[b][i]Opporunity II Orbit, ED Warden[/i][/b]

Lira was looking forward to this. Despite her ship being charged with warding the Opportunity system where their diplomatic hub with the Narix was located, she has yet to meet a single one. The Vanguard fleet seemed to hog all the OEP personnel for now, and the diplomats rarely ever had a use of her, and when they did, a video call was all that it required. Well, now she would get her fill, she supposed.

“This is some event.” Sola said as she stood next to her in the hangar, waiting for the transports to arrive with the Narix delegation. The upcoming talks were probably not going to be easy for either side, but the Narix were probably the one’s who would suffer bigger shock. Not that the Faira were not about to leave themselves wide open and vulnerable if the Narix decided to do away with them.

A flash of a Mindstorm announced Libra’s and Cygnus’ arrival, and they exchanged brief salutes and pleasantries. “Admirals. What is the game plan?” the junior flag officer asked.

“We tell them what threat they possibly face, and then we will see how they react, but the goal is to solidify a military alliance. We can not hope to stand up to the Ancients alone, no one can. They are thousands of years old, contingencies need to be put in place for the long term.” Lira answered, just as the dropships started to arrive.

The delegations arrival was nothing out of the ordinary. A single Vanguard arrived through the Narix node flanked by the frigates of its lance before jumping to the Fiara side of the system. It was then that a casual observer would notice something odd, as a launch of half of its fighter complement preceded two ships vaguely similar to the Pillager, but longer, missing any wings, sporting four separate engines and troop pods underslung beneath the hull. The transports, the first of the new Plunderer heavy transports, headed for the destroyer, flanked closely by the 16 Marauders. When the dropships entered the Warden’s docking bay, the fighters broke off and assumed a defensive screena round the hangar approaches.

Upon landing, the dropships lined up next to each other in their designated stands. Neither of them bore any markings except highlighted emergency handles. Once the engine noise died down, the boarding ramps dropped down, letting their occupants out. First to set foot into the hangar were the security forces, wearing an unmarked and more streamlined version of the Narix standard suit. Following them were the delegates, one carrying primarch Ascari and ambassador Taranis, the other minister Ertanax and two other Narix. Emerging out of the ships, the five delegates greeted the Faira with a nod of their heads and ambassador Taranis took the word, addressing Libra and Cygnus. “Good to see you again in good health. Shame about the circumstances of our meeting.” before turning to Sola and Lira, “I am ambassador Taranis. These are primarch Ascari, head of the Fifth Fleet and ministers Ertanax, Nebiros and Kandros, representing our government. Pleasure to make your acquaintance.”

“I am honored to welcome you aboard the Warden, Ministers, Ambasador, Primarch. I am Lira, admiral of the patrol fleet, and next to me Admiral Sola, commander of the Home fleet. Trust me, if you believe the circumstances are not good, you are in for a long day. This way, if you please.”

The group fell into march, leading to the cleaned up briefing room. As they walked, Cygnus could not help but lean towards ambassador Taranis with a whisper: “Ertanax? Any relation to...?” she asked hopefully discreetly enough, thinking of the technician aboard Astra’s ship.

“Indeed. The name ‘Ertanax’ runs far back in our history when it comes to engineering, mainly mechanical, but there are exceptions. Let me guess: you are worried we’ve sent you someone just because her uncle holds a position of power?” Runa couldn’t conceal a grin.

“Actually, no. I was just curious. It is common for us to have entire families serving on the same ship, given how long a deployment can last. It would be unbearably cruel to separate a family for as long as a generation. We maintain high levels of professionalism, with our form of government there is little choice. But we would not deny the relation. In fact, I am Commander Astra’s mother.” the admiral shrugged.

“So your daughter, with some help from rear admiral Libra, made sure an alien species didn’t start shooting at them, despite...” Runa looked over her shoulder to make sure Ascari was not within an earshot, “Despite the, well, rigid thinking of the person she talked to. Must make you proud. While on the subject, do you have anything to say about our exchange personnel? Complaints, commendations or general notes?”

“I am so glad that meeting did not turn into a disaster you have no idea. The Commander is no diplomat herself, and albeing in sciences she is the genius of her generation, people skills she inherited from me. Just awful.” she shuddered. “No, I have some notes, but none that I would want to share as they are more my thoughts than objective observations. It seems that your perfect Linsis has done rather well with hardware he did not know in an unknown hostile situation though, and my hangar crews are buzzing with excitement whenever one of your pilots issues a build order.” she rolled her eyes.

