Where we Left Off [RP TITAN]

[Error]

Flying through empty space SUDDENLY BUILDING DREADNOUGHTS?

[Solar112]

Rescinded

[Chairman_Tiel]

The cold gaze of the warp grew that much more steely as a plethora of Protectorate battlewagons joined the convoy already within it. Flashes of lightning in the fluorescent tunnel signified the entrance of each vessel falling in with the task force, their drive units immediately adjusting to accommodate the increased speed granted by the spatial sub-dimension. One, however, flickered in failure an instant later.

An observer on the command ship trailing the rest of the detachment felt his heart rise to his throat as he watched the scene unfold in a mix of apprehension and horror. Leftenant Samir's feathers rose in something approaching surprise at a plume of flame erupting from the harrier-class ship's engine component - a further indicator of catastrophic damage. The auburn colored Tien raced to a nearby comm unit, whose operator looked up at him in silent inquiry.

"Open a line to the Cariin, quickly!"

The words tumbled out of Samir's beak like a waterfall, but the bridge officer seemed to understand regardless. He turned back to the console with robotic precision and rapidly input the commands that would enable a communications link between the troubled vessel and their own. Moments later a stressed voice sounded over the speaker.

"You have the Cariin. We appear to be having some issues here."

Samir suppressed a scowl at the needless information but replied in turn, "Cariin, this is Squadron Lead. Yes, we can see that. What do diagnostics report?"

A pause, then, "Looks like a severe plasma anomaly in drive unit Beta. Disruption growing at a rate of 6 joules a second; please advise."

At six joules a second the blockage would reach critical mass in the next minute, following which the engine would inevitably 'go up', as the naval terminology went. And taking the rest of the crew with it, no doubt. Samir shook his head. They couldn't merely disable the drive without dragging the rest of the convoy down to a crawl, and a mid-warp docking would compromise the much more valuable asset present in the command ship itself. There really was only one option.

"Cariin, break off from formation and go cold."

"Sir?" A brief hint of panic entered the voice present at the other end.

"You're jeopardizing the mission." After a brief second, he thought to add, "We'll be back for you later."

"Copy Squadron Lead. Falling out of convoy." The harrier's auxiliary jets exploded into action, propelling the warship out of the warp tunnel. One last thunderclap indicated its departure from the rest of the group. Samir listened for the telltale sign of a fusion drive detonation, but to his relief the void remained silent. The crew had disabled the engines in time. They were effectively stranding themselves for however long this mission lasted with their long range capabilities offline, yet such was the duty of all Taln servicemen. It wasn't really even their fault, or that of anyone connected to the Cariin. These warp networks had not been traversed in decades, and without maintenance were more often than not hosts of the spatial clutter that caused such failures. Simply the wrong place at the wrong time.

Samir clasped the aurii of his wings behind him as he walked away from the station, whose user returned to reading a holobook. A few clacks on the bridge's alloy floor from his talons striking it brought him back to the viewscreen that dominated the fore of the room, and a suitably commanding view of the task force as it throttled forward. He genuinely hoped no more such problems would arise in their journey. As first officer he was (however temporarily) responsible for the safe transit of the Taln warships to their eventual destination, and he had no intention of failing in this task.

"Leftenant!" a gruff voice sounded from behind him. Samir spun on the knob of one of his claws, and immediately snapped a salute. Standing upon the command platform was his immediate superior, Holk, in a pressed uniform, looking expectantly down. Scores of awards decorated his wide chest, and a Fleet Marshall's rank insignia adorned a contrastingly plain naval cap. Freshly promoted, just like himself, the Marshall was a veteran of many skirmishes with human forces on the frontier. The Directorate had made a wise choice in sending him in lieu of the wizened Naval Executor, precedence of command be damned.

"Sir?"

Holk glanced forward for the briefest of seconds before returning his attention to Samir.

"I see you managed to lose one of my ships. Did we happen to make contact with the enemy while I was away?"

The junior officer grinned despite himself. "Yes sir, I forgot to sound the alarm. My apologies, I know you were looking forward to it." He dropped his salute. "No, merely engine troubles."

"That's unfortunate. We're going to need everything we have to counter this threat."

Samir frowned. "Everything, sir?"

It seemed like a premature admission of defeat. He was legitimizing the enemy, something that wouldn't do wonders for overall morale...

Holk threw him an admonishing look. "I know what you're thinking, Leftenant, and you need to throw that Academy garbage out the window." The older Tien looked up and out at the warp, as if recalling past memories. "To acknowledge a foe is not a sin. In fact, not doing so only makes room for the arrogant bravado that costs lives. I'm no fool, and neither are you. Firepower is all we really have in our favor against this clear, present, and significant threat to not only the galaxy, but our own border integrity."

Or at least, that was the explanation. One of Samir's relatives in the analysis service had told him that the invasion of Stratocracy space had been in the planning for years, merely waiting for a reliable excuse, but he nodded at the Marshall's words anyway.

Holk continued. "The AI has the resources of an entire star system at its disposal. It will react quicker. It will-"

He was interrupted by a voluminous beep filling the otherwise quiet bridge, originating from the communications area, whose current sole operator nearly leaped in surprise.

"Report." Holk asked over the sudden noise.

The officer stared at the screen for a moment before looking up at the Marshall.

