[b][i]ECR Enlightenment, Terminus’ comet cloud[/i][/b]

“Deploy the drones! All guns fire at will, single on target!” the commander of the faira cruiser scrambled to issue orders as the ship emerged in a particularly dense formation of comets and other chunks of space material. Unlike the larger ships, the Nebula class had a weaker hull not reinforced by the fiber mesh. The drones unclamped and raced to shoot down the rocks that threatened to impact against the hull. At the same time, the shield was evaporating the ice of the comets, soon turning the place into a soup of water vapor and debris. “So much for visual confirmation. It will be an hour before this cloud scatters enough to see through. Oracle, any news?”

“No, ma’am. Dozens upon dozens of small echoes consistent with rocks, but nothing that would indicate a ship or strikecraft.” the oracle reported.

“Oh well, recall the drones and let’s jump to the next location as soon as the drives are cycled. We’re meeting with a Narix scouting party on the next one to share logs. This mess of a place makes transmitting them nigh impossible.”

The Narix frigate has already been waiting by the time the Faira cruiser arrived. Some of the swarmer defensive turrets were still reloading, the hull bore marks of impacts and the dorsal fore turret was split open. A Pillager was circling the ship, unloading spare hull segments to replace the damaged ones. Several Narix engineers flocked around the worst dents with EVA packs, getting their ship in order.

“Enlightenment, Zenith. Good to see you, had any luck on your end so far?” the frigate’s commander sent her static-filled greeting to her Faira comrades. “Hold for transmission, we’ll have to unfuck our main comm array. Give us a few minutes.” the Narix offered an apology, drawing attention to the stump of the Zenith’s transmitter as it was being replaced.

“Zenith, Enlightenment. Your oracle can give us a tether and we can hop aboard, if you’d rather be done with this. Holding otherwise.” the CO answered, directing the comms officer to prepare the data package for download.

“Very well, we’re expecting you in the back of the CIC. Oracle, if you would.” the crew then started to clear the back of the deck to give the Faira some place to jump to.

“Evening. Sorry about the complications, a bigger chunk of rock whacked us over the head upon last jump. Decapitated one of our 2 meters, as you may have seen, and more.” the Narix aspirant greeted them, towering over everyone on the deck. The navigation officer grabbed a 10 by 20 cm data drive and handed it to the visiting Faira.

“Evening, sir. All of our logs since we reached Terminus, including the AWACS Pillagers.”

“Not to worry, Aspirant. We’ve lost a couple of drones ourselves in the last jump. This place is as hostile as they get. Are you heading to the node for repairs?” the CO asked, taking the drive and providing the Narix with their own, so that their navigational data would update and the map could be labeled with areas already scanned. “Since you’re here, I imagine you didn’t have any luck finding our prey either?”

“No, we’ll seal our hull breaches, restore full communications and continue the search. Fortunately, it’s only the turret that’s gone, we’ve saved most of our munitions for when we find the little bastards.” the aspirant shook her head. “Nary a peep, it’s like they’re made of smoke and mirrors. Eh, it just doesn’t feel right, how could eight ships just disappear like that. It’s possible they are laying in wait in the asteroid field, latched onto a chunk of rock big enough to hide them. Except as we’ve seen, we can’t stay there long enough to look. Maybe if we grabbed one of the two-seater jump bombers, put an oracle into the co-pilot seat and have them take a look?”

“No thanks, I like being in one piece. I’m not getting into those deathtraps.” the Oracle snorted from her station.

“I agree, we need a better detection method, but what can we do? Fighters are too small to detect to most shipboard oracles and the Marine oracles do not have the range. Our engineer is thinking of using large drone patrols to search for engine signatures, the adjustments to their sensors and AI would only take few days. But it’S two days we could be mapping the Nebula.” the Co frowned, not quite sure what to do. “Any word from other ships?”

She shook her head. “Naris and Equinox have completed their patrols and returned to the node. They’ll refuel and run their course again. The Halberdier reported all clear about an hour ago and then went silent, but we’re still reading their IFF and thermal signature from all the way out there. Oracle didn’t note anything odd either. They’ve not moved for the past twenty minutes, maybe they are in a similar situation to us. Since you’re asking, I assume it’s the same with you?”

“Pretty much. The Explorer group only has six cruisers to send out, and with the OEP we’re all in all short on Oracles that have a chance of spotting the little insects. What yo say is worrying though, surely the Lord-Commander would have sent someone to investigate already and take inventory of spare parts that would have been needed to deliver?” the CO inquired, not really comfortable with the thought of being stranded for an hour before someone noticed. She was fairly certain the Admiral would never do that.

