Okay folks, it been a long time...
I HAVEN'T forgotten about WHL, i'm just having a hard time finishing it. Maybe something will crop up soon...
To tide you over, here's a crossover that's been sitting on my drive for a while now.
Stargate: Armageddon
USS Independence
High Orbit, Earth
11th
July 2018
General O'Neill sat quietly in his command chair, aboard the bridge of the fleet flagship. All around him the crew moved about their preparations, subdued but determined. He, however, kept the despair from his features as his mind drifted yet again, to the course of events that had led to today.
By 2010, things had been going fairly well for Earth, despite its lack of defenses. The Asgard were an effective tripwire deterrent, preventing the Goa'uld from attacking Earth directly. Losses amongst the SG and Spearhead teams was high but they gave better than they took.
Construction had finished on the testbed vessel, Daedalus and, once she had proved her worth, work was finalized on the other ships under construction.
Soon afterwards, Earth's forces seemed to get their feet under them. The Goa'uld were pushed back onto the ropes and everyone's spirits rose as the chances of Earth losing the war diminished almost daily, it often seemed.
Earth's space fleets became a real force to be reckoned with in their little corner of the Galaxy and were holding their own in Pegasus as well.
Then, in 2015, things quickly started going bad.
First, there was strike one; Anubis returned from exile and subjugated the various System Lords under his rule with his vastly powerful array of Goa'uld Motherships enhanced with Lantean technical knowhow. His Ancient-derived technology gave his ships quite an edge and, once he had completely control of the System Lords, moved against Earth and several allied worlds fell quickly to his forces. A surgical and suicidal strike by SG-Omega managed to destroyed Anubis and his flagship but the damage had been done; the Goa'uld now had the new technology for themselves.
Then, for strike two, Earth's leaders had hoped that, despite the technological edge they now possessed, the Goa'uld would return to fighting amongst themselves. They didn't. Early on, there were signs that internecine warfare was starting up again were there and Earth did its best to stoke that particular fire but then and relatively unknown Goa'uld called Bast came along and, against all odds, managed to form a Union from the most powerful of the System Lords. United as one, with a common goal and a clear technical superiority, the Goa'uld Union imposed a blockade around Earth's territories and, little by little they pushed us off world after world until they had isolated us from our allies and bottled us up in our solar system, the one place they couldn't directly attack for fear of starting a war with the Asgard that, despite their new technology, still might not win.
Strike three, the final nail in the coffin for Earth. The Asgard died. Their bodies finally broke down and, after they realizing that we couldn't send an emissary to them, tried to pierce the Union blockade. Two vessels succeeded but were heavily damaged upon arrival, their crews dead, being already too weak to survive the injuries they sustained. We found the two Asgard computer cores they were bringing to us but it also pushed the Goa'uld into sending a scout vessel to the Asgard homeworld. Finding only rubble and no sign of Asgard activity anywhere, Bast realized that the Asgard were no more and decided to move against Earth once and for all.
That was two months ago. Carter and her Science Division had performed miracles in using what information they could get from the Asgard Cores to enhance, as best they could, Home Fleet's shields and weapons.
The first attack had somewhat mixed results. Home Fleet had intercepted them at Jupiter, coming at them from behind the gas giant, riding their massive gravity well like a slingshot and striking them from their rear. The Jaffa attacking weren't expecting Earth's ships to be so effective and nine Shal'kra Heavy Motherships were destroyed for the loss of only two battlecruisers.
While many cheered at the victory, the Admirals shook their head in despair. The exchange rate, despite being well in our favour, was nowhere near enough in our favour to offer us a chance of total victory. Especially since the next time they attacked, the Jaffa would be a lot more prepared.
Home Fleet was down to eleven battlecruisers and two battleships, supported by a dozen fortresses in high equatorial orbit, each with twice the firepower of an Ares-class battleship at the price of the ability to maneuver faster than a pre-Stargate shuttle. Bast had nearly two hundred Motherships of all classes readily available. No doubt more were assembling elsewhere.
And so it all came down to this moment, O'Neill thought. His prayers went out to the now packed colony of Atlantis, in the Pegasus Galaxy, filled with evacuees from Earth. Nearly eighty thousand people had managed to escape to the Lantean city before the Goa'uld began blocking the Stargate.
Those eighty thousand might be the last Tau'ri in existence after today.
-----
Colonel Caldwell, his longtime 'Flag Captain', turned from the tactical plot, his expression grim. "Sir, the Union is leaving Neptune orbit and advancing in-system."
To O'Neill, the words sounded like the death knell of his race and his despair threatened to overwhelm him but with the ease long practice, he pushed his feelings back down and settled into what he called his 'command mode'.