“I hope the pilots are not getting too overzealous. But it looks like we will need their skills soon, and many more like them. Have you seen the footage captured by the marines? The noises alone make my skin crawl.” Runa shuddered. “Now imagine the initial contact didn’t go as well, we were fighting each other and the Nightmares awoke. Can’t picture a scenario that could be worse by much.”

“We could have been believing in invisible omnipotent men living in the sky granting life beyond life if we followed their arbitrary rules and insist on you doing the same.” Cygnus said in a flat voice.

“Well, 1539 years ago… Some things are best not spoken of. The Dark Ones would have something to say about this, had the bloody fanatics left any of that ethnic group alive.”

“More on the matter of the Ancients soon. Much more, and you are going to wish you didn’t know. Tell me though, what is the meaning of the name you use for them?” Cygnus asked as they neared their destination.

“You know we require sleep, yes? Even when we sleep, our brain is still active and may or may not, during certain phases of sleep, produce images we perceive as dreams. A dream that incites terror, sometimes bad enough to cause you to wake up, is called a nightmare. The word is also used for particularly undesirable things or situations. One might say a set of difficult exams at school is a nightmare. For me, having my fingers crushed and arm broken at several places was a nightmare. An ancient, hostile race of aliens that don’t seem to die when shot? Quite a nightmare, wouldn’t you agree?” Runa tried her best to explain the word and thought process behind naming the new species. “If you refer to them as ‘Ancients’, what do you call the other species? The species that wreckage belonged to?”

“I’d rather not repeat myself. If you’d please.” The admiral beckoned into the room and they all took seats. 

Taking their seats, Runa spoke up. “So, your invitation was in equal measures urgent and unspecific. But it doesn’t take a genius to understand it has something to do with the events that transpired in the past 32 hours. So, go ahead. We’re all ears.”

“Your assumption is correct.” Lira responded, “As you know, we have initialized the OEP and other measures to gauge how well our peoples can work together. This form our side was also to gauge whether we can trust you with our secrets. Unfortunately, the appearance of active Ancients renders those plans too long. You need to be made aware of what it is that we might find ourselves fighting, and hopefully you’ll see the need for disclosure and why we were pushing for an alliance.”

Cygnus took the word then as a former scientist, able to share the information properly. “You were told that we have found debris of a ship form past era. That was not entirely honest from us. What we found, was an intact, inactive Ancient, or Nightmare as you refer to them, ship of massive proportions and capabilities, exceeding the destroyer specification.” she said, displaying the visualisation of the ship in question.

[center][img]http://wiki.hard-light.net/images/a/a7/Lucifer480x340.jpg[/img][/center]
“This ship is where we derived most of our current technology from. It’s main weapons were able to render the surface of a planet uninhabitable, and the shield it boasted was all but invulnerable. We have always wondered if they might still be roaming space, and now we know. And we know they do not like us. In light of this, we would implore you to rethink the decision to merge our forces sooner rather than later, and share our technological bases so that we can hopefully design equipment that would give us a fighting chance. Whether you do or do not decide to do so, the information we have on the Ancients and their ship is on this drive. Use it well.” she said, handing the drive to Runa.

“A lie by omission.”

“Being economical with the truth, minister.” the primarch interjected, accepting the drive from Runa. “In their place we wouldn’t have even shred as much as they have.”

“It has been our intent since day one to for a semi-rigid federation as well as a military alliance. We wouldn’t have agreed to the OEP otherwise. We were not sure our troops and yours could cooperate, given the obvious differences. But both the spaceborne and shipboard engagements have proven those worries null and void. I realize there hasn’t been enough time to fully evaluate our cooperation, but time is forcing our hand. The council has been notified of this, and we are prepared to begin shaping the alliance. Furthermore, Lord-Commander Zorea has been notified of this development and the Second fleet is mobilizing. Four battlegroups will be ready to be deployed tomorrow at 0600 hours.”

“There is also the matter of your construction project - the Singularity.” minister Ertanax continued, “Construction is proceeding faster than expected, but we still only have about 8 percent of the hull complete. I dearly hope that ship isn’t the bedrock of whatever we intend to do about this new, or perhaps I should say old threat, because it’s certainly not going to be ready in time.”

There seemed to be a massive relief on the Faira faces. “Very well. I and the rear admiral will be available to you for the making of this alliance.” Lira said. “Unfortunately, we can no spare any more of our ships ourselves. To be honest, the Vanguard, Patrol and Home fleets are all we got.” Sola then picked up, the hologram changing to display a large red star. “What you are looking at is our home system circa three hundred years ago. This,” she highlighted the planet closest to the star, “Is Faira’Erea, our former homeworld, with about five billion Faira.”

