Beyond Alpha Centauri :::

[History Guy]

Press Conference, Morgan Interstellar, The City, Central Plaza

“This is Matthew Kiernan reporting from the City, the center of Morgan Interstellar for MorganLink3DNews. In just one minute we will be hearing from Mr. Sicut, official media spokesman for Morgan Interstellar on the war against the terrorist company Interplanetary Enterprises and the government of Earth that shields them. And here is Mr. Rodney Sicut, official media spokesman of Morgan Interstellar…”

“OK, well, my name as you know is Rodney Sicut, I’m instructed to answer any questions to the media regarding the present actions in the Sol System against InEn…”

“Mr. Sicut? Matt Kiernan, MorganLink3DNews, can you tell us what the agenda for our men in arms is to be?”

“Well, now that we are in complete control of the moon of Callisto, I can say that the agenda is simply to hold it against any attack from the Earth Coalition or Interplanetary Enterprises. If needs be, the men there are instructed to leave via transport, and abandon the moon of Callisto.”

“Lynne Arbelia, MorganLink3DGovernment. But Mr. Sicut, would that not mean that those who have died will have died in vain?”

“Certainly not, Miss Arbelia, the primary objective of the attack on Callisto was to destroy the InEn holdings on Callisto, as most of that company’s holdings were on that moon. This was accomplished, and if needs be we can recall our troops on Callisto.”

“Who is commanding the Callisto force?”

“Uh, 1st Corps Commander Marmion, Mr. Kiernan.”

“Nephew of General Marchand?”

“Uh, yes.”

“Do you think that the Earth Coalition will counterattack?”

“There is a very high chance of that, of course. I hope they have the right sense not to do so, of course. We are defending our private rights.”

“How so?”

“Um, you are with the University Media, right?”

“Yes.”

“OK. What I mean is that in this war we are not the aggressors, we are the defenders. The company Interplanetary Economics attacked us not once but twice, murdering about one hundred and fifty men and women on the supply ship Namibian Queen and then killing our diplomat and attempting to shoot down our diplomatic ship. This is against the Geneva Code that the Terran Alliance itself holds so dear, and so if they do fight us they will be betraying it. They will in effect become, ladies and gentlemen, hypocrites.”

“But then your forces attacked Callisto…”

“We had every right in the case, we were responding to their attacks and defending our people by attacking, as we effectively put a large part of their company out of action, perhaps for good.”

“Can you defend the fact that your forces aimed for civilian targets.”

“That is a lie, or perhaps I should say a misconception. Never in the history of war has there been a war in which civilians have not been killed. Unfortunately in an environment such as Callisto there was a very very high chance of accidentally killing civilians. They were under no circumstance targets however. May I also remind you, ladies and gentlemen, that the majority of civilians killed after the conquest were suicides, who would rather die than surrender to us…and finally let me say that InEn itself was the only government in this little war that has chosen to target civilians. The moon affair proves that. Not only did one of their functionaries murder Mr. O’Loughlin, but then InEn ships were directly ordered to destroy our fleeing diplomatic vessel.”

“Thank you, Mr. Sicut.”

“Mr. Sicut, is it true that yesterday afternoon Morgan Interstellar intercepted a message from the Greater Hive Empire to the Terran Alliance suggesting that they were arranging a deal of some sort?”

“I am not authorized to affirm or deny that.”

“Is it true that we have signed a deal with the Believer Government over this war?”

“I think I am authorized to say that we have signed some sort of deal on it.”

“Does it have to do with the Soldier of God bill that government passed several weeks ago?”

“I am authorized to say so.”

“Mr. Sicut, I no that you have only a few minutes left to speak to us, but is it true that we are seeking a treaty with the secessionist kingdom of Saturn?”

“I am only authorized to say that we were the very first foreign government to acknowledge the Saturn Kingdom as a separate entity from the Earth Coalition, though several other governments now acknowledge it as well. I’m afraid I must go now, I hope I have answered most questions satisfactorily.”

“This is Matthew Kiernan for MorganLink3DNews signing off from the City, Central Plaza.”
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

[Silence]

To: Colonel Marcus Kessel, Supreme Commander of the Spartan Federation

From: Underminister of Foriegn Affairs, Sammantha Carter

Dear Colonel Kessel, the Conclave of Believers is not one to be threatened with. Doubtless your miltary weapons are far supieror to our own, but we at the Ministry are doubtfull that you could surive fighting against all of your hostile enemies and us at the same time. We too have long memories but we have put all that behind his, considered the recent denete with our former arch enemies the Univeristy.

In short, the Conclave does not take any diplomatic respoblity for the Soliders of God while under command of their rightfull employers. We seek no conflict with anyone and the offer to buy services from us still stands.

May God Bless you.

Samantha Carter

[Kassiopeia]

On board CNS Galaxy, Titan regional space

Commodore Craston kept on executing various commands with his datapad as his CO, Admiral Kamalakara, stared through the window. A small hurring started, and the Admiral was forced to leave the somewhat mesmerising sight of the moon bathing in light reflected from it's host planet as the blast shields closed over it. As the two layers of ablative armour had settled down, the room was lit yellow for a fraction of a second.

"Yellow alert", the Admiral muttered.

"Excuse me, sir?" Craston asked, glancing up from his pad. He looked at the dark window and noted: "Oh yes. Since the scenery room is of no use, I suggest we move to the Command Nexus."

"Acceptable, Commodore", Kamalakara said, still captivated in his thoughts. He and Craston walked quietly and without hurry to a lift that transported them near the central axis of the ship, where behind hundreds of metres of hallways and other rooms was the Command Nexus every Command Ship or Dreadnaught of the Coalition Space Navy was equipped with.

An elaborate holodisplay was active. The central circle, where the Admiral's seat was placed, was surrounded with a paronamic vision of the surrounding space, delivered by a vast array of sensory devices and cameras. Craston quietly shifted to the side to establish a personal hololink with the ship's bridge, while Kamalakara himself sat down and sighed deeply.

Craston had been in contact with Kamalakara's personal assistant and second-in-command for many years, and knew that this absent-mindness of the Admiral was not a thing to worry about. Always, whether it was a punishment trip to the Belt or a simple military exercise, Kamalakara acted in the last minutes before the insuing battle like this.

The Commodore set up a small circle for the holo receivers and cleared his throat. The familiar face of Captain Fiona Leigh appeared on the screen before him.

"Commodore", Leigh responded quickly and greeted the Executive Officer.

"Captain. The Admiral is ready. I have established a direct voicelink for you and him to interact. He is currently patching up a link with the rest of the Battleships. You have, as usual, direct control over the ship, but you must follow the orders issued from the Admiral's control devices."

"Confirmed. Link is established and operational, Sir."

"Secure links to other Battleships, Captain."

"Confirmed." Leigh's face turned away as she checked her senior officers that everything was ready. "Commodore, the Galaxy is all set."

"Roger that." A short pause as Craston took a quick look at the screen left of him. The all clear was coming from the other Battle Squadrons. Craston turned back to Cpt. Leigh.

"Good luck, Captain."

"Thank you, Sir." The image of the captain dispersed and became a status display.

Terran Alliance Headquarters

The two Coalition Council representatives sat in their chairs in the communications room, both wearing an impression of simultanious amazement and disappointment. Fifteen minutes ago Secretary General Daniel Stormhill had ended the meeting, which had granted Titan and Rhea membership of the Terran Alliance.

"We all know what this means", the male representative murmured. The female rep nodded and closed her eyes and rubbed her temples forcefully.

"Do we really have to contact the Prime Minister? I'd rather not. The press obviously have already gotten the information of it all the way to Saturn by now."

"As true as that is, it is our job to inform the Prime Minister of Council decisions. If we fail to do so, we could be held responsible for a number of things", the woman reminded him.

The male representative sighed deep and turned to the viewscreen. His colleague took a remote control device, and the screen flickered for a second as the link was established. In other situations, the two would of simply walked the three hundred metres needed to reach the Prime Minister, but in this case they felt that staying within the TA building would be a better idea.

Elise Drecaille was prompted by a quick alarm that the Alliance representatives were online. She turned towards her respective viewscreen and said: "Good day."

"Good day to you too, Mrs. Drecaille. You obviously know already, but - "

"Uhm, I am aware of the protocol."

"Of course, madame. However, it is my duty to inform you that the Terran Council has agreed, by resolution 2433/GD, that the moons of Saturn, Titan and Rhea, are now independent factions and members of the Alliance. The Combine, the Venutians and the Scions have already acknowlegded their independence, and our acknowlegment is expected. Also, the Council has ordered us to withdraw all our forces from the vicinity of the two moons, and remain in a distance of over seven hundred thousand kilometres from the colonies until the borders of our space have been remodified accordingly."

"Thank you, representative. Now, I urge you to disconnect, as I am very busy at this time."

"Understood", the disappearing image of the representative responded.

CNS Galaxy, in Titan space

"Activate level two communication silence", Commodore Craston ordered the fleet. "Only messages from other Squadron vessels and the Galaxy are to be received. Accept orders only from the Galaxy." Of course, this "silence" could be penetrated with a certain code attached to the message carrier wave - this was a simple precaution to avoid a scenario where an Admiral would flip out and commandeer a large portion of the Navy to himself. But, Craston had been informed that no such message would be sent, not for some while.

The Commodore turned to see the Admiral. He was rotating the display so that he could comfortably see straight ahead and some tens of degrees down, and gearing up in the cybernetic interface gauntlets. They were of a rather simple design - they had movement and location sensors that would indicate the central tactical computer of the gestures the Admiral would do with his hands. There were, of course, sophisticated translator programs that could determine his hands' movements from holographic footage, but the system was several times more expensive and prone to misunderstandings.

A light in the mouthpiece of the headset Craston was now wearing blinked. He opened up the visor communicator and could see the Science Officer of the Dreadnaught.

"Commander, I assume this is the detailed scanner report I asked for earlier", Craston immediately began.

"Correct, Sir. I am downloading accurate details to the tactical computer as we speak. There is however something I want to discuss with you personally."

"Do go on."

"There are 34 ships in the defence force. 24 of them are of various Belter junk designs, which we are checking for matches in different Belter sect ship types. But the remaining 10 are of a most interesting design."

Craston felt a sharp feeling of worry in his spine. It commonly was a bad omen when a Science Officer called something "interesting". "Interesting" usually equalled "dangerous", "lethal" or "destructive".

"They seem to have biological armour", the Science Officer continued.

"Biological?" Craston was slightly taken aback. "What do you mean, 'biological'?"

"We have detected phenomenal levels of biological residue in the space around Titan. The long distance probes, which of course were shot at sight, detected chemicals usually applied in large greenhouses on Titan. It may well be that this armour has grown around the superstructure of the ships."

"That is amazing. What properties would you speculate this armour has?"

"Numerous. The Titan research facilities have specialized for biotechnology. This armour probably can assist in the ships life support system, and what is more important is the fact that it can probably regenerate. At which rate, I can not tell, but I hope for our sake that it isn't fast.
It can also be resistant to Rail Gun fire, but I am certain that torpedos can do the trick. If you accept, I could ask the Weapon technicians to remodify the torpedos so that they detonate just before contact with the ships hull instead of immediate contact detonation. The blast can probably damage the armour."

"Make it so, Commander. I will verify the order as soon as possible. Have you tried to find any clues of the armour from the Naval Intelligence?"

"There are only a handful of reports available, and unfortunately none of them deals with this kind of research."

"Okay. I will confirm the order to remodify the torpedos."

"Roger that, Science Officer out."

The ship trembled slightly as the Dreadnaught's Helmsmen made an acceleration thrust with the sublight drive. The orange world of Titan started to close in on the fleet as it started it's final approach.

Craston sat down and started looking carefully at the status displays. He was to keep an eye on the closer details of the Admiral's ship and the general performance of the fleet. Little aspects, trivial matters that were to cause no constant stress to the Admiral. Kamalakara could concentrate on directing the two Battle Squadrons into battle.

The holographic panorama around Kamalakara was suddenly lit with several lights as the markers of different squadrons and ship groups showed up. He started pointing franticly at the figures, giving movement orders to the fleet via the tactical computer. He quickly barked a verbal command, and the neutral synthetized voice of the computer said: "Spearhead ships within firing range in three minutes." Adniral Kamalakara motioned the fleet to enter full readiness. Rail Guns were loaded and charged, torpedos were transferred to launchers.

Earth Coalition Headquarters, Conference Room 5

With the help of a FTL communications device, the Cabinet could monitor the battle in practically real-time, with a delay of some minute or two.

"Has the order to step down been sent?" Drecaille confirmed from the Minister of Defence for the third time.

"Yes it has been. And it appears that Kamalakara has followed our orders as it was. He has hopefully also ordered the Science Officers to fabricate an interstellar phenomena of some sort, or perhaps a jammer wave sent from Callisto."

"Prime Minister, may I ask", the Minister of Colonial Affairs' voice from one of the speakers asked. The Minister of Colonial Affairs' office was in the Moon, and so he had to attend Cabinet meetings via a commlink. "What are you going to gain with this?"

"We are going to land and take custody of Maria Sanchez. If possible, she could be eliminated for good. That is, if we can have time. The Alliance ought to pass it by with some minor economical penalties, since the fleet was coincidentally out of our reach. The penalties will be issued since the fleet engaged even after contact to Headquarters was severed."

"If this plan works", the President said, "it will cause some suspection in the political arena. The other members might not like this, even though Stormhill will probably let it pass."

"Well what else can we do? It is probably our best shot at getting Titan and Rhea back without much trouble. If this fails, we will have to do it the hard way."

CNS Galaxy, Command Nexus

Now Commodore Craston was consulting General Lagerfeld, who was in command of the Marine force packed up in the Barge carriers following the fleet.

"We are in one hell of a hurry", Craston stated. "The orbital insertion of the barges will have to commence as soon as we have nominal control of the space above Horizon Aida."

"That would mean putting my men directly on the line, Commodore. A thorough sweep of the orbital space -"

"Is impossible within this time frame!" Craston interrupted him. "We need the ground troops in Horizon Aida as soon as possible."

"Very well", Lagerfeld replied.

"Then, there is a limited time to apprehend Queen Maria. If the Marine teams have not eliminated her in fifteen minutes after landing, we will initiate precision bombardment on the city."

"Eliminated? I thought this was all about apprehending the Queen."

"Then there has been misinformation abound. The Marine team is to eliminate the target, not apprehend her. Use lethal force if necessary, but try to avoid civilian victims."

"Understood. I will issue the new orders as soon as possible. Tell me, Commodore, why is there a Communications silence?"

Craston sighed. Where had this General been in the briefing of the Senior Officers? Asleep?