"Are they trying anything fancy?" He asked, leaving his chair and approaching Caldwell at the tactical plot. The large holographic display showed a swarm of small dots leaving the marble sized representation of the eighth planet as the Union Fleet began its final assault.
Caldwell shook his head. "We've got good tracks on all Motherships. The ship count matches early recon results. Jack, they've got more than enough firepower to make any fancy tactics redundant."
O'Neill nodded. "We'll keep with Alpha-2 then, Colonel."
"Aye, sir." Caldwell replied and then turned to the bridge at large, spitting out orders to the rest of the fleet.
Alpha-2 called for the Fleet to break into two equal sized groups, each already having taken up position above Earth's northern and southern magnetic poles. The interference there was strong enough to heavily degrade Union targeting sensors. As the Motherships attacked, the two fleet elements would sweep out of the interference and strike the forward elements of the Union Fleet on a converging course, meeting at the equator.
The two elements of the fleet would then pass each other at the equator and allow the orbital fortress to cover their retreat, back into the polar interference, with each element having swapped polar positions. It was hoped they would be able to repeat this tactic a couple of times before the Union altered their straightforward approach.
Several variant strategies had been developed that could be put into place once the Union response developed but O'Neill thought they were optimistic. Not the plans themselves but that the idea that any of the fleet would remain to initiate any of them by that point.
"Six minutes to firing range." The TAO reported quietly.
O'Neill nodded. On a side display, he could see swarms of Sabre fighters and Pegasus bombers launching from the planet, the battleships and the orbital fortresses. They would help, a lot, but they wouldn't win this battle.
The crews of the Home Fleet, men and woman from nearly every nation on the planet, watched quietly as their deaths approached but none of them broke, none of the wavered, they all stood bravely, ready to do their duty, knowing they were about to die.
"Four minutes to firing range."
Caldwell stared defiantly at the plot. "Maneuvering, move out on the timeline hack, don't wait for my orders. Gunnery, enemy ECM will quickly knock out Fleet datalink just as our ECM will do to them. Keep your fire focused on the minimum number of targets, let's not dilute our firepower."
Heads nodded in agreement but O'Neill noted a strange look upon the sensor officer's face. "Lt Jeng?"
Jeng's head whipped up, his expression one of consternation. "I'm picking up a hyperspace window, sir, one million kilometers to starboard of the Union Fleet. It's massive…"
Caldwell spun round in surprise. "How massive?"
Lt Jeng's face screwed up with doubt and growing horror. "Nearly four thousand kilometers wide."
Heart's seemed to stop across the bridge as everyone heard the reply. Before anyone could say a word though, a massive flash filled the viewport as the oversized hyperspace window spat out what could only be described as a moon.
"What the…" O'Neill breathed out in shock.
If the crew of Home Fleet thought they were stunned at the arrival of a moon, which was nothing compared to their shock as the space around the rapidly scattering Goa'uld Fleet began to boil with eye-watering explosions of light.
There didn't seem to be any weapons fire from the moon to account for the explosions, although analysis of the sensor logs would reveal intense hyperspace activity in the area around the Motherships.
Within a minute, nearly three quarters of the Union Fleet had been destroyed. Only the massive Super-Mothership that served as Bast's flagship and twenty two of her heaviest Motherships remained. Mere seconds later, white beams of light slashed outward from dozens of points on the surface of the newly arrived moon that sliced straight through the shields of the remaining Motherships and stabbed deep into their vitals.
In an instant, another twenty-three blinding explosions tore space apart.
Silence reigned on all channels across Home Fleet. They had been mere minutes away from death only to be saved by the appearance of a moon that could travel through hyperspace.
O'Neill tried to push his shock aside and made his way over to the sensor officer who, like the rest of the bridge crew, was staring slack jawed out the viewport.
"Lt Jeng, scan that…moon." Jack ordered loudly. He needed information.
It took nearly thirty seconds but on O'Neill's display, the sensors results suddenly appeared. The moon was actually a ship! The crust only seemed to extend a few tens of kilometers deep but after that, there appeared to be solid hull made of some alloy that was hard to analyse. Trinium and neutronium were predominant with some other metal traces that the computer couldn't recognize.
Sensors could barely penetrate the hull but the scans whispered at massive machinery, engines, weapon ports and life signs, tens of thousands of life signs. Human life signs!
"General, we're being hailed by…that moon." The communications officer reported haltingly. "I have audio and visual."
"Onscreen." O'Neill replied. The viewport stopped being transparent and instead, displayed a middle-aged human male, with graying temples and a wry smile.
His uniform looked military in bearing, with shoulder bars and cuff rings. Behind him appeared to be a circular bridge with stations sunk into the floor, their operators interfacing with holographic displays and what seemed to be a clear view of space instead of a ceiling.
"Greetings General O'Neill. My name is Admiral Andha'san of the Imperium." The man announce warmly.
THE END?