, ma'am, along the two-oh-one bearing at relative level with us. The frigate cordon has already moved into position and I ordered the Triumphant to Condition Two and pointed us straight at the contacts. No word yet as to their disposition." The skipper nodded in time with the Terran's almost grating tone, her crest flexing subconsciously with irritation at the sound.

"Thank you, Mr Seven-Three. Weapons, give me shadow vectors on the hostiles for the accelerator. Ops, standby to bring the ship the Condition One. Comms, hail those frigates and ask if they need any assistance. It wouldn't do to steal good kills without permission." The bridge crew jumped to it, making adjustments and typing commands as necessary. Right up until the Comms officer glanced up and cleared his throat.

"Ma'am, the frigates have hailed us first. Contacts confirmed as Dominion vessels and we are not to engage." The collective feeling of relief that they hadn't had to fight and frustration for not being allowed to test themselves permeated the small space. Letting out a frustrated breath, Valinto considered her next words.

"Okay then. XO, sound the all clear. Ops, take us down to Condition Four. No sense in running a hot reactor forever. Weapons, scrub those vectors. Nav, get us back in the defensive patter will you." A chorus of aye, aye's and yes ma'am's sounded out as the officers got back into the routine.

Standing again, the Commander made her way through the bridge doors for the second time in as many minutes.

"XO, you have the bridge. Notify me of any changes."

Now back in the ship's conference room, settling into the projection field once more, she was practically seething, burning in her own damned anger at the intrusion and subsequent stand down. The very least the Dominion bastards could have done was let them know they had ships coming. Typical.

The shapes of the assembled diplomats and captains rematerialised in front of her, looking for all the damned galaxy like they hadn't been worried at all. This lot could win awards with that kind of skill. The lead diplomat for the Confederacy was the first to speak.

"Well Commander? Is the situation resolved?" She didn't know why, but this Terran's voice annoyed her more than all the others she'd heard.

"To the best of my knowledge the situation never happened. No shots were fired, at the very least. All I know is that the ships are Dominion vessels, which we did not know were approaching." The last was a direct barb aimed at the Dominion representatives.

"As for the rest, I believe that would be better explained by Commander Aresh. He was closer than I was to them, and was the one to issue the stand down. He will be best placed to explain."


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 Post subject: Re: Stars Without Number
PostPosted: Fri Mar 28, 2014 11:19 pm 
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Aresh couldn't help but bristle at the unexpected arrival of the Dominion vessels. Something nagged at him. Something was off about this meeting. Four-Zero, his first mate, sent him a private text message via the datalink.

'Scrub target locks?'

Aresh pondered it for a moment as Tagore mused about his latest conquest, something about the subjugation of yet another primitive and defenseless species. He pulsed a negative response along the link and sat back, still tense. He pulled up a 2-D vid link to the conference, just to make sure everything was going along smoothly. All of the delegates remained as they were, with two bodyguards for each delegation standing at attention in the rear. Negotiations continued as normal. Good. Perhaps he was simply getting paranoid.

The Urem continued to blather until Aresh interrupted. 'Tagore, is there a point to this conversation?'

'Ah, yes, yes, Khur-Commander. There is a point. I have fought a hundred battles with a hundred species, but there was always one that eluded me, one that, due to politics, never could enter my gunsights, Commander.'

Aresh felt he knew the answer to the question already. He gestured for Tagore to hold his thought and glanced at the screen. What was bothering him? Snap out of it, you old dog. You're just getting paranoid in your old a--

A third guard. There was a third guard behind the Terran speaker, designate Wordsmith.

'Get me a line to the summit now,' Aresh barked to his comm officer. His datalink pulsed in response as the officer opened a link to the space station. 'Wordsmith, you must evacuate the conference chamber immediately.'

'Commander Aresh,' the Terran said gently, bringing a finger to his commlink, 'is there a reason for your sudden interruption?'

'Consider it a hunch, Ambassador. You must evacuate this instant. I have reason to believe--'

'Hold your peace for a moment, Commander.' On the display, Aresh saw Wordsmith turn to face the third guard, who had produced a dataslate from an armored hip compartment.

'Wordsmith, whatever you do, do not--'

The Terran pressed a finger to the dataslate. A flash of light. A whitewash of the visual link, followed by a cut to a static-filled visual feed. Aresh heard dozens of voices call out.

'Nuclear detonation detected on Statio--'

'Status report! Ensign, damage reports n--'

'--ee what happened? Open a link to the station freq--'

Aresh shut the comm as Tagore roared in a mixture of surprise and panic.

'ARESH! WHAT IS THE MEANING OF THIS?'

The Khur gripped his command chair's armrests, tensing as he glanded combat stims into his system. 'Captain, I assure y--'

'THAT WAS A NUCLEAR DETONATION, WHORESON!' The Captain's gravelly voice deepened further to a deep, basso growl. 'The Dominion will hear of this, Aresh. I thought I could trust your people to speak peacefully, but you resort to base terrorism and murder? This is an act of war!'

'Tagore, you idiot, this is no time f--'

The Dominion officer cut his video feed. Aresh could do little but stare in slack-jawed horror at the implications of this event. Four-Zero's voice shook him out of his reverie quickly enough, as did the warning klaxons indicating an enemy target lock.

'Orders, sir? What do we do?' The Terran's voice wavered with fear. Even after having served alongside one for over a decade, Aresh still found the robotic species' emotive nature paradoxical and surprising. The old Khur soldier spoke with a heavy heart, reluctant to believe that it had happened at last.

'Launch our fighter screen and signal a weapons free order to the other frigates. The Cold War is over, Mister Four-Zero. Load the spinal lance with augur rounds and slave its fire control system to me. Gunnery, focus laser fire on the shield seam on the grand cruiser at these coordinates.'

On the battlesphere display, dozens upon dozens of Dominion dots flashed into existence. Tagore had called in reinforcements. Had they been waiting outside of sensor range this whole time? Had the bombing been a false flag operation orchestrated by a Dominion agent? Aresh shook his head. No time to think about such things now. He uploaded a numerical sequence to his ship's gunnery decks and began sending targeting data to every other Confed vessel within range. The ships of the 108th Expeditionary Fleet would need every bit of help they could get.


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