The video then sped up, and they could see the star eventually exploding timestamped hundred years from the original view. “This, in part, is why we have been so sparing with giving you any information about ourselves. The truth is, that the nebula we inhabit is in fact our home system. There are only a million of us left, they are all that we could evacuate in time.”

As the mood couldn’t get much worse than it already was, the news of the Faira homeworld didn’t have much of an impact. If anything, the Narix now felt validated in spending numerous resources on the First Fleet.

“Let me get this straight.” the primarch, for the first time, dropped his stone face. “You expect us to fight an alien enemy we have just learned about while you take the back seat and watch, despite knowing about this species and their abilities for what, 400 years?”

“Four hundred years trying to escape and reconstruct our society after going nearly extinct? I will not make any excuses for not being able to lend more aid at this time because we simply didn’t have the manpower to build any more. After you go through such a tragedy, they I will accept your judgement on how we have handled it, until then, you have no right whatsoever to judge us on the matter.” Libra said, a bit of a hiss in her voice.

Lira placed a hand on her forearm, trying to calm the rear admiral down. “It is true. Our only shipyard ship has been at non stop work since then. Why do you think we were so hungry for you to pay with build time in trade? We have literally jumped out of our home system for the first time since the nova of our star two weeks ago. What do you expect us to do? We have already committed two thirds of our forces to this, you can not expect us to leave out home completely undefended.”

“I am trying to be sympathetic, but I fear you have no choice. What good is rebuilding your civilisation going to be if we all get crushed? As much as I hate to use cheap phrases, this is a literal do or die situation. You have jumped out of your system for the first time? So have we. When have you ever fought a war without risk?”

“I think-” Cygnus interjected, “-That given what we know of the Ancient’S capabilities, we need to all calm down and admit to ourselves that if they arrive now, both of our races are as good as extinct.” she said morosely. “There is a single weakness in the Ancient superdestroyers’ design, which we know of because our ships suffer from it too - their shields do not work while in FTL. Now, given that your only ship that could even dream of engaging one of those in that condition at the present is the Latanos, and that is with a Faira technician operating it’s drive synchroniser, you need us right now to have a hope of saving your homeworld should they set their eyes on it, and even then, whichever jump node you would choose to engage them in would collapse with it’s destruction, likely taking all the other nodes out of the system with them. Much like that, we need you because we do not have the numbers to deal with a sizeable fleet of other ships. So can we please top accusing each other of what might have been done better to deter the Ancients now, when they are not even attacking us, and focus on how to deter them best for when they actually do show up?”

“You’re wrong about the Latanos, admiral.” Runa quickly spoke up when she heard Ascari draw a breath to speak. “There are still her sister ships, the Asgypus and the Malachor, which brought the ministers here. As I said earlier, more of our ships will arrive tomorrow. But it is as you said: we can’t face this enemy alone, which is exactly why we need you on your feet. Fortunately for us, the superdestroyer seems to be the only ship equipped with such a shield. The ships the Curious engaged did not possess any shielding system at all and our fighters, though outnumbering the Nightmare craft, managed to damage several of them despite their shielding. We can stand our ground against these threats until something bigger shows its ugly head. Is that superdestroyer all you’ve found? Did it perhaps contain additional information about this species, such as their strength, ship types or something?” she made an uneducated guess at what a warship might hold.

“There is something to discuss about the timeframe we think of. Thus far, we have no indication of the Ancients arriving in any larger numbers. Terminus is a system that doesn’t lead anywhere but back here.” Sola said, highlighting Terminus and Opportunity on the node map, “And on our side, we have Exodus system with a node only to Opportunity and to the Faira nebula, which in its own as far as we were able to scan it is a dead end as well. The Commander of the Curious theorized that the unknowns blown up their ships in subspace on purpose to cut themselves off of the Ancient forces. Unless there is a known entry point somewhere on your side of the map, I don’t see how they could even get to us, we have seen they use same mode of FTL as you do. What we found is looking most likely to be a remnant of the war fought eight thousand years ago, rather than a new arrival. We are of course still trying to chart the mindspace nodes in the Nebula, which is not easy given it’S turbulent environment, so there is a potential entry point there, in which case the Home fleet is exactly where it needs to be. Would you share your side of the map? If you know of a possible entry point, our best choice is to put a chokehold on it and not let them through to our systems in the first place.”

“Than we have a problem.” Ascari stood up, leaning towards the projected map. “As far as our side is concerned, our node from Opportunity leads to Naris itself.” he pointed to where Naris would be in relation to opportunity, Terminus and the Faira Nebula. “And that is a dead end. So either the Nightmares can travers unstable nodes, or nodes unknown to us, or we are trapped here with them. Either way, it seems we have no way out of here for the time being.”

