Fleet Command 2.5 : Heaven's Fall.

[Lord Harrab]

Although they were aware of the fire-fight going on around them, the crew of the Apollo were determined to carry out their mission with the precision and skill the Alliance was famous for, and brought their ship down heavily on the emergency recovery hatch located on the spine of the Icurus every ship was legally required to have if it ever wanted to see space.

Tufts of escaped gas shot from sections of the Icarus's hull as the recocery chamber was pressured

"this is Apollo, Recovery teams are away, keep those bastards off us for just a while longer."

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Corporal Lucy Jones gripped the stock of her Assault rifle tightly as she felt the Apollo impact with her target and knew in seconds she would be pushed out of this warm safe chamber to conduct an emergency sweep of the ship, now that Void-brothers had been confirmed in the sector, it was possible they had fallen back on their old trick of filling derelict ships with their horrifyingly skilled Dragoons, for no other reason that to cause as many causalities to their enemies as possible.

"Ten Seconds." a Sargent yelled, Lucy muttered a prayer under her breath as he continued to count down.

"Five,

Four,

Three,

Two,

One,

Go! Go! go!"


The marines spilled out of the narrow confines of the recovery tube as soon as the hatch snapped opend, their helmet camera's allowing their commander on the Apollo to see through their eyes, as well as pass it on to the rest of the fleet.

The camber beyond was empty, but the marines didn't slow, spreading out into their teams to begin their search of the ship, Jones following the rest of her squad through a malfunctioning hatch and into the corridor beyond.

Bulkhead by bulkhead they searched, finding nothing, no crew, no Dragoons, not a single sign of battle beside the obvious destroyed bridge they had seen on their way in.

"Corporal, I'll need your help over here."

Lucy nodded and joined a fellow marine beside a hatch, it's access panel was a deep red, locked, and her specialty was hacking, so she didn't bother wasting time with words and got straight to work.


A few seconds later the hacth opened and the squad stormed through.

And found something horrific.

Every panel, every terminal, even the entire corridor was dripping with blood and organic tissue, there was even the skeletal remains of a hand emerging from the mess that had once been a wall.

"dear God," muttered a marine. "what happened here?"

A gust of wind buffered their armored forms, and Jones automatically grabbed onto the fleshy sustenance to keep her balance.

As soon as her hand touched it, a blood curdling scream cut through their headsets, deafening them and in the darkness ahead, something moved.

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[rogueshadows]

Spoiler: OOC

i believe the rest of us are waiting on combat results, harrab.

also: bump

 

[Anarchemitis]

Spoiler: OOC

Yeah. My character's method of speaking is short and terse, so don't expect much superfluous speech from him, and even out of character, I don't like repeating myself much.

 

[Lord Harrab]

Spoiler: Brain freeze

oh yes, sorry, for some reason i kept thinking there was someone else still to post. that's my thinking privileges removed for a blaaaaaarrrg......

 

[Lord Harrab]

Outnumbered and out-gunned, the void brother interceptors were torn apart, flipping the balance of power back into the 23'rd fleets favor and with their escorts destroyed the strike craft swiftly followed suit.

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The porcelain blade's torpedoes passed through the anomaly without effect, but it didn't matter as soon the attention of every ships captain was on the Apollo, which was now echoing with the screams of it's rescue team.

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Alliance Recovery Ship Apollo.
Command Deck
Objective: Recover Survivors from Republic ship (Aborted)


"Away team, this is Apollo command, report status. I'm getting Bio-Hazard warnings all over that ship, what's going on down there?"

"BZZT,-lpha team, They are butchering us! Hostiles everywhere! Lock down the Rescue tunnel now! Don't let them ontobbxxzzzt!"


"Alpha team respond! Respond!"

"bbzzzt cut us Loose! everyone here is dead! Save- Arrg-bbzzzt."

"God forgive me... all hands, emergency detach now,"

Instantly, the cruiser bucked away from the larger ship as if it had been burned, as across the Icarus's hull, tendrils of the same material that had clogged the hallways started to spread across the red Armour plate of the research ship

23rd fleet this is Apollo, extraction aborted, no survivors. Possibility of Bio-Hazard contamination, i say again, possible bio-hazard contamination. I am placing a Grade 1 Quarantine around the Icurus-"



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The Apollo's captain cut out, as beside him, the same growth was spreading across the destroyer Paladin, and his sensors could see it's systems flickering into life.

The rescue ship turned and fled towards the protective umbrella of the fleet's guns, while firing it's single cannon, the helmsman wisely anticipating his captains order, while the gunnery chief tried to do as much damage before the enemy ship could respond.


Behanth the Icurus, Corvettes were emerging from its launch bay below the bow and forming into squadrons, there where at least eight craft so far.

"All ships priority one, the Paladin and Icarus are hostile, i say again-bzzt-"

suddenly a bubble of blue energy flashed around the cruiser and it's engines died, leaving the ship to drift aimlessly.