"I can not discuss it on an open channel like this. Craston out."

Immediately after closing the commlink, Craston heard a rapid series of beeps in the large circular room full of different specialists working on consoles. He took a quick look at Kamalakara, who was at present directing a group of frigates to advance.

"What was that?" he asked, and went to an empty console to bring up an overview of the fleet. One of the Nexus specialists ran to him.

"Commodore, Sir, the Flame of Odin has been destroyed!"

"One of the Battleships? How?"

"It and a squadron of Destroyers proceeded on an unidentified orbital platform. Once they reached weapons range, well, this is from a Science Officer of one of the escorting Destroyers, a bright streak left from the platform and immediately breached the Battleship's engine core."

"How is that possible?"

"The analysts are not yet certain. The Destroyers pulled out immediately after firing a volley of torpedos on the platform. It is still in place. The Admiral is informed and is now avoiding the platform as much as possible."

"Any footage on it?"

"Yes." The specialist showed Craston a blurry picture of a round shape with three barrel-like structures protruding from it. Then there was another picture, with three white lines flying from the barrels.

"We are not sure of it, but apparently the Captain of the Battleship assumed that it was a torpedo or Rail Gun station, and had turned the ship sideways of it. But still, it was a strike of luck."

"I am certain that -"

Another series of beeps.

"Now what?" Craston yelped and looked at the console. Twelve unidentified ships were closing in on the fleet.

"ID on those ships?" Craston said out loud and quickly accessed the scanner array. But he did not have time to do so, as a voice from somewhere in the room said:

"They are transmitting an authentic Alliance identification code!"

Press Conference, Coalition Headquarters, Geneva, Earth

"Apparently a disrupting phenomena in the solar wind caused the communications devices on the 21st and 28th Battle Squadrons to malfunction. Because of this, the message was not received until a Terran Alliance task force moved in on the battle and took control of the situation."

"Minister Koch, there are rumors that the ships were deliberately set on communications silence, and that the fleet was to eliminate Queen Maria of Titan?"

"Absolutely not. We were proceeding to detain Maria Sanchez as we had warned in our ultimatum to us. The fleet was not aware of the Council decision. All this was an unfortunate coincidence, which caused the death of six hundred men serving their country on board the CNS Flame of Odin."

"Who will be held responsible for the mishap?"

"There has been a call for Admiral Kamalakara to resign. The ones responsible for the death of the men of Flame of Odin were Titanian crew operating the orbital cannon, and since this was an attack conducted by us, Kamalakara is guilty only of a dire error in evaluating the abilities of the orbiting weapons. He is however a great tactician, and the Coalition Space Navy has seen no reason for him to resign."

"So no-one will be held responsible?"

"The Cabinet will stand for a voluntary vote of non-confidence in the Parliament tomorrow following this action. If the Parliament deems the Cabinet unable to continue in it's work, it will resign and a new one will be formed."

[Lonestar]

The Palace. New San Antonio

The Holo-chamber came to life, with a huge Starchart surrounding LP Ian and Minister Kolasklar. A section of space was highlighted and zoomed in. Finally, images from the last transmissions of the Glorfindel appeared.

It was a dark, greenish-brown vessel. Very ugly, really. The Glorfindel had come across it while it was attacking another vessel (Dosi records indicated it was a Pre-war Bree transport).

The vessel stopped firing, and turned to the Glorfindel. It began to fire.

"This," Kolasklar said, indicating the numbers running along the side "Indicates they did a sensor focus on the Glorfindel's location. Apperently, cloaking devices are only moderatly effective on their sensors."

As the Image ended, Ian nodded to Kolasklar. "Bring up the Dosi data on the Hferhin."

The Data was depressingly little. What was known was the the Hferhin were a race who had thrown in their lot with the Usurpers, using their ecological engineering skills to help cracked the secrets of the ancient Manifolds. A Holo-pic of a Hferi appeared, and Ian winced. They were ugly mo-fo's.

Tall, humanoid, they had craggy features and two almost horn-like extensions in the back. They had pure black eyes, like the kind that Teeps had when they went into Telepathic trances. A number on the side indicated that the average height was 2.3 meters tall, dispite evidence suggesting that their Homeworlds gravity was sufficiently higher than Earth's.


"They attack us just because they're *******s, or do you think the Usurpers gave them a bit of information on our ships?"

"Any information on us was probaly just gravy. They did what we would have done with a unknown, and apprently weaker ship would have. Sieze it and study it." The Glorfindel was twenty standard years old, before the Dosi had given the Nanotech hulls to the Protectorate. It had a standard Ceramic/Metal alloy hull.

"They were pretty close to Hive Space...think they cut a deal with the Hive?"

"Our Intel on the Hive is sketchy at best. Almost everything we have is from download histories about the Chiron Civil War, and long range optical shots from outside of their territory. No way to tell, though personally I doubt it."

"Hmmm..." Ian scratched his chin. "Go ahead and put me through the Ansible, I want a realtime view of what's going on in LP658-2"

[Silence]

CNSS Bright Light of God

Commodore Gregor Kincaid was in the former captain’s flagroom doing his ritual prayers before battle. He was reciting the Hymn of the Templar (which legend claimed that Sister Miriam herself wrote). The room was all dark except for the single candle glowing on the table. Gregor recited the familiar words over and over again, moving his brain up into the speed he felt that it needed to be to oversee a combat mission. He had fought several times against the Hammer of God, and he always followed the advice of his patron when he first was accepted into the navy of praying and fasting before battle. He felt that it gave
him a much needed break from the stress and allowed himself to focus. He closed his eyes and mental review the formation of the fleet. It was going to come out FTL in a loose formation and to follow the old military axiom "On deadly ground, fight". Initial
data had showed that the EC had stationed about 54 ships over the targeted system. Gregor got up as the room chrono beeped and remember reading the orders that came with the Morgan heavy cruiser that was sent to come along side the force. Test the waters around Callisto, do as much damage and then pull back , the nebulous order had said. As Gregor was putting on his uniform, all across the fleet, damage control crews and marines and sailors got ready for action.


Callisto

The Soldiers of God task force came screaming out of FTL weapons hot. The patrolling couple of frigates the EC had were taken out in a hailstorm of chaos beams and secondary weapons that hulled them within a minute. But their death had not gone unnotice. Sensors began to pick up several incoming drive signatures, their masses approaching from small fighters to the large dreadnoughts that the EC inexplicably called battlecruisers.
Commodore Kincaid, snapped as the information from the brief exchanged of weapons fire confirmed what the Morgans had told them. The chaos beam armed vessels had a longer range advantage then the pulse cannons and plasma cannons, and the Gauss armed ship were the only threat to them at this long range. not really an consideration due to the EC were using, however the damage from both weapons appear to be the same once the ranges were near point blank. Gregor saw the main view and the hordes of smaller fighter craft detach from their motherships and began to accelerate towards the Soldiers of God
task force.

He hit the communication button and said, "Flag to Lance 3 and 4 move to screen the cruisers, 1 and 2 stay and watch our flanks."

The destroyer escorts lances move relatively (since they were all moving) to position themselves between the oncoming mass of fighters and the capital ships. . The SoG (Soldiers of God) task force had came out on a extreme angle and where bearing in towards the polar region of Callisto with the EC task force being in opportune place to change their vectors and then accelerate towards the SoG. With them doing that, Kincaid's ship would be able to make use of the range advantage while the ships chased them. Already the main batteries on board the Bright Light of God , Truth of the Lord and the Morgan heavy cruiser Invisible Hand were firing at the oncoming EC fleet. Several direct hits had been taken on the EC forces leaving a frigate gutted, and a light cruiser spinning out of control. However the EC fighters were now hitting the screen. It was all going to plan
when then the sensors officer screamed out "Inbound hostile, are burning their way towards us, ETA 30 minutes, number of them in the excess of the hundreds. Sir its a TAF task force, its en route to Callisto and its blocking our way!"

Gregor felt sick inside, he had to change course, and there was only way to go then that would possibly allow him to fulfill his mission.

"Mr. Malmstead, inform the fleet that we are to swivel on this axis and reverse course, we are here to do as most damage as we can, and we shall fulfill this role. We are Soliders of God and we do not fear our deaths, but we are going to make sure that we can take as many of these foes along with us to the afterlife." The destroyer escort Salamis was hulled in the reactor and blew into pieces. Like an angry buzz of hornets the EC fighters
were picking at the screen elements. Gregor looked at the approaching TAF fleet who was just launching their fighters as he would do. They were going to try to catch them in a rock and a hard place. Back to the EC squadron, they were were just getting in range of the light crusiers that he had left in the vanguard near the screening elements. The EC fleet was a bit less numerous then they were before the battle started, losing 6 ships already and twice the number had taken some deep hits. Then as the ranges clear the targeting sensors on both sides began to get a more accurate info on the other side did the
real butchers bill started to accumulate.

Pulse and plasma cannon fire with some gauss rounds mixed with the various degrees of chaos naval riffles and shard torpedoes launched from the destroyers. Several of the high velocity rounds broke through the defenses of one of the light cruisers and burst out of the other side causing the SoG ship to spin out of control. The 3 heavy cruisers were fighting a battle with the battlecruisers that came in range. It was a pounding match and the Morgan cruiser took a plasma round right through the dorsal side and a string of secondary explosions gutted the dorsal side weapons array, but Gregor Kincaid was proud of the cruiser’s master as it flipped and used its undamaged side to fight the larger ship.
The torpedo destroyers began to make their runs supported by the light cruisers that only had torpedo launcher. 3 of the DD's were hit but they still kept on coming launching at the last possible minute, within seconds the launch the battlecruiser’s point defenses were in overtime trying to knock out the weapons. But several of them got through and 2 battlecruisers went up in a puff of smoke. The heavy cruiser Truth of the Lord took a damning hit to its FTL drive, and with Kincaid's approval throw itself at the other EC battlecruisers that were now entering range without a care. Several ships of the screen
were down and the others all had damage and were taking more fighting the numerically superior EC fleet. 5 minutes more the battle went on and the SoG ships began to jump into FTL. Leaving only the Truth of the Lord and the Perfect Grace a light cruiser. Within moments the Perfect Grace began to charge a enemy carrier that was moving to recover its fighters and was the subject of the entire EC task force beating and
quickly became pieces of debris and gas floating through the system. The Truth of the Lord was playing dead. It was that hard for the crew and the acting captain to do so since half the ships critical systems were down. They were in a slight gyration and were waiting for the time to pass when the angle would be just right. As one of the massive battlecruisers move to launch a shuttle to see for survivors, the drives on the cruiser flared for the last time and launched the ship towards the unsuspecting capital ship. Within seconds of the drive being turned on, the entire cruiser was turned to Swiss chess as
beams and gauss shots ripped through it. Then it connected with the battlecruiser. Finally the Second Battle of Callisto was over, leaving the crews of the TAF taskforce when they finally arrived at the battle scene to wonder about where the Morgans had found such suicidal people.


Butchers bill
Morgan/Soldier’s of God Task force
Heavy Cruiser Bright Light of God heavily damaged, listing on port side
Heavy Cruiser Invisible Hand dorsal damage, multiple hits on sensors and navigation, radiation leak
Heavy Cruiser Truth of the Lord destroyed
5 Light cruisers out of 8 destroyed, 2 of them severe damage
4 destroyers out of 8 destroyed, all damage,
3 destroyer escorts destroyed, 4 of them damaged

Earth Coalition Navy
3 Confirmed Battlecruisers destroyed, 2 damaged
3 heavy cruisers destroyed
10 light cruisers destroyed
12 destroyers destroyed
1 carrier heavily damage

[Frankychan]

Hive Prime
Emperor Yang's Private Office

Yang read the datapad sent by Shirlak and Ehud. The smile on his face belied the anger swelling inside him. Moments before, he learned of his agent's failure to keep the Hive Empire a secret in Terran affairs. Yang continued to read information pouring in from all over his empire. His peaceful trip to the surface was all for nothing now.

Not only was it bad that the Terrans knew about the Hive, but the fools were broadcasting in a wide spectrum. Anyone could hear what they were saying.

Yang continued to read the progress reports.

The agents responsible for the message mishap were executed for incompetence. Good, but not good enough.

Emperor Yang walked toward the window, reading more of the reports.

In addition to the Terran mess, the Believer's were asking for 900 thousand B-Bills, Believer currency. Hive economists figured that out to 1 ton of precious minerals in the imperial treasury. Price is too high.

The door chimed, signalling that someone wanted to see him.

"Enter." Yang said, not turning around to look who it was.

A Hive security officer entered along with Warmaster Kang, who both bowed to the Emperor.

Sheng-ji Yang unfurled his robes and faced the two men.

"Security officer, I've comprised a list of names. These families are related to those agents who were executed not too long ago. I want these families all executed for incompetence and treason against the empire. I want every man, woman, and child relating to those men killed."

Yang handed the officer a datapad with the list of family names, then motioned the man to leave.

After the man left, Sheng-ji turned to Kang.

"Our economist's have calculated that the price the Believers are asking is worth 1 ton of our minerals. Send them another message. I want two carrier's with accompanying fighters and 3 cruisers instead."

Kang nodded while Yang turned toward his desk. Not turning around, he continued talking.

"This 'Soldier of God' program the Believers have is starting to become expensive. Also, the Terran government is broadcasting a wide-ban signal trying to contact us. Shirlak and Ehud are composing a reply now. You are going to put the military on medium alert."

"Yes, my lord." Kang replied behind the Emperor's back.

"Our third fleet that was going to invade the Spartans I want back here. I think Admiral Brakus and the second fleet can handle them for now. I believe we are going to encounter trouble soon and we may need the third fleet to stand by."

The Emperor turned around to face the Warmaster one last time.

"Order the third fleet to cancel their order's. After you do that, send the Believer's our revised request."

---------------
Encrypted message to Believer Government
From: Warmaster Kang, Supreme Commander of the G.H.E. Military

Believer Government, we have calculated the price for hiring out your forces for our last order and according to our estimates, it would take 1 ton of our precious minerals to pay. We, instead would like to hire out the service's of two carrier's with accompanying fighters and 3 cruiser's instead.

Send us the price to hire these forces that we have asked and we will calculate the exchange rate.

[Lonestar]

Ten Kilometers from the Glorfindel Crash site.

The Valkrye Atmospheric Starfuries roared ahead, blasting at the unseen position. Major Jennings worked his Combat suit, and hefted his 25mm Canister Rifle. A spat of rifle fire erupted in the distance, as the Skydroppers continued to fight the Hive men on this dry, dusty, cold planet.

Two "Goliath" Infantry-support walkers were marching along with his battalion. The Point ISW suddenly stop-ed, and even in the thin atmosphere, the whirl of it's gatlings could be heard. A voice spoke in his helmet.