“Well, we would like to go over Naris itself as well then. Our oracles can confirm whether there is another exit. That would actually make your home the last defensible place to fall back to should they enter through the Nebula, and it actually sounds like we need to recall all our fleets back, possibly outfit some of your ships with shielding systems and hardened sensors as well and finish surveying there, so we know for sure.” Cygnus suggested. “If we are stuck in this region of space, then… Well, it will be able to support us both for a few thousands of years and keep us perfectly safe but what future is there then?”

[i]”An inevitable war over the remaining resources that would allow the victors to endure for a few more years before their unavoidable death.”[/i] Runa thought, but did not say out loud. “Since secrets are getting out, no point holding this one back: rear admiral Libra already knows a bit, but we were pushed out of Naris due to population growth. There are now over nine billion of us and despite taxing every child, that number still grows. I hope for everyone’s sake that we can find a way out that doesn’t lead to a galaxy infested by the Nightmares. If not, that unknown future might be here sooner than anyone would like, even if we started drastically limiting our population.”

“With the alliance taking shape, getting a few oracles to Naris shouldn’t be a problem.” Ascari took over, “The Malachor will be staying here for a while, the Oracles can hitch a ride when it returns with the ministers. Once their work there is done, they can either return here via a supply ship or join the forces that would be going through the newly discovered node. As for any plans regarding direct combat or even just hunting the Nightmares in Terminus, that is better left between you and Lord-Commander Zorea.”

“Terminus is being scoured by the newly established OEP wing as we speak, along with the Explorer group’s cruisers. If there is more of them there, we will find them within the week. We hope that the unknown shipwreck will be able to provide some answers, our combined scientists are working round the clock to restore power to it’s systems. We hope that logs form the last war with the Ancients might give us an edge on ours, whenever it comes.” Cygnus supplied.

“In the meantime, we can be relatively certain that Exodus and Opportunity are free of any other jump nodes, the Patrol fleet has scanned them thoroughly, in case of Opportunity the 5th fleet has confirmed the finding. For ease of mind, it might be worth to send some of your science teams to survey Exodus as well.” Lira noted, thinking it wouldn’t hurt to be certain.

“And, since the Nebula is the only system left not fully charted by either of our species, and thus far the most likely entry point for the invasion, I propose we move the Faira’Karte to Exodus so elements of your second fleet can have our shield and sensor suites installed so they can navigate the Nebula safely, and by extension train a first wave of your personnel to work with the technology. With those upgrades, they could aid in the survey, if that would be acceptable to you. If you need the lord-commander’s approval, then I think we should reconvene at a later date once the necessary people are fully informed.”

“I don’t think anyone is going to complain about mounting shielding onto our ships.” Ascari noted. “Perhaps it would be best to start with one ship of each class, or maybe an entire lance to see what changes there will have to be made to power grid, internal layout and so on. Since the Latanos has already been modified with the help of specialist Omicri, we could start with that. Not to mention the entire Fifth Fleet is under my control, therefore the only ones that could halt that are the council and I am sure ambassador Taranis could persuade them should the need arise.”

“That would depend on whether the Lord-Commander intends to deploy an exploration fleet or be on the safe side and deploy your attack fleet straight on. On our part, it makes little difference, but the sooner it is done the better, I assume the integration of the components will not be as smooth as we would like.” Sola noted.

“I am forwarding you the full schematics of the Singularity as well. It makes no sense now to tow it into a different location, it would be easier to ferry the components to Naris or assemble them there. I would implore you to go over the design and see what improvements you think could be made. We think that you could vastly improve the armor at least. Even without that, we designed it to be - in theory - capable of engaging the Ancient superdestroyer, or killing a planet. It’s the best shot we have at the moment to killing one of those things in normal space, unless you have such a ship or weapons platform you’d like to tell us about.” Cygnus said, forwarding the schematics to the ambassador.

“Yes, I recall people complaining about the Singularity’s hull.” Ertanax noted. “It would be best to make it segmented so damaged sections can be replaced more easily. We will send the schematics to the shipwrights in charge of that project and forward their notes to you.”

“Lord-commander Zorea would not deploy his fleet without sending us through first. We are better equipped and trained for that. His fleet is a weighty blade, not fit for recon and exploration. That gives us - in theory - time to equip his ships. That, or he could assist in hunting the Nightmare remnants in Terminus.”

“The exchange pilots also mentioned one of your conceptual designs, a sort of self-propelled capital ship weapon. A gunship, I think you referred to it? Do you think that could be useful against the Nightmares?” one of the ministers wondered.