“We have received no indication of problems, else they would have called. Between two comm arrays, the subspace array and their strike craft, there’s a slim chance of not being able to contact anyone in time of need. Sensors, how far away is the Halberdier?”

“Some 800 million kilometers in direct distance, no obstructions between us and them.”

“Do we bother them? Mian array reported operational.” the communications officer realized why the commander asked, getting a nod in response.

“Halberdier, Zenith. You’ve not moved for almost half an hour, is there a problem?”

The response took a few seconds. “Zenith, Halberdier, I hope you’re having a better day. We’ve lost contact with one of our Pillagers. We keep pinging them on short-range and have sent the remaining Pillager and two Halberds to run their course with regular reports, but they haven’t found then yet. I’m afraid they might have been hit by a rock and lost propulsion or power, or worse.”

“Damn it, we need to lure them out. We could be looking for them in this comet cloud for decades!” the CO exasperated, “But last time they came to check us out and we sent them home in body bags, no way they’ll just jump us. They would have been on us or the Halberdier already. Why did they jump the Curious in the first place? It couldn’t have been random.” the commander continued their makeshift strategic sesion.

“Well, we can be certain they’re not coming to the node, That’s where both the Explorer and the Ira are parked. Maybe they’re saving fuel? Waiting for someone to come help them? Or the Curious beat the fight out of them, wishful thinking?”

“Perhaps they came to rescue their kin from aboard the derelict?” the gunnery officer offered, “And since we punched them square in the face, they’ll think twice before showing their ugly heads again. If anything, I’m surprised they didn’t jump us before you arrived, we’re a turret down and half our swarmers were empty. A perfect opportunity, really.”

“Yeah, perhaps. I’ll make the call upstairs, see if they might relinquish one of the captured specimen as bait? They have plenty of corpses to study. How in the light did the universe produce something as deformed as them though?” the CO frowned in eternal mystery. “Very well, if you require no more assistance, we best be on our ways, just in case we stumble onto something.”

“Time we moved as well, see you back at the node. Hopefully, all of Halberdier’s crew will join us as well. Stars guide your way.”

[b][i]ED Explorer, Terminus - Opportunity node[/i][/b]

“The theory may have some validity to it, Lieutenant. Good work. I’ll contact the Lord-Commander and we’ll see what we can do. Dismissed.” Cygnus said form her desk without once looking at the Enlightenment's CO, busy as she was. The crews of the faira cruiser along with one of the Narix frigates came up with a genius solution to their predicament really. All that would be required was to get the brainiacs to relinquish their one living specimen of the ancients. Something the rest of the admiralty probably would not be keen on doing, despite the fact that nobody was able to even approach the ancient with an instrument or personally without being killed or destroyed. Even the dead bodies were well beyond anyone’s understanding.

Tapping into the comm suite, she contacted the Ira. “Ira actual, Explorer actual. I assume you have been briefed by the crew of the Zenith on what they cooked up?” she asked, hoping that Zorea might agree with executing this. With the COs of both their attack fleets requesting the specimen, there would be far less naysayers.

“Aye, I have. Don’t you love it when two great minds stumble upon each other? Give them a few decades and they will be sitting in our seats. The problem is getting the specimen AND getting it into position. I hate to call for family favors, but isn’t your daughter your chief scientist? Maybe she could help sway their minds? If that does not work, we could enlist the help of ambassador Taranis, she has a certain way with words.” If the combined efforts of those failed, Zorea would have to admit defeat. Although he despised the idea of having the special activities division raid one’s own bases, it would not be the first time that’s happened in Narix history. But there was no need to bring up that idea just yet.

“Good, you approve of the operation then. I do not know of how much help the Commander can be, as she is not assigned to that project, and I’d hate to have her shame the rest of our collective scientists into giving up the Ancient. The ambassador might be a good help, if she and the Rear Admiral Libra have given up on communicating with these insects. I believe our best bet is to go to them with a good plan though, preferably one that assures the return of the specimen to their hands. The Curious gave them a broken nose, so I think they will be weary of jumping a Faira ship again, much less if they do not have adequate ships available to take it on. Could you spare a Privateer class or a Vanguard for this? I think if we ferry the specimen via ship to the shipwreck, it would look convincingly enough like we want to run some tests on it there. They might jump in for a grab if the target is weak enough ship. We will of course have ships with drives hot and ready to jump to assist.” The Admiral shared the general outline of her plan.