"Grid area 32 is hostile, repeat, hostile. Request air sup-"

The ISW burst into flames, and gunfire from a foxhole tore apart it's right leg.

"Get down, Dammit!" Jennings and the Batt HQ company dropped to the rust-colored ground. Several loud sonic-booms signaled the arrival of the heavier landing craft. Off in the dust, streaks of light lifted from the ground, and there was at least one explosion in the sky.

Jennings suspected him and the rest of the skydroppers would not be able to clear a landing area close enough to the Glorfindel.

A Staff sergeant who hadn't seen combat crawled up to him.
"Where's our air support???"

Jennings grinned toward the sky. He had felt the sudden change in airpressure just moments before.

The Cold Harbor was over the crashsite, it's massive bulk was now fully blocking the sun. Spotlights were on, and gatling lasers were firing down.

Suddenly....

"What the Hell?" Jennings murmered. "It's leaving!"
------------------------------------------------------

The Cold Harbor

Providing direct support to ground operations was something every Protectorate driver hated to do. But as word of the loss of two heavy landing shuttles-two!-came up, Captain Bradley ordered the [i]Cold Harbor[/]i to fire it's thrusters and put it over the battlefield.

This class of battleship could land and take off with ease on any planet up to .4 G. This planet was only at .3 or so.

"Captain...the Hive station is firing it's manuervering thusters.. it's using our direct involvement in the battle to get out of our jamming range."

"What? Get... take us back into orbit, ASAP deploy the 23rd Starfighter wing." Bradley looked down at the frantic fighting on ground. "Sorry boys, you're on your own."

[Frankychan]

System LP 658-2
Spacestation Dragon
Time remaining: 3 minutes, 45 seconds...

The command center was booming with activity. The recently executed officers were replaced with fresh new faces, unfazed about their predecessor's fates. Commander Wilcox was also busy, issuing orders everywhere.

"How are our soldiers doing?" Wilcox asked, walking to the tactical display.

"Sir, they're reporting enemy fire. They also report that all positions are secure. Apparently enemy forces were trying to establish a landing area near the downed vessel but were unsuccessful."

Wilcox smiled, "Good. What about the larger vessel?"

A tactical technician spoke from down in the pit station.

"Second vessel hovered over the battlefield briefly, then changed it's direction. Its on an intercept course with us."

Wilcox grimaced, all he needed to do was break out of the jamming area so he could send an emergency transmission. If it was sent, Hive ships would arrive shortly from a neighboring system.

"Deploy our fighter and bomber squadron's, screen formation." Wilcox ordered. "Get this stations weapons hot and ready to fire. We may not be a combat station, but we'll show them the power of the Hive."

Just a little further and then we'll see how well they fare...

Meanwhile, numerous Hive fighter's and bomber's deployed in space, swarming like angry hornets from their nest.

----------

Unknown ship crash site

The enemy ground troops were caught in full surprise. One of the vehicles, a walker, was destroyed by an ambush.

Squads Foxtrot and Zeta didn't even get close to the ship when rearguard soldiers alerted everyone that enemy forces were converging on their position.

Major K'rintak directed the battle through his helmet-comm.

"Use heavy weapons to destroy those walker vehicles, I want hit-and-run tactics. No retreating, no surrendering."

K'rintak watched as he saw one enemy soldier running up to get a better position. The Bulwark aimed his shredder rifle and pulled the trigger. Through his scope, he saw the soldiers head explode like an overripe watermelon.

The heavy-weapon shredder stationed next to him was letting fly with its deadly bolts. One enemy position was erupting with the heavy shredder, kicking up clots of dirt and rock. K'rintak didn't know if any of the bolts were hitting anyone, but just pinning the enemy down was satisfactory.

The Bulwark saw another enemy, exposing his chest. Taking aim, K'rintak fired another round.

[Silence]

To: Warmaster Kang, Supreme Commander of the G.H.E. Military
From: Jorgen Fjolks Minister of War

We can send you, 2 carriers and 3 heavy crusiers for a price of 600k B-Bills. This will also include the escorts destroyers and a 4 light crusiers.

Signed,

Jorgen Fjolks,
Minister of War
Conclave of Believers

[Cybergod]

Location: Somewhere on Titan surface

Officer Kain opened the pod door with a hiss of the dense Titan atmosphere rushing in. He and a dozen others, ensigned to the Flame of Odin, had survived the destruction of the ship, loading the escape pod, just seconds after the bright streak blasted away the ship’s hull. It was a miracle thirteen of them survived. ‘Lucky?’ he wondered as he stepped outside the pod and looked around.

In the purple skies above, few remains of Flame of Odin still burned upon entry into the thick atmosphere, which was over 50% denser than that of Earth. Bellow lay brown lands of Titan, the wreckage of the EC ship littered across, the pieces that penetrated through the orange clouds. It was getting dark and there was no sign of any human settlement or activity nearby. They would most probably freeze or starve to death, since their body armour was in bad condition. ‘What a lovely way to die,’ Kain thought as all thirteen unloaded the pod.

Endless time passed, and then there was a sudden electrical interference in their communication devices – a nearby sensor has detected them. The thirteen huddled together, like penguins in the Antarctic, in an effort to warm up – skies were deep purple and it was getting late. Wind rustled nearby and then mechanical humming was approaching. Two hovertanks, armed and poised, appeared and a message was broadcast to them: “Surrender peacefully and you may be returned to your families. Show resistance and you will be dealt with.”

One of the hovertanks unloaded Saturnian marines that approached the thirteen survivors and took them with not much resistance. Once the tanks were uploaded, they hovered off into the direction of Voyna Zora, the major military installation of the Saturn Kingdom, which was near Horizon Aida.

Kain studied the purple eight-petal symbol of his captors and thought to himself – ‘We are now prisoners of war.’

*******************************************

Location: Horizon Aida, Constitutional Council Meeting

Maria looked across the circular table where all of her ministers sat – Economy, Research, Psych, Military, Diplomacy and Industries. This was an emergency meeting. Above their heads, in the last half-day, the battle for independence took place, even though their membership within the Terran Alliance should have stopped the member-member conflict, apparently an unexpected solar event made communications between Earth Coalition Command and their forces ‘hard’ and the result was that the Orbital Cannon was used and Flame of Odin was blasted away, carrying its victims. Maria always hoped for a peaceful way to end conflicts, but reality of life had taught her all too many times that sacrifices are necessary if a goal was to be achieved.

The meeting started with normal reports of the battle. “The enemy forces appear to have disengaged, our Queen,” Myodin spoke. “Our casualties are minimal – Theseus design of ships proved highly successful and enemy was left surprised. Belters suffered most casualties on our side. The Flame of Odin was destroyed almost completely by our orbital defences – a single escape pod penetrated to the surface, with thirteen survivors in total. They have been taken to Voyna Zora installations until a decision is reached about their future,” and he sat down. Next came the Diplomacy Minister, Mikael Petrov, a plump Russian with short white hair and blue eyes.

“The Belters seem distressed at the outcome of the battle – they fear that Earthers might attack their clans’ holdings in the Asteroid Belt. They seem keen on our new ships and their admirable performance in battle, and would like to purchase some for their own defences. Other news – our sovereignty has been acknowledges throughout the universe, we’ll need to send diplomatic teams as soon as possible, especially to Morgan Interstellar – they have a high chance of being our main trade partner in the future,” he paused. “The independence of the Saturn Kingdom should be followed by a peace deal with the EC, in my opinion. After all, they might try to retake the colony again, in the future,” and he sat down. Next stood Nicholas.

“Our Queen, the people of Titan have rejoiced that we are now independent but the spirit of revolution never lasts long. With our shift of Values from Wealth to Knowledge however, some businesses and various social centres are asking for more budget to be directed to Psych. Otherwise we could fall apart, from the inside. The second problem reported is the overcrowding of colonies on Titan, caused by the disastrous Planned economy, run by EC on our worlds. Now, with our carefully regulated Green initiatives on Titan, the problem could be overcome but I would personally suggest the council to consider future colonisation of other moons of Saturn – Dione, Iapetus, Tethys and Encelatus are all suitable for Rhean-style of human colonies. Speaking of them, now that it switched to Free Market, drone control by the Self-Aware Colonial AI has been disabled so proper psych enhancing facilities are needed. Overall more energy allocation to the Psych sector is necessary in the coming days,” and he finished. Samato Tanaka went next.

“The success of our researchers has been staggering, our Queen. You have been surely convinced of that by the latest innovation in space warfare technology. Our switch to Knowledge has further enhanced our research capacities and my department is most pleased. We will be even content if you reduced our budget and directed energy to Psych, as my colleague says. In the near future, the most beneficial field of research for us would be in the ‘Build’ classification, since we need to rebuild the infrastructure on these worlds. Considering our latest military developments, we could further enhance that field by opening up relations with the Scions,” these were sounds of protest and shock in the room but they ended as Maria raised her hand. “They have been successfully replicating biometal but seem incapable of creating it from scratch. I know the stories about their Dark Planet and all the phobias humans have about them. But really it was all CPP propaganda. They themselves fear us, we should really show them a good side of humanity,” and then he sat. Anita Delitz stood.

“Our Energy Banks are somewhat damaged by the war. But in the near future, our trade income should help very much. I would consider opening trade routes to Mars Combine, Morgan Interstellar and possibly other Chironian factions, eventually, but the deal with the CEO is the most important of all. This is why I think that our representatives there should have a degree of economic knowledge. Rhean’s Free Market would be an ideal incubator for our currently fragile economy. Most of business holdings should be moved off Titan, to extract most benefits of Free Market,” and she sat. Industries Minister, Darren Williams was last but not least.

“The industries had been heavily geared towards war production in recent times. Industrial development has been steadily increasing on Rhea while Green Titan could miss out on this Market boom. Also, unit production should be changed in the future to facility production to enhance the previous sectors my fellow Ministers mentioned. No other comments, our Queen,” and that was all. Maria thought for a moment and then spoke.

“Well, I am pleased at the outcome of this council meeting. We will detain the thirteen survivors in Voyna Zora until Terran Alliance or the Earth Coalition pleads otherwise. I will shift some energy allocation from Labs to Psych for the people’s benefit. Otherwise council is dismissed.”

The room emptied slowly until only Maria Sanchez was left in her chair, thinking. She stood up and walked up to one of the glass panels that gave her a view of the outside. It was nighttime and the giant image Saturn shone just above the horizon. The events of today and the thirteen ‘lucky’ enemy survivors stuck out in her mind. The EC would love to make a scandal out of this to add to their propaganda against the Saturn Kingdom.

Maria walked away and sat back down. With a click of her finger, the computer started recording a message to the Morganities. Just a few days ago she was only dreaming of today. But dreams have weird ways of catching up with reality.

*******************************************

Encrypted Diplomatic Transmittion
From: Queen Maria Sanchez
To: CEO Nwabudike Morgan

Dear CEO,

We will be sending two small FTL ships, one transport carrying our diplomatic team and a lightly armed escort, in case the Earth Coalition decides to strike upon us again. These ships will also provide transport for your diplomats and we will make sure no harm comes to them from outside forces.

I am sure that you are aware of today’s events in Saturnian space. Our new Theseus C-5 organic ships have proven most effective in combat against the EC ships. Perhaps we could engage in some tech trading after our Treaty of Friendship is formalised?

Best Regards,

Queen Maria Sanchez

[History Guy]

Morgan Interstellar, Ship Pad, Soldier of God Fleet

CEO Nwabudike Morgan was very enthusiastic. Imran Siddiqui had just informed him that the Terran blockade had been badly beaten up near Callisto by the elite Soldier of God fleet. Of course this was quite an astounding victory, especially when one considers the size of the average Terran fleet. Terra’s great strength was her navy, and with two nasty defeats for the Terran fleet, it seemed as if everything could be whipped. Not only had his raid taken down a large part of the Terran blockade, but the Saturn Kingdom had managed to take down a battleship as well. Of course, CEO Morgan knew that this string of outstanding success could not last forever. He’d said to Siddiqui earlier, “We have twice now, if you’ll excuse the term, caught the Terrans with their pants down, but it can’t last forever. It brings to mind what I read in the book that you lent me on the Roman War Machine. After a great victory, the conqueror would be given a triumph parade. He would ride around the streets of Rome in a golden chariot, and a slave would hold a laurel crown above his head, and whisper to him, ‘Remember, Conqueror, that all glory is fleeting.’ I am not wholly sure that the Earth Coalition can be defeated. InEn certainly, but the Earthers will take so much longer to take down, that is if we can even do so. But I do think that we alone cannot hope to defeat the Earthers. Yes, we have taken Callisto, and nearly destroyed the Earther’s blockade around it, but all glory is fleeting, as the slave would tell the conqueror, eventually all must be defeated. I shan’t tell the Soldiers of God that, though!”

Morgan had also sent a message to the Believers asking for as many of the largest and best ships they could send, as he was extremely pleased with the other ships’ performance. He was so pleased, in fact, that he was about to give a speech in their honor, not a long one, of course, but one of congratulation. He was also going to decorate the fleet commodore, Kincaid, with one of the highest medals of bravery. As he strutted out onto the platform at the ship pad, he looked out over the landing field. There were several thousand soldiers, some sitting, and others standing, all in a line on the tarmac; their eyes fixed on the CEO. Most had large red crosses emblazoned on the backs and fronts of their battle-armor. These men were the Soldiers of God.

“Soldiers of the Almighty God,” cried a high-ranking officer, “stand to attention. CEO Morgan is to deliver a speech in honor of yesterday’s victory.” Everyone in the ranks stood to attention. A Chaplain gave a short prayer, and the CEO began.

“My friends, when I sent you out yesterday evening, I did not fully know what results to expect. Let me tell you though, you fought against the best fleet known to man, and you won. A more complete victory over the Earth Coalition fleet has never been won. It was at a high price, of course, but are not all-great victories? Rest assured, your broken and wounded ships are at this moment in the shops of our finest engineers receiving the necessary repair work, and they shall soon be once again serviceable. The most important part of your victory is this, we know now that we can beat the Earthers, and we can avenge those murdered by InEn,” a cheer arose in the ranks.

“And my boys,” continued Morgan, preparing to put in some of their beliefs, “remember the fallen in your ranks in yesterday’s great battle. The great dead, who died serving all that is right, who died surviving the God of your ancestors, the God of Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob, the Christian God, the Holy Trinity. It was for this God that those who died did die, and all who died, as your doctrine states, were immediately taken to God when they fell. They have become Holy Martyrs, and have died in the name of God. They have joined their God, the greatest thing they could hope for. It was the Will of God…” a second cheer burst from the crowd.