"We've just pierced the Stratocracy's borders. No signs of resistance, but we've intercepted an open broadcast."

Silence descended on the bridge once more for a handful of moments. Samir turned to look at comms operator.

"The contents being.."

"Right, right." The officer returned his attention to the viewscreen before him. "Looks like it's from an unknown entity-"

"The AI, presumably." Holk interrupted, as though eager to return the favor.

"Possibly." A look of perhaps restrained annoyance crossed the Tien's face. He nonetheless continued.

"You may either leave, or help me fend off the attacks. I will not attack you, you have my word. Weather you value my word or not is up to you."

The comms officer looked up once more, emotions concealed. Samir was glad this was the case; such an exposed reaction would be grounds for a pre-emptive court martial.

"It was sent to an ID that matches recording instances of the Commonwealth's military naming schema."

The Fleet Marshall leaned over the command platform's railing in apparent consideration of the information, crest raised in what Samir could only assume was analytical thought. His beak clacked once, then twice, before speaking again.

"We can only assume, then, that the Novans will oblige them. Our past encounters have shown these humans and their ilk are unwilling to contribute to the greater good if it compromises their perceptions of 'morals'. They see an 'innocent being' and must protect it no matter the long term consequences."

Samir's own crest raised in alarm. "Are we.."

Holk looked at him and nodded, his features tight. "Aye."

He then motioned to the comms operator, who was seemingly unmoved by the gravity of the situation. "Send combat orders to the rest of the task force. All ships in Stratocracy space are to be fired on regardless of origin. Send to the Directorate for reinforcements."

The senior officer looked around the bridge, round eyes weighing risks, then added, "After that, maintain absolute comm silence."

[Ivan2006]

Simple really, take apart old ships and build new ones with the old one's parts.

You do know thta to take apart old ships and build new ones with their parts, you need just as much a shipyard as for building them from scratch?
BIC:
//Message to Novus//
I suggest the construction of a joint-effort GSI Titan.
Not something like your retrofitted Station, but something REALLY big.
A real joint-effort capable of taking on large numbers of hostile ships.
//end of message//

[DeadlyMiddie]

//TRANSMISSION TO THE STRIGIFORME NATIONALIZED KINGDOM//
We are going to send 4 Imperial Guard transports, 3 Broadsword battlecruisers, and 2 colony ships through your Yttrium portal to the Triangulum galaxy.
//END//

[Solar112]

Rescinded

[Professor Fenway]

Solar, you CANNOT JUST START BUILDING DREADNOUGHTS. You need dedicated shipyards, constructions, materials, etc.

Just no.

Also

"All of the AI controlled ships jump to a random location, ending with all of them in interstellar space. Another jump. closer to the edge. Another. At the edge now. Another. Intergalactic space. Sublight engines full power. .15c, .20c, .30c, .50c, .70c, .90c, .99c. Jade sends a few ships off in random directions, then cuts power to them, set to turn back on in three hundred million seconds."

Shouldn't you be gone for 10 years then? How build dreadnoughts?

[Error]

"Admiral, massive subspace distortion. Several light-years away... signature matches a warp drive malfunction."

Meinholl frowned. This was just getting better and better. "Hyperpulse communication to the disruption: This is CSV Prometheus. Do you require assistance? End message. Anything on the planets yet?"

"Nada. Just a bunch of radioactive craters and a few glowing wrecks."

Meinholl punched the console.

"Sir... message away, and we might have a trace on Jade's exit vector. I'll need to send it to Intel for analysis, though."

"Do so. Begin open broadcast, as follows: Alpha Leonis is under quarantine. Do not enter this system. Quarantine enforced by the Commonwealth. End and repeat."

- - -
-Message to Moboquestrian Republic-

The Defender-class titan Sabazius is 5,260m long, 2,346m beam, and 2,676m height. It is to be equipped with three hundred twenty 150mm HV-R cannon, two hundred ten 270mm HV-RA cannon, and twelve 1440mm HV-X artillery arrays, plus eight Phoenix cannon and a prototype Nova weapon.

Defenses include over one thousand PD emplacements, five hundred seventy flak batteries, and adapted planetary shield arrays, plus three meters (minimum) TI-M5 battleplate.

If you want to assist in the construction effort, you may; this ship will serve as the GSI's mobile command center and a meeting ground for solving disputes.

That, and the ability to jump up to 12,000 LY makes this a "REALLY big" vessel.
-End-

[Chairman_Tiel]

OOC: if that was for my benefit, we are observing absolute comm silence

[Solar112]

Rescinded

[Error]

You can genocide. But building new ships without a star system (of which we have several metric shitpiles) was just... no.

But if you have construction ships, find an uninhabited system and go nuts.

And Tiel, comm silence means (normally) no transmissions, not "turn off the radios". But okay.

[Solar112]

I can't really genocide without everyone going apeshit so nope. My current post still stands until shot down by ACH.

[Chairman_Tiel]

absolute

Intercepting transmissions discreetly isn't something we're really capable of, invoking the whole 'proud warrior' trope

[Error]

You can genocide without the owls hating you. They're like that.

And nothing is stopping you from running away (as my scrambler didn't work).

Seriosuly, mate, this just seems to be a "I wasn't allowed to create dreadnoughts out in the middle of nowhere, RAGE".

[Chairman_Tiel]

Hey man, not to rag on anyone here, but it is solar. Just roll with it.