“My thoughts exactly, aside from using the derelict. We’ll use the NSS Naris to get the specimen there and lay in wait. If they swallow the bait, we’ll jump to catch them in crossfire. Worst comes to worst, the Naris can jump away given its drives. As there is so few of your people, its Faira personnel can be offloaded before this mission. First, we have to acquire the bait though. And hope they don’t have a Lucifer hibernating in this system. I’ll call the Alchemist so the ambassador can start cooking up a way to get the beast. Another problem is getting the beast back to the scientists. We cannot guarantee what it will do.”

“It’s hard preparing without knowing what they can and can’t do. Try to imagine yourself in their position. You’ve sent a rescue party to a ship of an old enemy of yours to recover some of your men. But someone’s gotten there first, blown your ships from the sky, routed your surviving fighters and captured your people. And now they return with one of your own to that wreck. What would you do?”

“Honestly, if I was left to my own devices with naught but a few warships for eight thousand years, I would have already put a plasma bolt through my head.” Cygnus snorted, “Can your ship simulate a drive or power failure to give them some extra incentive? I will also jump the Explorer as far out of the system as I can, hopefully they take it as a jump node exit.” Cygnus thought up further. “In any event, the Ancient we have in captivity now has thus far proved unable to break through the containment shield we put it in. A similar cage, if you will, could be constructed in one of the Naris’ cargo holds.”

“Even without said cage, the cargo hold is quite durable. Although if it does break free, the crew will have to do without provisions, munitions and toilet paper until the ancient is subdued, that’s not a happy thought. They could cut engines mid-maneuver to have the ship tumble a bit and increase the core output for a short while. That temperature increase might be enough. For extra effect, they could do so upon exiting subspace, but it would have to be executed carefully.”

“Only if it’s safe, lord-commander. We already lost one Pillager, no need to add a Vanguard. Very well, make the call to the ambassador, I’ll get hasty clearing out my forces to the edges to the system, make them think we think it’s safe. You should stay at the node, just so they do not attempt to break out. We’d never catch them until they made contact with the rest of them, and, well, that isn’t a though I want to entertain.” Cygnus signed off, happy with the Narix putting a competent man in charge. For once.

“Don’t forget the rest of my fleet is currently camped in Opportunity. We won’t let them through. And the Naris is manned by the best frigate crew in my fleet. You could only find better men and women in the First Fleet.” he turned to make the proper arrangements. There was quite an operation in the making, acting, not reacting. Right where they should be.

[b][i]NSS Naris, Terminus - Opportunity jump node[/i][/b]

“For the record, I am SO not okay with this plan.” the Naris’ XO fumed at the sight of a security feed from their cargo hold. “A live Nightmare aboard our ship, are they mad? Let the saps from the Zenith carry this out since it was their damn idea.”

“Stow it, it’s not gonna help. Take solace in knowing they picked us for the job because they thought no one else could hack it.” the CO barked. “NSS Ira, this is the NSS Naris, we are go. Engaging drives in T minus sixty.”

“Received, Naris, stars guide your way.”

“Engineering, is everything prepared?”

“Feint prepared, ready on your go.”

The Naris lurched forward and a subspace window swallowed it. Five seconds later, a subspace window appeared 1000 meters off the ancient wreck. Upon exit, the Naris seemed to have an engine malfunction, firing the forward-right RCS thruster, sending it into a leftward spin.

“Ruse is a go.” the frigate broadcast along with an authentic crisis signal. All that was left now was wait for the Nightmares to come.

They didn’t have to wait for long.

[center][img]http://wiki.hard-light.net/images/4/42/Sddemon-old.jpg[/img][/center]
A massive Nightmare ship of destroyer proportions have arrived form subspace on a parallel course. Strangely, the behemoth didn’t open fire itself. Instead, it started spewing wing after wing of fighters and sortied two transports.

“Restore drives, swarmers loose, load frag twins! Helm, heading 3-1-3 inc 1-9, jump when ready!”

“All forces, beast took the bait, we’re pulling out!”

The swarmer turrets spat missile after missile, soon joined by the 750 mm twin turrets ripping into the fighter formations, creating an almost perfect wall of fire behind the frigate, covering its retreat.

Above and to the sides of the Nightmare destroyer, about 1500 meters away, several groups of jump points formed. Soon, the destroyer was besieged from two sides by the First Fleet’s three Vanguards, their fighter and bomber wings appearing not long after. Among them were a few prototypes of the jointly-developed fighters - the Dagger-class interceptors, Halberd-class multirole fighters and Flail-class heavy fighters.

The nightmares would only have seconds before the first salvo of torpedos from the Vanguards, 16 per cruiser, reached the destroyer’s hull.