“I will now proceed to decorate the brave commodore, and remember as I pin the decoration onto him that I am rewarding you all this medal.” The commodore stepped up onto the platform, and Morgan pinned the medal to his coat. The commodore turned about, displaying the medal. A third cheer arose from the Soldiers of God below.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

ENCRYPTED DIPLOMATIC TRANSMISSION
FROM: CEO Nwabudike Morgan
TO: Queen Maria Sanchez

My Dear Queen Maria,

This modus operandi of travelling to Morgan Interstellar and then ferrying our diplomatic team to the Saturn Kingdom sounds like a good idea to me. I see nothing wrong with it at all. If the Earth Coalition does take a shot at these transports in any one of it’s trips to and from Morgan Interstellar, I shall activate some alliances, and bring this war to an even quicker end.

I did hear of yesterday’s victory, and I trust by now you have heard of our own victory over a fleet of Terran ships by our Soldiers of God. Now that our trade route is more open, we could most definetly make all sorts of trading deals, I am sure.

All my best,
Morgan
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

[History Guy]

Morgan Interstellar, CEO Morgan’s Office, 4 Hours Later

“Again, I must say to you that we are all in your debt, Tracking Officer Delbar, and I’m sure we can find some pleasing way to repay you in the future…” said Morgan, watching Tracking Officer Ferdinand Delbar stretch out on the large black and gold colored couch, placed to one side of Morgan’s incredibly spacious office.

“Well, sir, to start with, if I could have a light for this obviously most excellent cigar,” responded Delbar, chewing on the edge of the unlit cigar that he had just been handed by the good CEO himself. Morgan nodded to Lieutenant Mowangi, who took out his lighter and ignited the tip of Delbar’s cigar. “Thanks.” As he puffed, he ran a finger along the blue marble that made up the walls of the room. “Ooooh.”

“How about a glass of wine, Tracking Officer Delbar?” asked Morgan.

“Ah, OK, I don’t usually touch anything stronger than the brew concocted by the Station Coffee Machine.”

“You’ll like this,” said Morgan, popping open the bottle from his own personal wine rack, “It’s fresh from Chiron. I got a case shipped in yesterday.” Poor Lieutenant Mowangi filled the three glasses, one for the CEO, another for Mr. Temple, and the third for that lowly Tracking Officer. Bloody wonder that he should get this sort of treatment, thought Mowangi, after all, all he did was find that piece of correspondence between the Terrans and the Greater Hive Empire. Delbar took a sip, and licked his lips. “It’s good isn’t it? Made of xenofungus…” said Morgan. Delbar suddenly appeared as if he was close to spitting the stuff back into his glass, but he managed to control himself.

“Errr, I was sort of hoping, sort of, that you’d be able to tell us exactly how you retrieved the message,” asked Temple, sitting down on the couch and downing his wine.

“Ah, quite easily actually. It was like fishing. I simply tracked the message as it went by and I intercepted it. I’ll dare say the others were pleased with me, though, nearly all of them missed it themselves.” Boy were they pleased, too. Officer Stagg herself had even given him a little osculation. All he could say was thank God that he’d managed to tactfully stuff into his face a little breath mint the moment he intercepted the message.

“Ah, OK,” responded Temple.

“You know, Mr. Delbar…” began Morgan.

“Ferdy, call me Ferdy, all me friends do,” said Delbar.

“Uh, ok, Ferdy...you know that message you intercepted was quite valuable, in fact it may have changed the course of this war entirely. You, my friend, are a national hero!”

“A national hero? I?” Delbar was astounded. Officer Stagg would fall for him now for sure. Heavens, he might even be able to permanently silence that bloody trashcan!

“Yes, Mr. Del…errr…Ferdy. You see, it seems the Terrans were responding to the Greater Hive Empire. They may well have been planning to make some deals, against us in fact. You see, without you finding and retrieving that message we may still be in the dark about it,” said Temple. But Delbar’s mind was elsewhere.

“It’s been great mates, but I must be off now, I have things to do, my shift’s not up, and all. Thanks, mates,” he said, before popping out the door. Morgan wasn’t really too sure what to think.

“What a brisk fellow,” he said.

It was true, though. Delbar’s actions had very much assisted Morgan Interstellar. An Earth-Hive alliance was the last thing Morgan wanted. The implications of that would bring were endless. Certainly, Morgan Interstellar could not survive against such an alliance. He’d fought the Hive before, and luckily it was at a time when they were down, a time on Chiron, when the Hive was worn down by war. He was there when combined armies nearly destroyed the Hive itself, but had mercy. He knew they should have destroyed Yang when they had the chance. That chance might never come again. The Hive, as he knew, was almost unbeatable on Chiron, and now it must be even more so. The rumors were that he’d subjected many smaller alien races and was breeding for himself a super army. It had truly been a great surprise when Morgan learned Yang was even still alive, but it was confirmed when a spy captured an image of the man himself. Morgan remembered recoiling slightly when he saw Yang’s face. The man had changed slightly, only physically, he was still mentally the same. His body was smaller now than Morgan recalled, but that was understandable. The man was ancient. His face was still the same of course, but the skin had thinned out more. His face was like a hideous skull.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Morgan Interstellar, 3rd Tracking Station

Tracking Officer Fred Gaughin was tired of this coffee. It was bad stuff, he knew, the very idea of calling it coffee made him ill. For a start, the stuff was too thick to be coffee. Good coffee isn’t this thick, this stuff was as thick as porridge. How he managed to stomach it for the last three years was beyond him. The look was somewhat repulsive too. The color was off. This artificial sweetener was awful, it must have been the deadliest poison in the whole of all the Morgan Interstellar holdings. The creamer was bad too. One simply couldn't take black coffee though, as the stuff was so bad plain. One couldn’t even call it black coffee even when it was black, the stuff would be better called ‘brownish-gray’ coffee. Lastly, he knew it was keeping him up so long that he was beginning to see things that simply weren’t there. Proof of this came about one minute after he chucked the coffee in the talking trashcan.

In burst the hero of the hour, Ferdinand Delbar, the man who found the message. In his hand was his shredder pistol. “Oh, hello Fred,” he said.

“Hey there, Ferdy,” responded Gaughin, “What are you doing?”

“Just watch,” responded Delbar. He aimed at the hated trashcan and fired. “Thank you for preserving the Environment,” it said. A second shot tore the top off the bloody thing. “Thank you for…” The last shot killed it all together.

“Thaaaaaouuuuurrrrrreeeeeesssssviiiiiii,” it said, before the thing collapsed inward. It was as dead as an electronic trashcan could be. For the very first time in his life, Ferdinand Delbar was pleased.

“You’ve just destroyed company property, Ferdy!”

“Don’t worry, Fred, the CEO owes me,” said Ferdy, smiling. He then re-holstered the shredder pistol and left the room. Staring blankly at the charred trashcan, Fred Gaughin returned to his work, determined to swear off that ‘coffee’ for good.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

MorganNetDaily.com
All the News A Morganite Needs
Weekend Edition, Pg. 1

SOLDIER OF GOD TRIUMPH- Yesterday evening, the mercenary fleet of the Soldiers of God, based at Morgan Interstellar, attacked the Earth Coalition’s fleet blockade around Callisto. According to Mr. Sicut, the Morgan Interstellar media spokesman, the attack was a total success, clearing about half of the blockade from their positions around Callisto. It is also reported that many large Earth ships were destroyed in the fight. Soldier of God losses were apparently minimal compared to those of the Earthers. READ FULL STORY

TERRAN-HIVE MESSAGE- It has also been confirmed today by Morgan Interstellar that last week a Tracking Officer did indeed intercept a message from the Terran Government to the Greater Hive Empire. It appears to have been sent in response to a Hive message asking if possible negotiations could be made. It is rumored that the Hive also sent some valuable information on our own government’s foreign holdings to the Terrans.READ FULL STORY

SATURN KINGDOM TREATY?- A treaty is to be made between the governments of Morgan Interstellar and the Saturn Kingdom effective the first of next month. Queen Maria Sanchez of the Saturn Kingdom is apparently quite pleased by Morgan Interstellar, as our government was the very first to recognize her kingdom as a separate entity from the Earth Coalition since their secession last month. Analysts suggest this is the start of lucrative trading deals. READ FULL STORY
-----------------
WHERE DO YOU WANT YOUR NODE TODAY?
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

[Cybergod]

Location: Saturnian Space

The residues of the battle were being collected by the left over bacterium that was used to produce the organic ships Saturnians fought with. Earth was still angry at the outcome the two battles that were fought by her navies. They never expected this, nor did they know about the Queen's reactivation of the Orbital Cannon. In short, it was the element of surprise that won the day.

One small ship left the Titanian atmosphere, bearing the swan-like image of the new Saturnian symbol. It was an ordinary conventional ship, with no visible trace of organic technology used on other ships. It was carrying the Queen's representatives to Morgan Interstellar, to open up much needed good relations in this sector. The ship ascended upwards, into high orbit, to be accompanied by an organic ship, lightly armed, about the same size. It was there, just in case the Earthers decided to strike upon the diplomats. The two ships synchronised movement and moved in the direction of Morgan's primary system, and carefully accelerated until they entered FTL space. They were on their way to deal business.

*******************************************

ENCRYPTED DIPLOMATIC TRANSMITTION
From: Queen Maria Sanchez
To: CEO Nwabudike Morgan

Dear CEO,

The diplomatic ship is on its way to Morgan Interstellar. Our ambassador to you, Vera Sofia, and her diplomatic staff are in the ship, which should arrive soon.

Best Regards,

Queen Maria Sanchez

[Lonestar]

The Palace, New San Antonio, BH4

"Oh hell."

Ian watched the telescopic view of the ground battle, as the heavier armored units finally left the landing barges and joined the Skydroppers in fighting the Hive. Now that the Mjolnir Main Battle Tanks were on the ground, the destruction of the Hive force was assured.

The same could be said of Hive station in orbit of the nameless planet, although it was spewing forth a number of vessels to get outside of the Cold Harbor's jamming bubble. It would be only a matter of time before Hive vessels would arrive, although the Boromir and Moria probaly arrive before them....

"Sh!t!" He added, and stared at the display uplinked through the ansible. I wish Grant was here, and not talking to the Drones. Outloud he said "Do we have any idea where the Hive Throneworld is?"

War Minister Kolasklar gave him a dour look. "No. Yes, our agents in the Gaians have pinpointed one of three systems."

"Prepare to send a message through the ansible to the Cold Harbor, from there to the three systems. Computer, encounter gram "2""

A Dark Tall shroud covered Ian, rendering his face not visible. Where his hands were there were now armored, clawed fingers.

"Computer" A voice from where Ian stood hissed. "Begin transmission."
-------------------------------------------------------
Cold Harbor, LP658-2

"They're trying to send smaller vessels outside of our jamming range."

Bradley watched the tactical overlay with interest. The Protectorate and Hive starfighters were going at each over, and the last of the heavy armor had been unloaded from the landing barges.

Unfortunatly, the Hive would probaly fight to the last man. Oh well.

"Tactical, fire forward Particle Cannons at the spacestation's launch bay."

"Sir! Incoming transmission from New San Antonio, we are to pass the Vid file attached to the three accompanying coordinates, ASAP!"

Bradley was stunned. Surely His Excellancy was going to do what he thought he did?

"I...transmit."

"We also got a text mesage just for you."

"Put it through to my Padd."

In small lettering it said:
Capture as many Hive soldiers, human and other, as possible for mindbend study, reagardless of outcome of confrontation. -War Minister Kolasklar.

[Lonestar]

To: Emperor Yang of the Greater Hive Empire
From: The Lord Protector of the Protectorate.

Emperor Yang, I bring you greetings from the Protectorate.

A deep space exploration vessel of ours went down in the LP658-2 system, near the edge of your space. Our knowledge of the extent of the GHE is limited, and we assumed the system remained unclaimed by the major Human powers. One of our Battleships arrived to recover the vessel and leave, only to be informed by your listening post that under Hive salvage laws, it is theirs.

As I speak, my forces are battling yours on the Planet, and your Listening post is in immient danger of being destroyed. I am, however, willing to in this conflict now, if you retrun custody of the ship and crew to my Battleship.

Of course, We will not be opposed to rendering compensation to you for loses incured thus far. We have recently aquired a Starchart of several Usurper affliated worlds, and would be willing to share it with you.

That is the extent of my offer, at this time. For the sake of your spacestation, and your men on the planet, I recommend you beam a standdown order to them immediatly. My Battleship will temporally lower it's jamming bubble so your Outpost can recieve it.

The Lord Protector.

[Mr. President]

The Grand Temple, near Caledon, Vega Prime

"I don't like this at all."

Gary tapped feverishly at his Upson counter, trying to make sense of the data it was giving him. The device showed him a strong drop in the alien ruins' low-level resonances, and a drastic increase in the higher levels. Closing his eyes, the Thinker saw an overlay of the graphs onto a floor plan of the Grand Temple.

"It looks like it's building up huge amounts of energy, Derek," he said, "and the nexus is about twenty meters from here, in room 12."

"Are you sure?" Derek Sorensen asked incredulously.

"Reasonably," Gary replied, "Although -"

He was cut off by another strange event. The scientists felt the rumble before they heard it. Then the sound drowned out all others, shaking the walls and making the very air seem to ripple around them. Strange lights and colors danced before their eyes. And the walls came alive again, rippling with colors, not the serene yet alien green tones of before but angrier purples and crimsons and other shades without name.

"Evacuate!" Sorensen screamed into his quicklink. "Now!"

They hurtled unceremoniously out of the building, and were joined by a stream of other scientists and technicians. About a hundred meters from the Temple's main door, Gary turned and looked back. A column of amber light rose slowly from the Temple. Other beams joined it, rising majestically from other parts of the building. When all of them were in place, there was a flash as the combined beams turned fiery orange, and the light leaped out into space, moving impossibly fast. In a heartbeat it was gone.

"This can't be good," Gary said to no-one in particular.

***

The Capitol Building, Avalon

Gary hurried into the Capitol Building ninety minutes later to find Sorensen already there. "What did they say?" the Thinker asked breathlessly.

Sorensen's eyes were flat, his voice hollow. "The Grand Temple has been declared off-limits to civilian and scientific personnel."

"What?"

"And I think they're going to cut federal funding for Temple study."

Gary pondered this for a moment. "They're afraid of what it is," he said, half a question.

"Perhaps," Derek replied.

The Thinker shrugged. "I suppose there is also the issue of energy beams flying around."

Derek glared. "Fear should never be allowed to hold back scientific progress," he declared, the imperious inflections of a lecturer entering his voice. "You felt something alive in there, Gary. Just like the Planetmind on Chiron, sooner or later the Republic is going to have to deal with this."