At the other end of the system, far behind the fleet, a single Void-brother cruiser decloaked, mocking laughter echoing from it's comms, then it vanished into hyperspace.

Spoiler: FLEET UPDATE

The void-brother threat is gone, but something far more sinister has emerged from the two ships you had been sent to rescue.

The Paladin is arming weapons, and the Icarus is launching Corvettes.

The Apollo is under the effects of an EMP attack, for the next two turns it is immobile and cannot defend itself.

 

[Ultrajoe]

"I'd like to meet their research division" Admas mused, as Evil settled into the command chair. Control panels extended jerkily from the floor, and observation screens and readouts dropped down from the roof. Amadues reached out and grasped the controls, flicking over startup systems and sending bursts of proppelant from the thrusters that covered the ship. The Gloria spun slightly, slowly under the touch. The helmsmen stood down from their posts, now that control was in the hands of the Captain.

"Adams, have Mr Green set squads to repel boarders and establish a search patrol to run 24/7. Mister Ferosian, send order to the gunners, get my weapons ready to sing. Give me readouts, firing solutions, and someone get something to clean these windows!" He barked, settling in to his chair, gripping the complex control gears of the cruiser. He pulled a viewglass over his left eye and slid the status speaker into his ear. The tones of a ready craft played in his ear. "Have the Tyrants form up around us, close proximity, they can handle the Corvettes while we tear the craft to shreds"

And then the engines roared.

The Gloria was a ship built for speed and more speed, it's front a mass of heavy plate and sheild amplifiers, and it liked to go forward, lots. Reckless and illegial pirate engineering pushed it's maximum speed higher and higher over the years, but direction was everything. Volkan liked forward, because head-on let you see their expressions. The Gloria was built to exploit and survive it's captain, who used it like he had used his Fighter: A Weapon.

"Unless anyone tells me otherwise, i'm about to light up the sky" He growled into the Comms "And this ship doesn't leave large bits to search"

 

[rogueshadows]

"...That?s not good, miss."
Isabelle Zephyr looked across at her XO. Normally, he was a quiet, efficient man, but now his eyes were wide and his pupils small.
"No," she said quietly, "no it's not." below them, the strange... stuff. Yes, stuff was a good word. Not flesh. It couldn't be flesh. Could it? Anyway, the... stuff was creeping over the surface of the research vessel, and the larger military one behind it. They didn't have long, Izzy suspected, before the two came to... er, life.

"Corvettes!" scopes' shout jolted the bridge back into action.
"Not good."
Comms called, "the Gloria is moving, captain. She is engaging the Icarus."
"Seen those devils-on-wings, captain? I read their file. Those corvettes are toast."
"Don?t get cocky, Gunner. I don't doubt our... esteemed companions abilities, but there is something about flesh growing on a ship... in space... that doesn't quite scream, 'vulnerable' at me."
"Sorry ma'am"

"Torpedoes are reloaded, captain"
"Thank you, engineering. Gunner, fire on the corvettes. Let?s clear the path a bit for our pirate friends."

There were affirmative sounds, then the distinctive clunk-hiss-whooomph of exiting torpedoes.

"Unless anyone tells me otherwise, I?m about to light up the sky. And this ship doesn't leave large bits to search"
Izzy fumbled for fleetwide comms. ?Captain Amadeus, we?re firing on the corvettes. If the? things are using the ships own systems, they?ll need the bridge, just as anyone would. I suggest you confiscate it.?

?JB, you?re our resident distributed consciousness. Any thoughts on this? stuff??

 

[Anarchemitis]

"Autoalgae. Hold your fire Gloria. We would recognize it anywhere. It has long been our rival in existence and otherwise our antithesis. From what I remember and can extrapolate, it's a Bacterial weapon designed to incapacitate the crew and then die. It breeds, can eat several types of plastics and some metals, using them as food, and as a collective entity can create pressure and electrical signals to override controls of ships if necessary. A few hundred years ago like a cliché space opera conflict, evolved and went beyond simply killing beings and started taking control of the ship at its pleasure of sorts. Now it poses a similar danger as I do, except it has no ability to communicate or reason. Autoalgae is a lot like me if I couldn't understand verbal commands or prioritize targets. It could have changed since then, since last I saw of it was 78 years and 49 days ago. The best way to rid ourselves of it is to somehow get that ship without touching it or generating excess shrapnel, into a star. Your God better help you if your ship makes contact with it physically, and the only method of removing your ship of it is to dispose of it, or at least scorch the insides of your vessels with boiling lead for a few weeks.
And I also reccomend you get all of your crews immunized for the flu."
"Will it help?"
"Maybe. How would I know?
-It can't spread without physical contact, but as I have said, it may have evolved further. Keep your distance - even a robot is vulnerable."