Far away, at the Terminus - Opportunity jump node, lord-commander Zorea stirred in his seat. Three cruisers against a destroyer. His soldiers on the line and he had to sit at the node and let the battle take its course. But the risk of the Nightmares reaching Opportunity was too great.

Alongside the Vanguards, two Pulsar class corvettes detached form the Explorer group made the jump, with orders to take out the engines on the destroyer as soon as the target data became available. Cygnus had to fight not to jump in the Explorer immediately as she looked at the image of the monster sieging the small Narix ship. But on second look, the ancient destroyer, wherever it was hiding, suffered damage (or was it inflicted as far back as the Great War?), making her hold her own destroyer in reserve after all.

“The bastard jumped! It’s headed for the node! One of it’s heavy plasma cannons made a hit on the Naris’ main engine!” sounded form one of the corvette COs. “Either they are after the Zenith or they are trying to run. Helm, set course for the node. This ends here. Launch the Muons before we jump, have them target the engines again!” As she ordered it was done, the sleek and fast tactical bombers recently developed launching, a pair of them, and jumping ahead of the destroyer.

[b][i]Terminus-Opportunity jump node[/i][/b]

“The fuck was that?”

“Hit to the stern, main drive’s gone!”

The ship rocked violently before it left subspace, nowhere near the jump node it was headed to and far away from the Ira’s protection.

“We’ve jumped short.” the navigation officer called. “Still have about 200 000 kilometers to the node.”

“Reload ATAFs and see if you can sort out the drive.”

“No good, sir.” the chief engineer reported, “Half the engine’s melted, we’ll have to make due with secondaries.”

“Cut power to main gun batteries, just muster enough power to  limp back to the node, we can work from there.”

“Incoming!” the sensors officer shouted, his voice a mixture of disbelief, annoyance, fury and dread. “Right on our arse, too.”

The massive warship emerged just a few hundred meters above them, as if trying to pull the frigate close in a hug.

“Crisis, crisis, this is the NSS Naris, our jump drives are down for the moment and we’re in knife range of the Nightmare destroyer. ANy available units, please render assistance.”

A salvo of twelve torpedos was launched, directed at what appeared to a Narix eye to be a fighter bay. The Naris still had twelve more torpedos, but reloading them would take time. The gunnery control officer took the initiative, giving the order to load armor piercing munitions into the 750 mm guns and worked with the dorsal astrogation dome to target any apparent turrets on the destroyer’s belly.

“Naris, Claymore wing!” sounded a Faira voice form the comms suite. “Put yourself on a perpendicular course and go full sublight, we have orders to disable that ship. ETA 30 seconds!” the pilot sounded frightened herself. No wonder, they have ran into the cockpit without so much as proper weapons training for the recently developed craft. Just their luck to have a Faira capsule mounted on them, so neither an AI or a trained Narix pilot could take the job. Fortunately, they at least had the OEPs pilots whispering good stuff in their ears over the comms.

As soon as the bombers came into range, they opened up with the hypervelocity cannons, the rounds punching through the destroyer’s armor and wrecking it’s single engine cluster, causing it to float forward uncontrollably. Seeing the success of the cannon, the two bombers retargeted their EMP torpedoes onto the largest turrets they could see, letting loose before veering off course lest they collided with the large ship. “Naris, Claymore lead. Target disabled and the main armaments are disarmed. Hold tight, help is on the way.” they signed off before jumping out, just as the Ancient fighters were closing in on them, effectively drawing them away on the other side of the destroyer form the Narix ship.

“Much appreciated, Claymore.” the comms officer thanked as the ship turned quite nimbly for its size, burning as much as its crippled drives would allow. With the largest armaments disabled and fighters held mostly at bay by their defenses, the Naris’ commander felt like they might actually live to tell this tale, despite the hammering the ship was going through on the account of the fighters’ primary weapons and several forgotten turrets.

“Sir, we can’t muster enough power to make the whole jump, the secondary motivators have taken a beating when they hit the main drive, though if we disable life support, we’ll do with three hops.”

Throughout the ship, the sound of ventilation died, gravity disengaged and lights switched off in the halls and habitation sections. The Naris broadcast their expected jump points to the rest of the ships involved in hounding their unexpected prey in case the Nightmares didn’t need main drives to jump and executed the first one, slipping away, at least for the time being, from the Nightmare’s grasp once more.

As the Naris ran, the Second Fleet returned in a wedge formation, fighters clamped to the Vanguard’s radiator wings, and let loose another barrage of their main armaments. Space was once more filled with colorful flashes of light as weapons fired and ships fell.