"I don't know if I felt something alive," Gary said. "It was a computer, Derek. You can make a computer seem alive when it's not."

"You have a computer in your head," Sorensen snapped. "Does that make you less than alive?"

The Thinker bristled. Sorensen's face softened slightly. "I'm sorry, Gary. I didn't mean that. All I -"

"I understand," Gary said. He rubbed his forehead and looked at the floor for a long moment. "Let's get back to the lab," he said at last. Maybe there's something we can do there. Make an appeal against funds being revoked."

[Frankychan]

Hive Prime

Minister Zell ran through one of the numerous hallways at an urgent pace. Only a short while ago, Hive communication officers intercepted a message from an unknown race.

Zell continued to run down the hallway towards the Emperor's private office. The Emperor needs to read this.

After running for a short time, the Minister finally reached Yang's office. The entrance was decorated with red and green dragon's that seemed to stand guard and watch whoever entered. Zell pushed the panel on the wall notifying that someone wanted to see the Emperor.

The door hissed open. Minister Zell breathed in and entered.

Yang's office was dark and forboding. The room was dimly-lit and was furnished rather solemnly. Yang himself was looking at a map of explored space. Minister Zell watched as the Emperor ran his finger from Hive Prime to Sol.

"My lord, you have an urgent message." Zell spoke up.

Yang turned to face the Xiero. His face looked annoyed.

Zell handed the datapad message to Yang and bowed.

Pressing the "Open" icon on the datapad, Yang watched the message.

The figure on the screen sounded snake-like, hissing its words. It was dressed in flowing robes that obscured its face. Yang listened as the figure talked about the occuring incident at LP 658-2 and the ensuing battle.

The message made Yang's right eye twitch. What was this 'Protectorate' and why didn't Hive agents know about them?

Sheng-ji turned to Minister Zell.

"Send them a message. Tell this 'Lord Protector' that we agree to cease hostilities so they can recover their ship. Then send a message to the station commander there. Order him to take some of their dead for analyzation. Also, send two ships into that system for protection."

Minister Zell bowed once again while Yang walked closer to him.

"I'm going to call council again. We have to know more of these new people."

--------------------
Encrypted message
To: Protectorate
From: Minster Zell of Foreign Affairs, on behalf of Emperor Yang

To Protectorate, we will order hostilities to cease so you may conduct a rescue of your downed crew. Emperor Yang hopes that there is no ill will between us. He also wishes that our two people can establish a mutual friendship so that we can learn more about each other.
--------------------

--------------------
Encrypted Message
To: Spacestation Dragon Commander
From: Hive command

Cease and Desist all hostile actions to unknown forces. You are to recall all ground tropps and allow their ship to commence rescue operation. However, you are to obtain some of their dead so Hive command can analyze them.
--------------------

[Lonestar]

The Cold Harbor.

"Sir, there's a ship entering realspace; it's the Boromir."

Bradley grinned, the Ranging ship had finally arrived. As he watched the tactical overlay, his grin faded. The Hive ships were ceasing fire!

"Cease fire! cease fire, Damn it!"

"Incoming message for his excellancy, from the general region we beamed the His Excellancy's vid. It's...skipper, Yang's letting us pick up our boys."

"Send the message to Colonel Winters, then pass it along to Beta Hydri."

------------------------------------

Planetside.

"Hey you Bastards, live him alone!" Jennings was shouting at the hive men, who seemed interested in dragging away a poo, dead Protectorate PFC. They dropped him and walked off.

Turning to the Battalion S-2, he said "Sobel, we catch us any Hive folks?"

"A few pug-faced ones, but none alive, sir. They just didn't want to...give up."

Jennings nodded. The rumors about the Hive had been true, and they had fought as hard as his men would have for the Protectorate. Of course, they had to resocialized in order to do that, while he was every bit as proud in how his men were unaltered.

The wind suddenly picked up, and the Boromir, which had landed less than 100 meters from the Glorfindel to rescue the crew lifted off and left. The Sun blackened as the Cold Harbor moved over the site and fired it's grappling hooks. As the main body of the downed ship was being hauled up, Mjolnir MBT's moved forward and opened fired on the pieces scattered about. Star Marines did a police of the area.

Looking up as the [i]Cold Harbor[i/] re-entered orbit, Jennings wondered Now What?.

[Kassiopeia]

The media waited. Thirty minutes had passed since the news of the disastrious accident costing the Coalition Navy a Battleship. And some hours ago, the Morganites had managed to take out a third of the joint blockade orbiting Callisto, taking down numerous capital ships.
Yet, the government remained silent. The word told that the Cabinet was in a heated session, trying to decide what to do next. And as usual, the rumors were not far away from the truth.

"What we must do now, is to stop and reassess the situation as a whole", the Prime Minister, Elise Drecaille started the meeting.

For the fourth or fifth time - she had already lost count - the Cabinet, or parts of it, was convening in a short period of time. President Tremaine, Defence Minister Adrian Koch, Colonial Minister Shauna Watkinson, and Ministers of Internal and External Affairs Peter Kalm and Trey Jacobs, were orderly present, and Supreme Commander Wakazashi was interacting via a commlink, hovering over the Moon, visiting the magnificent scaffold housing the future pride and joy of the Space Navy.

"The military losses suffered at Titan and Callisto can not be repeated", she continued. "The credibility of our Space Navy is at stake here. One more defeat of this magnitude, and we will lose our standing in the political play."

Wakazashi's face on the holographic display were slightly blushed as he replied in defence. "I am appalled by the performance of our military. But, firstly, the loss of the Flame of Odin, about which I will elaborate later on, was both a pure co-incidence and a result of misunderstandings in military intel and a communications breakdown between the central government and our fleet in Titan.
What comes to the defeat in Callisto, our forces were encountered with what was almost a suprise attack. Quick study of the debris tells that the bulk of the assault force was not of Morganite origin. The Naval Intelligence is working hard to find out who the assailants were."

"Very well, Admiral", Drecaille responded, "but you surely understand that we need a victory over Morgan Interstellar, soon."

"I have already discussed briefly with the Joint Fleet Commander of the Alliance, and he has decided that the retaking of Callisto will commence in a matter of hours. I have already informed Marine Commander Rosenberg, and our troops are ready to assist the Terran Marines. Callisto will be in Terran control in a matter of hours."

"Terran control? You mean Alliance control?" the Minister of Colonial Affairs asked.

"Yes. The Alliance has decided to leave a large contingent of men on Callisto, to ensure that this kind of blunder is unlikely to happen again", Wakazashi admitted. "Formal control will be of course ours and InEn's."

"Well, the Cabinet is trusting for you to succeed this time", Drecaille said.

The Supreme Commander nodded and terminated the connection.

"Now, comes the issue of the colony of Titan. Or, Kingdom of Saturn", the Prime Minister continued, using a most despising tone for the latter sentence.

***

Ten minutes ago, Corporal Kelsey Rickenbacker had been fast asleep in the small area of bunks located inside the Bargecarrier Lemuria. Eight minutes ago the Master Sergeant of the 8th Combat Squad of the 3rd Unit of the 21st Marine Battalion had woken him up along with the 49 other Marines in his Squad.
Rickenbacker was in charge of the Delta Team of his Squad, consisting of ten men. Nine equipped with a standard issue Gauss Rifle, one with a tripod-fixed Field Rail Gun.
The equipment varied from team to team, but the Team Delta 8-3-21 was a typical representation of a group of hardcore Coalition Marines.
Between the eighth and seventh minute Rickenbacker had dressed up, checked his vital signs with the medical scanner and done other chores required from a Marine when preparing for a surface assault.
Then he had assembled his team and moved to the central bay of their Transport Barge - a vast empty space - rectangular in shape, some five metres high and tens of metres wide - in the abdomen of the barge.
On each of the walls was a large door that would lower and allow the Marines and Combat Vehicles inside to disembark once the Barge had landed. The floor was full of straps, small straps for Marines and big ones for Combat Vehicles, their purpose being to prevent the passengers and cargo flying around sporadically should the landing be a rough one. Also, the Barge left the field of artificial gravity for several minutes before reaching surface, and by the time of landing, without straps the Unit inside could simply not function properly. Even deaths could of occurred as people would of been crushed by falling equipment and vehicles.
After suiting up in medium class air-sealed Personal Armour, Rickenbacker directed his Team to it's own spot, a clearly marked area with ten holding straps for personnel and two for equipment. They tied their weapons down carefully like all the other Narines in the disembarkment bay. Vehicle teams were seating in their respective vehicles, which had been already strapped down firmly since the departure from Earth three weeks ago.
He checked the straps of his men quickly as the lighting inside turned slightly bluish. It apparently was night on surface, and the troops were being adjusted to the level of brightness there. The ship's artificial gravity had made them accustomed to the a lower level of gravity of Callisto for the last 24 hours.
Then there was a wailing of the siren, informing the people inside that in thirty seconds, the Barge would detach itself from the docking clamps holding it steady inside the huge bay housing it.
After twenty-eight seconds, accompanied by four loud successive thuds, the Barge shifted slightly in it's bay. The wall below the Barge split in half and the parts disappeared inside the hull. The Barge fired it's thrusters against a sturdy wallframe inside the bay, and hovered out majestically simultaniously with the other five Barges onboard the carrier. Far in the distance, the second Bargecarrier of the fleet was going through the same process of launching her Barges.

***

"Titan is now intestellarly recognized as an independent nation. The problem here is, should we too recognize the colony's sovereignity?" President H.G. Tremaine presented the question.

"We should. We would soon be deadlocked in a similar situation as the ancient Earth powers, arguing over and over again when the Titanians present their national identity, whether it is in form of flags, people, action... it would mean a long period of diplomatic trouble." This was the opinion of Minister Jacobs.

"Trey has a point. It would end up in squabbling between us and the rest of humanity." The President backed him up, making Jacobs sit a bit straighter in his chair.

"I must disagree", the Colonial Minister protested. "That would mean admitting that the Titanians overthrowing their legitimate government was acceptable. We would have Europa, Ganymede, Callisto, the whole lot of them revolting to independence in notime!"

"What is needed is a compromise. All points presented are equally viable. Whatever we do, we are facing problems." The Prime Minister held a pause, looking at the Cabinet's members. "We have to recognize Titan, but not risk the loss of other colonies. I believe I have a conclusion for this dilemma. We can admit Titan, but we must at the same time tighten our leash on the other colonies. Groups like Nova Saturna must be suppressed as soon as possible, and with as much force as needed. Security measures must be increased and the population must be placed under a more careful eye."

***

The Barge started to shudder as it used it's powerful retro-rockets to fight the moons gravity. Corporal Rickenbacker was swiftly introduced to the usefulness of the straps as several G's tried to throw him away from where he had attached himself to the floor. The straps had an automated release mechanism that would allow them to be removed only after the ship had landed, to avoid people suddenly flipping out from causing any harm.
As soon as it had started, the shaking ceased. Rickenbacker sighed inside his helmet and activated his communicator to check out the status of his team. They all checked in fine, and a visual overview of the two equipment packs told that they had no need to use the auxiliary weapons stored in small lockers in the floor of the disembarkment bay.
There were now only small spotlights in the bay, to allow the Marines to disconnect themselves and to make their way out into the darkness waiting outside. The Barge continued to hover for a few moments, escorted by a Squadron of fighters, until a suitable site had been confirmed and locked on. The inertial dampers were activated for a fraction of a second, as the Barge placed itself on the crust of Titan.
In a few moments, the Marines were free of their straps, and were marching to the doors in the sides. Rickenbacker's team was to leave through the starboard side door. The Corporal looked around while walking towards it, listening carefully to the Command channel, a shared communications channel for all team leaders.
Once the Delta Team had stopped behind lines of other teams of their Marine Unit, the Channel came to life. Rickenbacker's team was ordered to provide support for two other teams, who in turn were ordered to proceed to establish a safe position in a given sector of the terrain ahead.
Then, after all was clear, the door opened and in front of the troops presented herself the capitol city of Callisto, a sprawling complex of lit domes clearly visible towering over the rugged grey volcanous and crater-covered surface of Callisto. Just before launching into a fast sprint alongside his fellow Marines, Corporal Kelsey Rickenbacker glanced a bit above the horizon, and admired the grandness and the red-white-grey stripes of Jupiter.

***

In the orbit above Callisto, a Coalition Battle Squadron held it's positions. It was replenishing the sphere of proximity sensors formed around the planet, and the ships with the ability to conduct orbital bombardment were placing themselves to establish secure firing arcs.
The four Coalition Bargecarriers and the several Alliance transport ships had emptied their Barges and were now heading to the moon Europa. The troops were planned to stay planetside, and thus there was no possible need of an immediate evacuation. Because of this, the lightly armed ships could pull back and wait for the dust to clear.
There were still several Morganite transports and, according to some, battleships landed near the population centres of Callisto. The spaceports of Callisto One held most of them, but some had landed in leveled plateaus outside smaller cities. Now that the counterattack was beginning, the blockade forces were keeping a careful eye on the moon.
The assault made by a so far unknown party some hours ago had caused worrying losses to the Battle Squadron and the Alliance Task Forces. The Battle Squadron was only at 60 percent of it's normal supplement, and a mere twelve ships were left unscathed in the attack.
The replacement ships were some half an hours' journey away. They could of not waited for the reinforcements to arrive, because of direct orders from the Alliance to immediately retake the colony.
The Carrier of the Battle Squadron, Pygmalion, had taken some distance to the moon, accompanied by two Destroyers. She had suffered greatly, with big black burns covering most of her hull and a small cloud of debris and gases still surrounding her.
Her fighter compliment had been reduced, but she still had enough Bombers to effectively assist the forthcoming ground assault. Fortunately, her abilities to refuel capital ships was not needed as all the required supplies were available in the near vicinity - at least in interstellar terms.

***

The battleground, some seven kilometres north of Callisto One, was silent. Much too silent, was the worried thought inside Corporal Rickenbacker's head.
Target Zone 67 was highlighted in the minimap in his helmet's visor. According to the computer, the Delta Team had just entered it.

"Calling Gamma Leader, this is Delta Leader. We are right behind you, Yzerman. We are holding positions at Zone Sixty-Seven."

"Roger that, Rickenbacker. We are setting up the POLAR. Power up in three."

"Roger, Delta Leader over and out." He checked with the Epsilon Team, which was the other team the Delta Team was to provide support for.

