[center][h2][u]Hestollon System - Hestollon II[/u][/h2][/center]

A dim red glow bathed the ships bridge, the active combat alert a tangible reminder of the Scorpine’s continued presence in the system.  It had been hours since their attempted bombing run on the still organizing fleet had been repelled, and in that time they’d done nothing more than move into a high orbit of the frozen and undeveloped rock that represented the systems third planet.  Olivia drummed the arm rest of her chair in anticipation, the Scorpine were either waiting for reinforcements, or for her to make the fatal error of chasing them.  If they expected the latter then they’d learned nothing from the last year of skirmishes.

Even in the faint light of the bridge she manifested a distinctive appearance.  Her short porcelain hair, the result of some genetic tampering a generation back, seemed to soak in the light, appearing as red as the status lamps that produced it.  Her eyes, long since replaced with cybernetic equivalents, could be seen scanning the bridge, her pupils actually glowing a dull yellow.  For what was easily the fifth time she shared a tired look with the ships Captain, and as if on cue a crewman on the bridges lower deck shouted, “Contacts exiting warp!  We have a...  A Scorpine patrol fleet on an attack vector, they’re burning hard, twenty minutes to contact.”

Before Olivia could even stand another woman on the level below her, one of the ships targeting officers,  spoke out, “The main Scorpine fleet is setting a course to rendezvous with the newcomers.  Enemy fleets will merge five minutes before contact, well outside of current weapons range.”

Now upright and surveying a tablet handed to her by her adjutant Olivia openly scowled, “They’ll hit us with more than twice our number, then.”

The ships Captain regarded his own command chairs screen, “I must recommend a withdrawal Admiral, had they been waiting on stragglers we could have fought them off, but to contest a hostile fleet of this size is beyond our capabilities.  We should rendezvous with one of the reserve fleets and return with the initiative.”

Her eyes only flitted upward to acknowledge the Captain before she went back to analyzing her tablet, “There are four hundred thousand men and women on that planet Captian Gray.  How many will there be once we return?  Half that?  Our soldiers won’t give up, and the Scorpine have long since learned that lesson.  We shall match the resolve of our men.”

Paying no mind to the Captains worried expression she strode up to the railing of the bridge’s raised command platform and spoke commandingly, “Communications officers, inform the front line they are to keep themselves in the silhouette of the planet relative to the encroaching Scorpine formation.  They wont risk firing long range munitions if they might hit one of their own population centres.  We’ll make this a knife fight for the bugs.  Inform the rest of the back line they are to to feign retreat and position themselves behind the planet before going dark.  All battlecruisers are to exploit the gravity well to find firing solutions around the planets curvature, even if they have to drop projectile velocity, so that they may provide the cruisers with support when the Scorpine engage”

“Captain,”  Olivia turned to face the portly man, “Contact our surface command and inform them that they are to refrain from using their surface to orbit cannons, but that they are to be ready at a moments notice.”

“As you say, Admiral Lahti.” As much as the Captian tried to keep the relief at being indirectly ordered away from the combat out of his voice, the look of disdain he received at acknowledging the Admirals orders attested to his failure.  Nevertheless he carried out his duties with the well practised efficiency of an experienced, if not courageous, man.

To the Scorpine it might have looked like the Resurrectionist front line was covering the retreat of some dishonourable commander fleeing the fray, or perhaps defending a hasty evacuation of the planet.  Regardless of the conclusion her counterpart came to, the Scorpine formation accelerated its advance when it saw Olivia’s back line move out of sensor range.  

The Scorpine combined fleet, like all things in space, seemed to take forever to close the distance even as it moved at was almost assuredly maximum burn.  The tension on the bridge grew with every minute, every officer and crewman fidgeting or demonstrating whatever nervous tic they espoused.  When the fighting started, it was both anxiously awaited and unexpectedly sudden.

The Scorpine, clearly hungry for an easy victory, all but ran into Olivia’s trap.  Their fleet closed to a distance where they could be certain they wouldn’t be clipping their own planet with particle beams and opened up on Olivia’s front line.  The cruisers and their destroyer support ships wove in and out of the larger Scorpine force, trying their best to keep to one side of the formation in anticipation for what they were buying time for.  As she watched the fleets duke it out on her tablet Olivia tapped her foot against the deck and lightly pursed her lips, impatiently waiting for the moment the Scorpine fleet gathered [i]just so[/i].  With no preamble, and reading data that on first glance didn’t appear much different than it had been a moment before, Olivia commanded, “All battlecruisers open fire on the Scorpine formation, carriers assign all assets not screening this formation to the fight.”

The effect was immediate, and dramatic.  The massive hypervelocity railguns aboard the battlecruisers produced enormous and revealing flashes in the darkness of space as the formation fired as one.  The rounds lit up in brilliant fireballs as they scraped the planets upper atmosphere and arced around to strike the Scorpine formation in the flank.  

The Scorpine reaction to such a volley would have been immediate, had they expected it at all.  No doubt the back lines position behind the planet had lit up on all their sensors when it had fired, but the chaos as the slugs impacted the Scorpine formation was evident in the time it took for nearly a quarter of the enemy fleet to break off to engage Olivia’s back line.  More than three volleys had been delivered before the fighters and bombers hit the forces the Scorpine had assigned to eliminate the formerly hidden threat.

Olivia had caught them by surprise, but as the minutes added up it was evident that the Scorpine still held the advantage, even if they’d been savaged by the ambush.  As the picture became clear a dour expression took hold of her face.  “Captain, inform the surface to orbit batteries they are to saturate all known Scorpine fleet assets with nuclear flak.”

To his credit, the man only shook his head in resignation as he delivered the orders to the artillery positions on the planets surface.  The Scorpine detachment heading towards Olivia’s back line had only begun to crest the horizon of Hestollon II, tiny orange flashes around it speaking to the plight of Olivia’s fighters, and she watched the white lines rising from the surface to meet it.

The nuclear blooms made the previous fighters efforts look like a mere skirmish in comparison, and she knew from her tablet the same was happening at the site of the main battle, out of her view.  Contact after contact, fighter, destroyer, and cruiser alike, vanished from her screen as the nuclear flak exploded among the combatants without regard for their nationality or intent.

A minute later the gored Scorpine formation was warping out of the system, its numbers nearly halved.  Olivia was deliberately expressionless as she took account of her own losses.  “A victory then, Admiral.” The Captain all but spat.