With the Naris safe, it was merely the case of pecking the Ancient destroyer to death and dealing with it’s strikecraft. The first task was about to become a lot easier though, as the Faira destroyer finally arrived. “Explorer to all ships, stand clear of the Ancient destroyer. All guns, engage the main target!” Cygnus called on public channel, and the four P-15s bit savagely into the Ancient warship, gutting it from bow to stern and melting everything in their path. The P-5s have targeted the remaining turrets, blowing them clean off on most accounts. The glows on the ancient ship flickered with the second hit from the Explorer’s main armaments, before the entire ship went up in flames and flashes of nuclear detonation when the torpedoes finally arrived. “All ships, Admiral Cygnus. Return to base if your integrity falls below medium. There is plenty of us to mop up the fighters, let’s all get home alive.”

Turning to her XO, she nodded: “Launch the prototype fighters and drone squadrons A through D.”

“Red wing standing by for launch.” Having the control of his fighter taken away from him for the launch was still something Iris hated. Once out of the bay and with the ship back in his hand, the interceptor took off, seeking the closest thing that in any way resembled a bomber, intent on turning it into several smaller ones. It was much the same with any of his comrades, some even remembering the strafing runs of the Exile Rebellion. Some might’ve found it odd how detached from reality an emotion their voices seemed despite sitting in a metal coffin filled with fuel, ordnance and other combustibles while under fire.

With the destroyer meeting its doom, something changed in the behavior of the remaining Nightmares. Where pilots struggled, suddenly, they came out on top. Even at the node, in the Naris’ cargo bay, the beast struggling to get out of its prison seemed to have lost some of its elan. The crews of the cruisers started to calm down as the tension slowly faded, replaced by collective exhaustion.

Upon hearing the news, lord-commander Zorea finally sat down after pacing around his CIC in circles since the Naris misjumped. Mere days after its hasty formation, the alliance has scored its first major victory. Losing a destroyer was no small defeat to any side he could imagine.

[b][i]Faira FleetNet News[/i][/b]

[i]Terminus secured[/i]
Today at 2242, a joint operation conducted by the second fleet and Vanguard fleet elements saw an end to the Ancient threat in the Terminus system. After conducting extensive patrols bearing no fruit, the crews of the NSS Zenith and ECR Enlightenment came up with a scheme to lure the remaining Ancient fighters out. What we expected to be a few fighters turned out to be a destroyer class ship hiding in the comet cloud, now designated Demon. After a brief chase, the Explorer was able to land the killing blow, while the second fleet’s cruisers annihilated it’s fighter complement.

[i]Combat trials of new strikecraft[/i]
During the engagements, several new strikecraft prototypes were tested. The fleet has decided to adopt the Electron space superiority fighter and Muon tactical bomber following great performance against the Ancient capital ships and strikecraft. The Antiproton interceptor has been rejected, instead the current Proton drones will take over the interceptor role after slight modifications. The remaining craft designed by the Faira are still undergoing trials.

[i]Jump nodes[/i]
There is now confirmation of no system other than the Nebula having a jump node leading outside of our local cluster. The Fifth fleet is now being upgraded at Faira’Karte to be able to assist us in scanning the Nebula for further jump nodes.

[b][i]Narix national newscast[/i][/b]

[i]Awakening[/i]
Mere hours ago, lord-commander Zorea’s battlegroup,in conjunction with the Vanguard Fleet, enacted a cunning plan, devised by the command crews of the NSS Zenith and ECR Enlightenment, to hunt down the Nightmare fighters. What was thought to be eight stray fighters turned out to be a Nightmare destroyer, now designated the NID Demon. Despite taking damage, the NSS Naris adapted to the circumstances and helped a wing of Faira pilots disable the destroyer, allowing elements of the Second and Vanguard Fleets to destroy the ship and mop up the remaining fighters. Finally, the Nightmares have been slain and all can wake up and breathe freely again.

[i]Partial field tests successful[/i]
While the newly developed bombers have not yet been tested, the council has agreed to adopt the Halberd multirole fighter into service following its retrofit to full atmospheric capability. Further assessment of the Flail heavy fighter is pending to see how it compares to the standing Raider-class. The Dagger interceptor has been rejected, but Ausira Dynamics have announced the stiletto, a civilian two-seater version, will become available early next year.

[i]The Nebula[/i]
All eyes now look upon the Faira Nebula as the Fifth Fleet ships are undergoing retrofits at the Faira’Karte that will allow them to survive the harsh environment. The council has not yet made any statement regarding alternative methods of reaching distant stars should no jump nodes be discovered.