"Private Saunders, Private Rewell, fix Rail Gun here", he said, pointing a spot on the terrain with a light attached to his suit's arm. The soldiers carrying the gun laid it to the designated spot and started to fit the tripod down.
Rickenbacker activated the long distance camera of his helmet, zooming straight towards Callisto One. Even after adjusting the display, he could not get a clear picture of the domes, all he saw was bright lighting.
The minimap on his visual was updated as the POLAR, Portable Location Radar, was ready. The troop movements in the sector was now clearly displayed, telling that three Brigades of Rail Tanks were approaching their positions.

***

To be continued, scroll down please...

[Kassiopeia]

In the domes of Callisto One, Colonial Magistrate Trudy Napgraft was standing back in his office at the top floor of the local headquarters. Morganite details were marching in the streets, making their way to either at the outer plains to hold the invaders out or to the transport ships preparing for departure.

The leader of the Morganite forces, General Marmion, had left the headquarters, and the Command Nexus some fifteen minutes ago. To co-ordinate the desperate last stand outside the domes or to flee within the transport ships, she could not tell. All she knew was, that her family was fine, living in a temporary shelter in the western corner of the primary dome, and that in less then an hour, there would be no Morganites alive on this moon.

She looked at the distance, over an impressive array of tall office buildings. Bright flashes were twinkiling over the horizon, with white and green trails criss-crossing the landscape. Once in a while a larger flash erupted as something exploded violently into a cloud of debris.

The conditions outside in the Callisto night were horrible. No-one would survive out there without a firmly pressurized vacuum suit that had a reliable heating system. The darkness bestowed upon the moon made the temperature to fall well below - 100 Centigrade, not to mention the random toxic pockets of gases or the lack of any atmosphere altogether.

She turned her look once again to the north, were the largest starport resided. Former InEn transports and combat vessels were being loaded with supplies and men alongside the Morganite ships that had made it to the surface. There were no vehicles in the city; apparently all were in the battlefield to slow the Marines down so that the evacuation could take place unhindered.

The Magistrate looked at her office interior. The Morganites had stolen all the information in the central CallistoNet, virtually ripping off hardware from the walls and the mainframe. Lonely threads of electric wires protruded from empty sockets reserved for screens and consoles, and the floor was full of computer components scattered around. There had been other damage to the colony besides the raid of Napgraft's office - all the warehouses in the city and the starport, the local shops, even some homes all were emptied of anything that might be useful to the Morgan Interstellar.

In the blackness of Callisto, another explosion lit the view for a moment.

***

In terrestrial combat situations, Corporal Rickenbacker always enjoyed the moment when the fighter bombers came into play. A wing of them were now roaring over his head, or at least they would of roared if there would of been an atmosphere to transfer the sound to the soldiers' ears. They quickly changed into a "Plow", a formation specifically designed for taking out ground units. The fighters plummeted towards the ground, launched three volleys of missiles at the three Brigades threating them, and then pulled back to the sky, flying over Callisto One with the tips of the domes nearly scraping their wing pylons.

***

The Coalition Space Navy's Battle Squadron, or what was left of it, swiftly set to motion as the scanners picked up the first signs of ships rising from the moon. Six ships emerged from the ash-grey background, all carrying InEn insignia. The CSN ships asked for an identification, but decided to target their guns as the transports ignored them and started to accelerate into a FTL jump. In a rapid series of flashes, five transports were gone into FTL, while the crippled sixth one remained, transmitting an emergency signal.
Now, the Terran-Coalition ships moved to the exact spot from where the Morganites attempted to escape from. After three transports had been forced to crash on the moon, the Morganites started to make a rise from a location closer to the northern polar area. But the TAF reacted quickly, and a group of Battlecruisers applied their Ion Cannons, incinerating four Transports.
Three more transports rose from the surface, and all of them were either halted or crippled to critical levels.

The Coalition and Alliance Joint blockade was disappointed as it reported that exactly one third of Morganite evacuation ships had succesfully left the theatre.

***

The Marines were now striding towards Callisto One. There were only core defences left, and the soldiers had been ordered to proceed as soon as possible to the dome to capture as many prisoners as possible. Some Morganite soldiers would undoubtedly take their own lives, whereas others remained in their positions, firing berserkly until they were killed. The amount of Morganite prisoners taken in Callisto One could of been counted with the fingers in two human hands.

***

Colonial Magistrate Napgraft saw from her room as an explosion shattered the sealed airlock in the far side of the dome. Two doors remained intact, so the pressure level of the dome remained normal. Terran Marines started to pour in, taking out or capturing any remaining Morganites.

As her scavenged room had no use, except for perhaps a scenery room, the Magistrate descended to the ground floor. The other released workers of the headquarters stood there. Many of them had died, either in blasts or gunfire, and some of them, like the assisting Lieutenants of the General of Defence, had been taken prisoners by the Morganites. Not much, however, as the Morganites concentrated on colleting hardware and supplies instead of prisoners.

***

Corporal Rickenbacker strolled the streets of Callisto One. He had removed his helmet, which was strictly against recommendations as the area had not been fully secured yet. But he wanted to get a sniff of some fresh air - albeit recycled, the greenhouses of the domes kept the air somewhat better in quality then on a starship - before returning to space.
He was satisfied. His team had scored fifteen kills, with an ammo loss percentage of only six point three. He personally had eliminated three enemy soldiers.
This good performance always meant for a Coalition Marine that he would get both a leave, either back on Earth or in the closest colony, and a nice one-time bonus and a possible raise to his salary.
As he, accompanied by three of his teammates, crossed over a road, a person stepped out of a building. The foursome immediately raised their Gauss Rifles, targeted at the man's forehead. A single shot from the gun, from this range of ten metres, would even with the lowest level of power make the man's brain scatter themselves to a wide area.

"No!" the man shouted and raised his hands.

Rickenbacker lowered his rifle somewhat, but gestured his men to keep him in target.

"Identify yourself", he ordered the man, lowering the Rifle down to his hips. For a short moment he had a premonition telling him to put his helmet back on and stand back, but he ignored it and took a step closer.

"My name is..." the man started. Rickenbacker noticed that the man was sweating all over, and clearly nervous.

The man lowered his hand, keeping the other up, reassuring the soldiers that he was not in hostile intentions.

"I am..." he said, still keeping his hand in his pocket. The premonition struck Rickenbacker again, and he tightened his grip of the Gauss Rifle.

"...Brigadier Bismarck of the Morganite First Corps!" the man screamed and brandished a Shredder pistol. Rickenbacker quickly raised his Rifle, but could not make it in time. Bismarck fired once, a lethal shot tearing half of the Corporal's head away. The three others from the Team Delta fired their Gauss Rifles, punching a dozen of holes in the Brigadier's chest.

***

News of the new turn of the events in Callisto reached Earth, and in a wild (spontanious) applause the Prime Minister and Minister of Defence were welcomed into a media conference.

Firstly, the Prime Minister held a speech, recognizing the sovereignity of the new leader of Titan and Rhea and wishing to initiate peace talks with them.
However, she reminded that the other regions of Saturn, around Titan and Rhea, are still technically Coalition territory, but she then added that all negotiations would be possible.

Then it was the time for the Minister of Defence to talk. He congratulated the Coalition Marine Corps and the Navy for the excellent performance in Callisto, reading out different numbers and statistics very favorable to the Terrans.
But, after that, he concentrated on the Titan mishap. He apologized in behalf of all Earth for the accident, and blamed a Solar anomaly for the communications breakdown.
Also, he asked for the Titanians to return the Coalition any Coalition citizens and crewmen that might be in their custody, especially any possible survivors of the wreck of the Flame of Odin.

[Mr. President]

[double post, deleted]

[Mr. President]

Caledon, Vega Prime

Derek Sorensen did not even realize he had been asleep until the videophone's insistent beeping woke him up. Sitting upright, he saw that a soap opera about deep space explorers had come on. The only human character was the ship's captain; his first mate was a dinosaur cloned from Mesozoic DNA, and they got worse from there. Switching to MorganLink 3D News, Sorensen answered the phone.

He was mildly surprised to see Gary's face on the video screen.

"Derek," the Thinker said without preamble, "you've got to come to the Temple right away."

"Why?" Sorensen asked.

"The President flew in that xeno-computer guy from the University." That grabbed Sorensen's attention. Gary continued, "We have one week to get everything we need and then the ruins are being locked down again. For good."

Derek leaped up and started buttoning his shirt. "In that case, what are we waiting for?!"

***

The Mall, Orchard Valley, Firaxis Prime

A strange rainy day and strange unexplained events. By the road stood a medium-sized building with a Spartan banner flying over the gate. Outside were parked three Orchard Valley police cars, and there were more than a few military uniforms visible. Only a few hundred yards down the road, the sparkling commercial district was brimming with people going about their daily business, for the most part unaware of what had just taken place.

Few anywhere were brazen enough to throw a pipe bomb over a Spartan wall.

It had not gone off, but had caused a fair bit of confusion. Fortunately, the highly-trained Spartan guards had reacted quickly and effectively, locking down the embassy and summoning the police immediately. The unexploded munition had been disposed of, and local and embassy security personnel were combing the street outside for signs of the bomber.

Sergeant Adam Gibson conferred quietly with the Ambassador, a slim but muscular Spartan woman in their trademark black fatigues. "I'll be honest, ma'am," he said, "They've likely melted away into the crowds by now. But we're picking up evidence even now, and Headquarters is already compiling a list of suspects."

The Ambassador nodded, then turned slightly away as one of the detectives asked her more questions. Sergeant Gibson turned, shielding his eyes from the orange sun as he looked up at the Jagged Edge mountains. The snow-capped peaks reflected the bright morning light. In their foothills exquisite magnigoth trees swayed slightly in the wind, among the largest living things in the known universe, their red crowns almost a thousand feet from the ground. He could easily understand why someone would want to protect them, and the rest of the world. But the sergeant was, though he concealed it well, taken aback by the brazen attempt at sabotage.

Ironically, the Spartan Embassy represented one of the most effective methods by which the government protected Firaxis. The pistol hanging at his side was manufactured in a Spartan factory. Gibson moved slowly back to his car.

[Lonestar]

Colonization Fleet, Roving

The four 5 km Conestoga's were drifting idly in orbit of the first Protectorate Colony World farther than 4 ly away. The luck in finding this unused G-type star system had been fantastic, and the Lord Protector had authorized Colonization of it pronto.

The Name of the planet was "Roving", and it was startling Earthlike, with no indigenous intelligent beings save for some apes that may or may not achieve intelligence down the road. A Division of 5,000 Star Marines had been deployed, and the base had been named Fort Worth. The 50,000 or so settlers had opted to build the Colonial Capital near the base, and so the capital was named "Ft. Worth" as well.

Since a disproportianite(sp) of the original Endeavor colonists had been from the American Southwest, this fit in well with the personality of the LP's subjects.

3 Battleships orbited the Planet as well, the squadron to protect the colony. The number was expected to grow rapidly, with 3 more older Santa Fe class Ceramic/metal hulled Batteships to join soon.

The Incident at LP 658-2 had shocked the Protectorate colonial authority, the system had been presumed unclaimed and was 11 ly from Roving.

As the fleet gathered above the new Colony, the settlers waited anxiously to hear what the GHE was going to do now...

[Frankychan]

System LP 658-2
Spacestation Dragon

Commander Wilcox grimaced as he watched the now known Protectorate ships commence in their rescue operation. He really thought the Hive stood a chance against them.

Ever since he received the order to cease fire, he felt almost cheated out of, what he thought, victory.

Suddenly, as if from nowhere, two Hive corvettes entered the system. A comm-officer spoke up.

"Commander Wilcox, Hive ships Skipfire and Sliver reporting in. They say that they were sent here by Hive command to oversee the Protectorate operation. They also have a message for you. Shall I put it through?"

Wilcox turned to the viewscreen and motioned for the officer to put it on screen.

"This is a pre-recorded message from Minister Zell...

Commander Raymond Wilcox...we have sent these two Hive ships to oversee these 'Protectorate' vessels. Attached to this message is another message we want sent to their ships after this one is finished.

After your men have left the planet, we want you to load one of these two ships with whatever you have retrieved from these aliens. Our two ships will then leave the system. Send your report to command when you are finished."

The screen went black.

"Sir, that's the end of the message. The attached message is pending."

Wilcox looked away from the message viewscreen and turned to look at the planetary screen.

"Send it. I've had enough of these 'Protectorate' aliens."

--------------------
To: Lord Protector of the Protectorate
From: Minister Zell via Hive Spacestation

His excellency, Emperor Yang, offers his hand of friendship. We wish to discuss formal diplomatic matters. Therefore, in this message we have included the Emperor's link. Please respond in kind if you wish to conduct matters of diplomacy.
--------------------

* * *
System LP 658-2
Planet Surface
Hive shuttle landing area

Bulwark Major Largos K'rintak surveyed his men. Some were injured, many were dead. The first rule that the Hive military had was to never surrender, to kill themselves before being captured.

A couple men were pulling a load of corpses on a sled, waiting to board the next shuttle up into space. Major K'rintak walked over to the sled. More of our men dead. The Bulwark moved one body aside to see underneath.

A Protectorate soldier was staring back at him with cold, lifeless eyes. The body was masked by the dead Hive soldiers piled on top of him.

The major looked back at his men. More of the sleds were being pulled in...

[GeneralTacticus]

Encrypted Diplomatic Transmission:

To: Colonel Marcus Kessel, Spartan Federation.

From: Menelaus, Supreme Leader of the Laekdaemon Cadre.

Dear Colonel Kessel,

Although I know you are preoccupied with many matters regarding Sparta and the situation in the Sol system, I hope you will carefully consider what I have to say. Although the Cadre and your regime in Sparta have been mortal enemies since the founding of the Cadre, I see no reason to continue this situation. I am also sending diplomatic messages to your allies the Morganites and Free Drones, but I will make you the same proposal. It is as follows:

1. Spartan recognition of our independence and the mutual agreement to refrain from the use or threat of force against one another.

2. Opening of relations that would allow trade and investment to move freely between our two factions, as in the past seven years our surveyors have found abundant mineral resources on several planets and moons in our system, utilization of which could benefit us both.

3. Transferral to Sparta of several data files compiled on Progenitor technology located in the ruins of Tau Ceti. There is not much there, but hopefully your science teams can find a use for it. Ours have benefited from the use of their resonance and recycling technology.

We are open to negotiation about any point of this proposal, so if you have any problems with any part of this, please say.

Regards,

Menelaus.


Encrypted Diplomatic Transmission:

To: President Kirsty Adams, Free Drone Republic

From: Menelaus, Supreme Leader of the Laekdaemon Cadre

Dear President Adams,

Although I know that ever since the founding of our Cadre we have been effectively at war with Sparta, I see no reason for this to continue. I have therefore sent a message and proposal for a peace deal to Colonel Marcus Kessel. I would like to offer a deal to you as well, as we believe you would be a valuable ally. It is as follows:

1. Free Drone recognition of our independence and the mutual agreement to refrain from the use or threat of force against one another.