“Those were conceived as cheap offensive weapon. I do not know how effective they would be on defense. I suppose, provided we could protect them long enough, we could use something like them to blockade the destination end of a jump node. But they would still be extremely fragile. I’d rather see more capital ships built. The curious proved that even a somewhat lacking frigate is capable of destroying several of their line ships. No doubt with some experience that ratio would improve, and with some further upgrades perhaps they will not be left in such a sorry state.” the Vanguard’s admiral thought out loud.

“Upgrades such as a fighter bay or proper power generation.” the primarch snorted. “I understand your resources and shipbuilding capacities may have been limited, but how does the latter not raise any red flags? Or rather green flags.”

Outside of the primarch’s field of view, Runa shot the Faira an apologetic look. While she agreed, there had to have been a better way to put it.

“Don’t forget the ability of Nightmare strike craft to use subspace to jump on their own. Even if the range would be limited, it would level the playing field.” minister Ertanax continued, “Imagine if a Partisan-class carrier could deploy all of its strike craft while staying on the other side of the system? One such carrier carries 240 fighters and bombers. If provided proper jump coordinates, they could annihilate small lances without any help from a capital ship. How quickly do you think the Nightmare fighters trapped in Terminus, provided they are indeed trapped, can be tracked down and captured?”

“We know of the weaknesses of the Comet class, a replacement is already well in the simulation stage, although pending the review of the Singularity, we might make other changes as well. The Meteor and Pulsar class are thus far good enough, but we are looking at the complete deprecation of the smallest warship class. After seeing that monster of a cruiser they tossed at the Curious, nothing we can produce yet can compare. That thing could stand up to a corvette.” Cygnus frowned.

“Yes, miniaturization of a jump drive should be something we should work on. In the meantime, provided there are psychokinetic volunteers, a special strike craft class that would serve to wakejump other craft could be designed. Is there any progress on the support ship?” Lira asked.

“With the introduction of the larger Plunderer-class transport, this task just became much easier. Three prototype support modules are already being assembled, they should be delivered within the next few days.” minister Ertanax rubbed his hands, “Not only can the Plunderer carry more materials due to its size, we don’t have to modify the craft itself, we just build the desired module, much like the Discovery-class. In a few days, we’ll take the same ships that brought us here, detach the troop pods, attach the support pods and boom: support ship. As to how it’s going to work, that lies in the stars so far.”

“Yes, the Lilith-class.” Ascari frowned, “Corvus Linsis dedicated a few paragraphs to that nasty little beast. I hope there are no more of those hibernating around here. I doubt anything smaller than a Comet or Vanguard stands much chance unless they manage to cripple it very quickly.”

“Very well. I think we have what we came for. Minister Ertanax, rear admiral Mercuriel will be your contact in facilitating any technology exchange. Read admiral Libra will be handling the drafting of any alliance related documentation form our side. Regarding our military deployment, Admiral Cygnus and the Vanguard fleet will remain in Terminus and finish surveying it. Primarch, your fleet is welcome to help and double check, but we would like if you could send one instance of each ship class form your fleet ahead to Exodus to begin the refits. Given the sizes of the ships, our shipyard will be able to refit them and repair the Curious at the same time, it would give us a head start. Admiral Lira and the Patrol fleet will be deployed throughout Opportunity and Exodus to keep a lookout for any ancients that might have been left slumbering there, as well as sending a cruiser to verify Naris as a dead end on the map. Finally, I will away the fifth fleet’s arrival in the nebula once your ships are ready.” Sola summarized what the Faira fleets’ plans were. “Would this schedule be acceptable?”

“Very well. I will send the Asgypus, the Sharlatan and the Natanis to begin the refits. That will give us two Vanguards that can be synced to your drives. I will return with the rest of the Fifth present as well as the science ships to Terminus for now. I expect lord-commander Zorea to pitch his tent here for the time being, as he could quickly respond to any threats at Terminus, Exodus and Naris alike.” Ascari nodded.

“I will sort out the proper clearance for the survey of Naris as soon as I get back to the Alchemist.” Runa continued. “In the meantime, the ministers will put together a skeleton of the treaty. Rear admiral, say we meet in 48 hours at your convenience to get things moving?”

“We’ll get started as soon as we stow our things. I will also forward any updates regarding the Singularity to the rear admiral directly.” Ertanax finished.

“Please, pass the design changes to Commander Astra. She is to be the commander of that ship, and it is her design after all.” Cygnus noted, and the group got ready to depart back to their respective fleets. “One final thing. I believe we should switch most of the OEP personnel to the Home fleet. Get them used to working in the Nebula. It is a bit of an… acquired taste.”