The communications officer turns in his seat, "Sir, we are picking up lots of communications around the battle its getting... Complicated"
The captain glances over "Oh?"
"yes sir, it.. it looks like there are as many factions here as there are ships. I dont think there are any formal alliances or empires working together except for the big pyramids."
"well, shit. We are not going to declare for or against anyone at this point.. Except the pyramid guys, i don't like the sound of them. maybe we should force the situation to shake out"
Desai stares at the captain puzzled for a moment "What do you mean sir?"
"Well, This ship" says the captain gesturing to vaguely around himself "is the most valuable ship in this area. We can essentially rebuild, refit and rearm any ship out here indefinitely at least with Empire technologies or any blueprints they happen to share with us. We can mine out an asteroid belt and make whatever they need. If we wanted to force the situation we could send a wide spectrum burst transmission offering our services to whoever comes out on top."
"would that be wise sir?" asks Desai incredulous that he would try to stir the already violent situation so that only one or two ships survive the roiling battle.
"Ah, thats the thing, i have no idea. It might force a coalition fleet to form up and in the end we might have a whole cadre of Capital ships to support us... or it might become a blood bath and we might only get one half broken ship who would be entirely reliant on us. Either way whoever we join up with would actually be very reliant on our supplies and manufacturing ability.. basically we would probably not be in command of anything but our ship but our voice would be hard to ignore if we made a decision."
"That sounds dangerous captain" says Desai "A capital ship might attack us to simply deny another from having access to us."
The captain nods gravely, "That is a risk we take.. Prepare a wide band-"
"Sir, what about the agreement we made with the Caldari?"
"Details" said the captain waving his had dismissively "They know how things are out in Null-sec its a survival play and they might not come out on top, however i would prefer there to be a large coalition fleet. Comms, wide band transmission."
| This is the Forge, ORE syndicate Manufacturing, Mining and Freighter Rorqual. We are offering our services to The fleet or Capital ship who can ensure our safe passage from this dangerous sector. |
|---|
With the message sent, confident the local captains would understand the meaning of his transmission and infer how important his service would be he sent another message re-tasking the small fleet of escort ships.
Captain Geroh broadcasts to his small gang of ships "I am returning to the Rorqual, you are to join with wing two, Wing commanders take your flights out and continue harassing these Anubis pyramid guys."
Breaking out into smaller and more mobile gang of ships they quickly isolate and bully the Gliders racking up several more kills in short succession. "Deadman, Abyss, do a flyby of the Battleship, see if your guns do any damage." says the Enyo Squad commander
The two Incurses zoom off with their afterburners hot reaching hundreds of Km/s as they pepper the nearest Battleship with their railgun darts. The shields flair with the energy to halt the hyper-velocity bullets slamming into them but show no sign of weakening or strain.
"Venom, Shields flair with impact, no damage done. High Kinetic resistances."
-=Target lock detected=-
"Oh crap" says Deadman as he pulls his ship tight to the battleship's shield trying to fly faster than the turrets can track him but recieves several strikes that burn through his shields in an instant. Abyss preforms the same maneuver dodging several blasts before pulling away from the Battleship's range. Deadman takes another smashing hit that leaves globs of molten armor plating in his wake. the last turret catches him blasting the structure of his ship to pieces and cutting through the pod that should have protected him leaving a scorched corpse floating though space.
a nanosecond later Deadman Gasps in the clone bay of the Rorqual. "DAMN IT" he shouts as he pulls himself from the viscous slime of his clone's tank not any different than he was moments before his death. Even with the lingering memories of having an energy weapon burning through the pod protecting him from the vacuum of space he dons a flight suit and boards another Incurses frigate to wade into battle once again. As his ship is launched from the Rorqual he jokingly transmits "Deadman back in action.. Immortality really is a blessing"