2. Opening of relations that would allow trade and investment to move freely between our two factions, as in the past seven years our surveyors have found abundant mineral resources on several planets and moons in our system, utilization of which could benefit us both.

3. Transferral to the Free Drone Republic of several data files compiled on Progenitor technology located in the ruins of Tau Ceti. There is not much there, but hopefully your science teams can find a use for it. Ours have benefited from the use of their resonance and recycling technology.

As I stated in my message to Kessel, we are open to negotiation on any of the above points, so if you have any concerns on this please raise them.

Regards,

Menelaus.



Encrypted Diplomatic Transmission:

To: CEO Nwabulike Morgan, Morgan Interstellar

From: Menelaus, Supreme Leader of the Laekdaemon Cadre.

Dear CEO Morgan,

Although I know that ever since the founding of our Cadre we have been effectively at war with Sparta, I see no reason for this to continue. I have therefore sent a message and proposal for a peace deal to Colonel Marcus Kessel. I would like to offer a deal to you as well, as we believe you would be a valuable ally. It is as follows:

1. Morganite recognition of our independence and the mutual agreement to refrain from the use or threat of force against one another.

2. Opening of relations that would allow trade and investment to move freely between our two factions, as in the past seven years our surveyors have found abundant mineral resources on several planets and moons in our system, utilization of which could benefit us both.

3. Transferral to Morgan Interstellar of several data files compiled on Progenitor technology located in the ruins of Tau Ceti. There is not much there, but hopefully your science teams can find a use for it. Ours have benefited from the use of their resonance and recycling technology.

As I stated in my message to Kessel, we are open to negotiation on any of the above points, so if you have any concerns on this please raise them.

Regards,

Menelaus.


Encrypted Diplomatic Transmission:

To: Emperor Sheng-Ji Yang, Greater Hive Empire

From: Menelaus, Supreme Leader of the Laekdaemon Cadre

Dear Emperor Yang,

Although the Cadre has been largely quiet since our secession from Sparta fifty-seven years ago, I feel that it is time to change this. I have already despatched diplomatic messages to Sparta, Morgan Interstellar and the Free Drone Republic, suggesting a deal with them. As I have not in fact offered them support against their enemies, I feel fully justified in proposing the following deal to you:

1. The transmission of some GHE security files to Laekdaemon Central (our HQ on Atreus Prime) to assist us in building up our security forces.

2. The potential transmission of some Hive technology re: cloning, cloaking, and genejack technology. I realize this is probably classified, but this is simply a request.

3. The transferral to you, if agree to point 1, above, of several data files compiled on Progenitor technology located in the ruins of Tau Ceti. There is not much there, but hopefully your science teams can find a use for it. Ours have benefited from the use of their resonance and recycling technology.

4. Potential transferral to you, if agree to point 2, of schematics of Spartan military technology in our possession. This is classified stuff in Sparta and very valuable, so we will require a significant incentive to transmit. I must also ask that you keep this proposal secret, as if it were known it could lead to troubles with Sparta.

Regarding point 1, there is a faction forming within our society that believes in the continuing of total war with Sparta until victory is achieved, and is willing to fight against me if necessary to go through with this. Any help received in suppressing them would be appreciated.

Regards,

Menelaus.

[Lonestar]

The Palace, New San Antonio

Once more the Holochamber rippled the Starchart into existance, showing a detailed view of the ongoing operations at LP 658-2. Lord Protector Ian I held up the small flimsy that held Emperor Yang's private link, and tossed it on the desk in the middle of the Chamber.

War Minister Kolasklar, and General of the Armies Matthew McCarty were in the room with him.

"Tell me Gentlemen, if we were to go to war tomorrow with the Hive, would we win?"

McCarty looked as if Ian had whipped out a knife and threatened to cut his balls off. "Only if the Dosi aided us all the way, Sire. Whatever technical advantages we may have are negated by the huge numbers of the GHE."

"That's my thinking too." Ian scratched his chin. Right about now they'll be finding out from our dead we not only resemble Humans, we are humans.

Turning to War Minister Kolasklar, he said " When will the genetic profiles be ready on some of the captured alien bodies?"

"Dr. Pym says in about a week, Sire. Then we can begin work on the necessary Genetic plagues. As a precaution, of course."

"Of course." There was a long silence in the chamber, common when Ian was thinking about something. "General, I want you to order the Cold Harbor to Roving when they are done with operations in the LP 658-2 system. Captain Bradley will then brief Admiral DuGalle on known Hive military doctrine."

Ian scratched his chin again.

"Open up a link to Emperor Yang. Don't bother with the Encounter Gram, he knows were Human by now. Send it through the Ansible, I don't want him to know where the transmission is coming from."
----------------------------------

Encyrpted diplomatic channel # 451-78Ba

To: Emperor Yang of the Greater Hive Empire
From: Lord Protector Ian I of the Protectorate of Man.

Emperor Yang, Greetings from the Protectorate of Man. As you doubt know by now, we are as human as you. (perhaps more, Ian thought) As such, there is no need for cheap theatrics. One day, perhaps, I will sit down and explain how we came to be, but not yet.

I have decided to accept your offer of friendship. Among other things, this transmission contains a file with a starchart of the Usurper worlds I promised. Consider it a act of good faith.

I would be interested in conducting further negotiations, opening rade and the like, but not in person. For the time being, I will transmit through the Ranging ship Crockett, which arrived recently in the LP 658-2 system to aid my other ships in the recovery of our vessel. Should you request the Crockett be moved somewhere else, we will honor it.

Do not attempt to cross us though, or me, for that matter. We are subtle and quick to anger.

Regards,
Lord Protector Ian McDiarmid I

[Silence]

Morgan Interstellar
CNSS Blessed Redeemer

Rear Admiral Gregor Kincaid was silent as the pinnace pulled into the boat bay of the carrier. After brining home the taskforce, he decided to move his flag back to the carrier while the ships of his taskforce were being worked on. He stood at attention when the door to the pinnace opened up and the medium sized lady with blonde hair came out. He saluted her and she saluted back and said, "At ease Admiral."

"Welcome aboard Admiral Demover." The shock of seeing Vice-Admiral Lisa Demover as the commander of the 8th, now actually 1st Solider of God Fleet was no on his face, he knew that she was coming but, he didn't expect her to be real. Ever since her father was executed for treason people hadn't trust a Demover in uniform, it only had been her great tactical ability that managed to allow the last heir of the Demover family to be given such a command. Gregor could imagine the feeling of awe that she must have in having control over that much firepower. He had been visiting the Morgan flight control talking with their director about how to increase security when the 8th Fleet came out of FTL. The Morgans had ships that were large and powerful, but when they saw the actual visuals of the flagship, the super-dreadnought Grace of the Lamb he had seen the young officer at the station had his mouth drop, when the mountainous ship came into view along with her 3 consorts and the rest of the fleet.

So they were walking towards to the admiral's cabin, Demover said, "I see you handled your first fleet action very well indeed, admiral."

"Thank you Ma'am, while we did much damage to the enemy, I am still unhappy that we didn't get the other 2 of their battlecruisers."

"Its spilt milk now and if you would of stayed, the TAF taskfore would of been able to squish you." Demover said, and they walked into the cabin, he offered her a drink and she gave him a order, while he was getting the drink she sat down and said, "So what is your unbiased opinion of the Terran naval capability."

"Ma'am, they are tough fighters, but we have the range advantage, the only weapons they have that are quite comparable to the our long range chaos naval riffles are their gauss cannons, but they are going good when they knock down our primary shielding systems at long range, and in close range they have other weapons that are much more powerful then those. I am still looking over the damage the fighters did to our escorts, but I am sure with a solid phalanx of our DE and your new CLE that we will be able to keep them from doing to much damage."

"Yes, the 8th fleet was outfitted with the latest ships and technologies to see how they would work in actual combat, now since the HOG campaign has been reduced to a piracy action, as the government calls it."

Gregor snorted and said, "Piracy? figures they would do something that stupid, I know you seen the reports from the captured destroyer squadron, they have a base out in deepspace on a rouge planet, and unless we find that base, we will have to keep our forces spread out across the Oort Clouds and asteroid belts to make sure they come back again."

"I know admiral, but that is neither here nor now, we must focus on helping Morgan win this war he has going on."

Gregor smiled, he knew that he was going to like this admiral but he had to ask a quick question, "Ma'am, am I under your command or what is going on, we didn't receive any orders dealing with the new fleet."

Demover replied, "Your taskforce will be merged with our existing force and you will be running the battleship squadrons, and act as my XO for this mission."

Gregor blinked, XO? Battleships squadron, that was what one gave a rising star and served as a step for a admiral to get his own..... He smiled and raised his drink and took a swig.

"So Admiral Demover, what are your plans for the fleet?" He asked.

"I am going to recommend to CEO Morgan that he allow us to take our ground forces (the 8th had brought alone several more 3 more corps) and take out saw Cappella and then began to work our way through the other systems, and use them as based to raid Sol
until they give up."

Gregor Kincaid raised his glass up and said, "Well then, a toast to the road of victory!"

[History Guy]

Morgan Interstellar, Central Plaza Building, CEO Nwabudike Morgan's Office

“Mr. Ku,” began CEO Nwabudike Morgan, pacing about the room, addressing the Intelligence Chief, “are you sure that there are several traitors from our company who plan to sell information on our strengths to our enemies?” Ku was a good man, a good Intelligence Chief, in some ways much better than Roze, the last Intelligence Chief, who’d left Morgan Interstellar on Chiron to found the Data Angels, whom had been no end of trouble for Morgan afterward. Now Mr. Ku was reporting to him that there seemed to be a conspiracy by disgruntled Morganites to sell their enemies information that could be extremely damaging to the well being of the Conglomerate.

“I am, CEO. Absolutely sure,” Ku responded.

“Are these men Drones or disgruntled members of the working class?” asked Imran Siddiqui, his arm freshly out of its sling.

“No, it seems they are all officials. I have the name of at least one, Mr. Siddiqui.”

“And who is that?” asked Morgan.

“Mr. Gervaise Binstead, a minor diplomatic figure, now retired. You may recall he served briefly as an ambassador to the Terran Alliance, but was replaced by Mr. Carlson and Miss Dewhurst. It seems that he has of late been making efforts to contact the Terrans to sell information to them on Morgan Interstellar’s military forces. Luckily, it seems no deal has of yet been reached.”

“It is a shame,” said Morgan, “I had always liked Binstead somewhat. But I suppose the fact we put him out to pasture aggravated him somewhat.”

“I am afraid that is most probable.” Ku seemed to be focusing his gaze on the pen Morgan was fiddling about with unconsciously. He was waiting for the arrival of the Saturn Kingdom’s dignitaries, and of the eclipse at 5 o’clock in the evening.

“I am afraid we can not allow Mr. Binstead to continue with this, and so action must, of course, be taken.”

“We must take action, CEO?” Ku asked, suddenly changing his glance from Morgan's silver pen to his face. Morgan nodded. Ku bowed slightly and turned to leave the room. But he after a few steps towards the door he stopped and turned to face Morgan and Siddiqui. “CEO, there may be a danger that Mr. Binstead’s associates wish to sell information on our military positions to the Greater Hive Empire.”

“How do you know this?”

“It is…suspected, we are not sure as of yet however.” Morgan considered this. He feared no one as he feared Yang and the ‘Greater Hive Empire’. He knew that the Terrans, as mighty as they were, would simply be minor concerns when the Hive was against him. If there were anything he would ever wish to totally destroy, to crush into dust, it would be the Hive. A knock suddenly came at the door, and Morgan bade the knocker enter. It was Colonel Jerome H. Motyer, the Adjutant.

“CEO,” he said slowly, “General Marmion sends word that the Terran Alliance has retaken Callisto, but he has managed to survive with over one third of his force, and is returning them to the nearest Morgan planet. Apparently, when the Terrans attacked they came in huge number, and we managed to kill a good many of them, but they overwhelmed our force, and took a large number out by rail gun attacks. Before his men left they rendered all InEn machinery useless, and they destroyed the Callisto Command Nexus totally. Callisto is no longer useful to anyone.”

Morgan was stunned. Only 15,000 men of his force were coming back with Marmion. They had fought a good campaign, but they’d been decimated. In a sense it was a victory, InEn would have to claim bankruptcy sooner or later because of this. A good deal of its military force was taken out, many Coalition ships were destroyed. Saturn was protected. But at what cost? What was it that Pyrrhus of Epirus had said? “One more such victory and I am finished.” Yes, this indeed was a pyrrhic victory. “Thank you for the information, Jerome,” responded Morgan, sadly, “I am sorry to hear of it. Is there anything more?”

“Yes, General Marmion states that his right wing commander Brigadier Harry Bismarck was killed valiantly in action against a battalion of Terran attackers, and that while he was surrounded he refused to surrender and died a heroic death. General Marmion asks that you consider Bismarck for posthumous promotion. The same goes for Ordnance Officer Nassar, who is mortally wounded.”

“Yes, certainly…”

“General Marmion has prepared a full report, sir, if you would like to view it.”

“Yes, thank you, Jerome.” Motyer walked to the wall alongside Morgan’s desk, on which there was the holo-map of the whole of charted space, and slipped a data-disk into a slot just under the map. The image of the map quickly faded and was replaced by the face of Major General Marmion. His was a weary face, and around his forehead he wore a bloodied bandage.

“Official Report of the 2nd land battle of Callisto, a moon of Jupiter,” began Marmion. “After the two tremendous victories over the InEn and Earth Coalition forces on and around Callisto, we made preparations either to hold or to leave en mass, and unfortunately we chose the latter situation over the former, and therefore wasted many good men in the defense of Callisto…” Marmion droned on for anoter fifteen minutes detailing the fall of Callisto. Marmion had stayed in Callisto’s command nexus to the end, of course, and barely made it to a transport. Luckily a good number of his men had also survived, and a good number of Earth Coalition men had not. In the defense, Colonel Nassar of the Artillery had been mortally wounded by the initial bombardment from the sky, which Marmion referred to as “cowardly”, and was not expected to live out the week. The Right Wing Commander Brigadier Harold Bismarck had been killed in action, valiantly. All in all, the defense of Callisto had been a magnificent affair, and would have been even more so had the Morganites won it.

“Thank you, Colonel,” said Morgan to Motyer as the recording ended and General Marmion’s face faded into the darkness of the screen from whence it had come, “General Marmion and his officers will of course each be rewarded a medal of heroism. I’m truly sorry of it all, but at least what we set out to do was accomplished. If only we could have accomplished it without so many losses…”

“One more thing, sir,” added Motyer, “the Soldiers of God forces wish to be given permission for an attack on Capella…”

“Capella?” Morgan turned his attention to the re-appearing map, and he saw the closeness of Capella to the Morganite territory, and how distant it was from Sol, “I don’t know. Let me think. Capella is close enough to our territory that it could be invaluable to them in launching an attack on us. Unless we make an orbital cannon or two that might just be very dangerous. But on the other hand, if we attack and take it, we shall eliminate that threat, destroy a major Terran holding, and take something from them that they can not so quickly re-capture. And furthermore, if we take that over…if we score a major battlefield victory over their armies in their land…if we totally destroy their armies in that sector of the universe…if this is accomplished we may have them exactly where we want them, they could not commence an offensive quickly against us, and we may have enough time to sue for peace…”
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Gervaise Binstead opened the door of his private apartment, which was on one of the top floors of one of the huge skyscrapers in Central Plaza. Binstead was whistling a tune he’d heard somewhere that had now etched itself temporarily in his memory. In about twelve minutes those Saturnians were scheduled to land and to meet with Morgan and his dignitaries, who would leave the next day for the Saturn Kingdom to set up a permanent treaty (as well as embassy). Binstead wasn’t invited to intend any of that, of course, he was now out of a position in diplomacy. He had briefly been thought of for being sent off to this place Firaxis Prime, but that fat Grecian Mr. Physkon was sent instead. He was out in the cold, so to say. This Terran thing was not improving things for him as well, but he felt that fortunes would change shortly with the deal he was proposing.

Gervaise Binstead sat down in his real leather chair and turned on the tube, wondering whether to watch MorganMovieChannel, MorganLink3DSports, or MorganLink3DNews, or something else entirely. He settled on the News, and watched as Miss Kathryn Dewhurst, who Binstead had worked with in the Terran government embassy, was interviewed in 3D. No one had asked Binstead to do that stuff. Ah well. At least he would enjoy this eclipse tonight. The primary moon of Castor A, known as Achaemenid, would totally eclipse Castor for a full two minutes, but that wasn’t for another half hour yet.

As he waited, Binstead brewed himself a cappuccino; he’d need something warm to drink, as it would get a little chilly during the eclipse. As he left his kitchen with the cappuccino in his hand, he thought he saw something in the darkness of his TV room. It was very quick, a metallic glint in the darkness, something moving incredibly fast, and yet still remained totally silent. Had he imagined it? He reached to turn on the light, putting his drink down on the kitchen counter first. As he switched the light on, he saw for a split second a tall, square-faced man, clothed wholly in black, holding a small pistol in his hand. It was not a shredder pistol, but it looked deadly enough. So Mr. Ku’s intelligence men had caught up with the leak, he thought.

Binstead’s reaction was to turn quickly, and to try and dodge the intruder’s fire, but suddenly the room was plunged into darkness again. The eclipse blocked out most all light, and the intruder seemed to have quickly turned the light off again. A sudden light broke through the darkness, coming from seemingly nowhere, and then there was total silence. The intruder had done his work, and Gervaise Binstead would never see the light of Castor again.
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

Vera Sofia’s arrival at Morgan Interstellar had been relatively quiet and without much fanfare. The small diplomatic ship had come in at the Central Landing Pad in the City exactly as scheduled, and the light escort ship landed several minutes later. Luckily the Earth Coalition ships had either not seen the diplomatic ship, or had respected proper military protocol, unlike the InEn ships several months earlier. The Earth Coalition, it seemed, were a bit more respectable than that, though Vera Sofia would never have thought so of them. Enough members of her family had been murdered by the EC that she bore an intense hatred of the Coalition and it’s government.

Vera Sofia was now Titan’s official ambassador to Morgan Interstellar. It was her job not only to set up a permanent treaty, or perhaps even an alliance, with the Morganites, but also to make proper diplomatic deals and that sort of thing as time passed. Her first half-hour at Morgan Interstellar had been truly impressive. She very much enjoyed the eclipse about fifteen minutes after her arrival and the sight of the huge Central Plaza building of Morgan Interstellar was truly impressive. She also liked CEO Nwabudike Morgan very much, and found him the most charming fellow she’d ever met. His reputation had gone before him, and Vera had found all she heard of him to be quite pleasantly accurate.

“Good evening, Miss Sofia,” said CEO Morgan, coming to greet her in the ‘lobby’ of the building. She shook his strong hands, and found herself dwarfed by the giant fellow. He was dressed in some of his best, and was obviously out to charm.

“Good evening, CEO Morgan.”

“I trust you enjoyed the eclipse a few minutes back.”

“What I saw of it I did, yes.”

“Good, good. I’d like to invite you and the rest of the dignitaries back there to dinner with myself, Mr. Siddiqui, Mr. Walker, Mrs. Rabinowitch, and our own dignitaries to be sent off to Saturn. Would you like that?”

“Oh yes.”

“Good, then we shall have dinner, and then have a drink or something, and tomorrow Mrs. Rabinowitch and her gang shall leave for Saturn, and the lot of us can talk over these arrangements that I would very much like to cement.”
++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

[Lonestar]

Cerro Gordo Federal Lab, New San Antonio

"Ugly little buggers, aren't they?"

Dr. Pym chuckled at his collegues remark. The largest number of non-human GHE soldiers the Boromir had brought back were of the so-called "Bulwark" species. Very ugly indeed. The Dosi Datalink on them was small, merely commenting that they were a "Primative Species, unfit for membership in the Federation." Yang's meglomania wouldn't have allowed a Primitive species to exist near him, however, without them worshiping him as a God.

Henry Pym leaned over the corpse, and looked at it for the millionth time. The Genetic profile on this species was almost complete, and work on a gene-plague would be able to begin soon.

Also worth noting was the "Mindbend" techniques Yang used. It wasn't all that different from the resocialization the Protectorate used on some of it's more 'culturally challenged persons', which meant is was impossible to deactivate without a injection.

The Lord Protector wouldn't like that; it meant any war with the GHE would be a disaster for the Protectorate. While there was no doubt the GHE wouldn't be able to break through Home's defensive grid without great difficulty (to say nothing of the thousands of bunkers scattered throughout the system), and offensive action would be impossible. Fortunatly, the LP was taking the diplomatic route, at least until other avenues were opened up.

Pym put down his PADD and walked over to one of the Hive-human corpses. They were fortunate to get a Teep to do a "deathscan" on this man before he died, which gave some clues to Hive Society.

Pym shook his head. Entire cities buried under ground! The old Chiron recordings were true, then. It also appeared as if not many people in the Hive knew it's true extent, and where the Throneworld was. Interesting. It's military technology was unremarkable, prefering quanity over quality, although General McCarty pointed out that Quanity has a Quality all of it's own.

Pym rubbed his eyes. How did the LP convince him to become the Minister of Science? He knew the answer, the Lord Protector asked, so he served. Now he had to go back and inform War Minister Kolasklar that the Deathscan, while informative, gave nowhere near the amount of information needed for a campaign.

In any event, ties were being opened up between the two nations. Perhaps the precautions they were taking would prove unneccessary...




....for the time being.

[Sprayber]

Major Castor hated to be the one to disturb the Colonel in his private quarters. Not that she hated going there at all. She had spent many nights there in the past and even once or twice recently. But that was always as Lera and not as Kessel’s chief of staff. She hated to bother him because he spent so little time there, and too much time inspecting this or that or making sure Sparta was kept in running order. Kessel was a Spartan but he was also a human being. But the messages that had been received couldn’t wait for his duty shift. As she pressed the button to annouce her presence, she let out a sigh. Things were about to change in Sparta, and some of them meant that new enemies would be made and old ones drawn nearer. As the door slide open the familiar sound of Kessel’s favorite music filled the hallway outside. This time it was a man singing in an old earth language that few in modern Sparta knew unless they had either been there or had it uploaded into their MMI. She knew the words but the meanings had always been slightly out of her reach. But she knew that they sounded sad, and that was why Kessel appreciated it. He had told her once the songs were called the blues, but again the true meaning had been lost on her. Kessel turned from filling a glass and punched a button that ended the music.

As Kessel sat down he motioned to seat. ‘Come on in Lera.”

“I’m sorry to disturb you Marcus, but these messages that have arrived were important and needed to be seen right away” She said, as she walked over and handed Kessel three data pads.

“Let me have the worst news first, so that we can go from there”

Lera sat down and got out her own data pad. “Well sir, the Terrans have retaken Callisto. Our informants on the moon have reported in once again. Both are alive it seems. It appears the Morganites were able to evacuate some of there personnel. Maybe as many as one third, but that number is unconfirmed. Watchers in Morgan territory have reported roughly that many have returned. Our sources on the moon were successful in remaining hid among the Terran population. The agent that was uninjured was able to send us a rough rundown of the Terran attacks. That combined with information provided by official Morgan military contacts will be fed into the computer at the Command Nexus and a scenario will be available in a few hours describing the details of the Terran attack. Morganite officials have requested our data on the results.”

Kessel nodded approvingly “Of course, all information will be shared with them”

Lera made a note on her data pad and continued with her briefing. “On a side note, the Believer mercenaries performed admirable in their raid against the Terran fleet. They inflicted significant losses against them in a modest amount of time. A run down of their success will also be processed today and be available for review. Which reminds me sir. You have yet to reply to the Believer response.”

Kessel took a sip of water and sit it back on the table. “There is nothing to respond to. I made my point, either they agree or they don’t. But Sparta’s position will stay the same.”

Lera nodded and decided to move on to the next order of business. “Admiral Hans has asked for instructions on how to deal with the Hive ambassador.”

Kessel handed over a data pad to Castor “He is to transmit this to the ambassador. There is to be no discussion of terms, just relay the message. We will see if Yang wants to stall for time or if he is wants to move quickly.”

Lera placed the data pad on the table and looked down at her own pad again. “We received this message just a short time ago, sir. And is the reason I came here tonight instead of tomorrow at the regular time.”

Kessel leaned forward in his chair and looked intently, “A message from the Terrans already?”

“No sir.” Castor replied. “It’s a message from the Gorn. Or at least so it claims. It was authenticated of course and there is no possibility of human origin at least.”

Kessel looked visibly surprised at this bit of news. “We sent out a message two years ago. I had figured that they were ignoring us and didn’t expect a reply. By all means let me see it”

Castor produced the data pad that contained the message and Kessel input his code to allow access. What he saw was both hopeful and disappointing.

humanSpartans we watch for sometime your species. You are not united and do not pursue common goal. This is puzzle us. You are much like progenitor in that you do not follow logical course of cooperation. We do observe that some fight bree and some do not. We think some cooperate with bree but do not see where to be exact. Do know that humans that cooperate with bree will be enemies of Gorn and must be eradicated. But at time do not know who those humans are. We see that humanSpartans fight bree many times. We see that at times humanSpartans can out fight bree. We see that other times humanSpartans fight other humans. And still other humans fight other humans. We will not care who humans fight. We are not interested in fighting old ones at this time. But can when bree are eradicated. We will keep watch on humanSpartans and humans. But be warned humans best be small. Small things go unnoticed in big space.


Kessel read through the message three times before he finally put the pad down. “The translation was better than I thought it would be.”

“Actually Marcus, that is the way we received it, along with a sample text of the Gorn script. I think they were trying to teach us a little of their language. Or at least enough to understand them.”

“Knowing their language is all well and good Lera, but they didn’t offer much new. Except that they thought some humans were cooperating with the Bree.” Kessel got up and walked over the window that looked on the parade ground complex. “What was the other message you have there?”

“This is going to be stranger then the Gorn message. “ Kessel raised an eyebrow at that statement .

“What could possibly be more strange than the Gorn message?” Kessel walked over and took the offered data pad from Castor.

“Well I will be damned. The Cadre. Stay here while I prepare a message.”

An hour later Kessel had finished his two messages and handed them to Major Castor. As she was leaving to follow out his instructions. Kessel caught her before she left completely.

“One last thing. Inform the officers in the cryo detention facility to move the cryo tube for Cyan Solo out of deep storage. They are to put it in a secure lab and order a detachment of the Spartan Guard to maintain security.”

Castor went a little pale at this last order. She had heard Kessel talk about Cyan Solo and had been able to read some of her file. But she maintained an even tone and simply acknowledged the order . As the door closed behind her, she could already hear the music begin to play in Kessel’s quarters. The music was darker then before, but still very sad.

************Encrypted Message***********
To: Menelaus, Supreme Leader of the Laekdaemon Cadre
From: Colonel Marcus, Commander Of The Spartan Federation

Your group has been a thorn in our side for many years. You refused to abide by the doctrines and orders of your then superiors. There were numerous attempts on the lives of officers in positions of authority, including Colonel Santiago. But that was in the past. The Spartan Federation makes no claim on your system now or in the future. We do not consider you an enemy any longer unless you choose to go down that path. Your offers are acceptable as is. We will even offer you an official warning to other governments that your system is to be considered a Spartan ally. And that an attack on your system would be considered an attack on Sparta itself. Not because you are a dependent or apart of Sparta, but because you are an ally. There is one condition to our offer and our acceptance of your offers. It is something that all our allies know and understand. You are not to aid the Greater Hive Empire or any declared enemy of the Spartan Federation, be they human or alien. Your trade deals with any other governments are your concern. But any kind of military aid or support to the any enemies of Sparta will be considered an act of aggression and we will act accordingly. This includes accepting military support or aid from Spartan enemies. I hope we can come to some kind of accommodation between our two societies.

Respectfully, Colonel Marcus Kessel. Colonel Of The Militia COTM


To: Hive Ambassador Telhai M'rock
From: Admiral Aaron Hans: Commander, Spartan Taskforce Maya

Ambassador M’rock. Colonel Kessel of the Spartan Federation sees the benefit of cooperation. He asks that if the Greater Hive Empire is interested in peace, then Colonel Kessel and Emperor Yang should be the ones to handle the negotiations. After a general agreement has been worked out then a team from both sides can get together and work out the details. He believes that since neither side is interested in invasion, the process can be carried out over FTL COMM. This would of course require the FTL codes necessary to communicate with Emperor Yang on your homeworld. Since this is a stipulation already in place by treaty among the civilized and advanced societies, this would put the Greater Hive Empire in compliance. Colonel Kessel eagerly awaits your emperor’s response.

Admiral Hans ….

************Encrypted Video Message***********
To: CEO Morgan
From: Colonel Kessel

CEO Morgan. I am sending you this message to inform you that I have indicated to the Terran government that any attack on Morgan Interstellar outside the Sol system will mean immediate action by the Spartan Federation. Sparta will stand by Morgan Interstellar for as long as it takes to defeat the Terrans or any others that attack you.