So, here's my sequel to "The Dragon and the Wolverine" the latter was in many ways the experiment and if you haven't read that I recommend you stop reading this right this moment and read the other story before reading this… I mean it, you really should stop reading this story right now unless you have already read the first story.
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… What are y'all deaf? Unless you have read the "Dragon and the Wolverine" story you should really stop reading now…
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… Don't eyeball me….
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Also thanks to doctor Anthony for proof reading.
AND of course, I own neither of the franchises Terra Nova (as it would've never been cancelled had I owned it) or BattleTech…
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…...…. Panpour system, Late 3048 …
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Within the ComStar Phoenix Armada in far orbit around the Panpour system,
"This is command, all ships of the first taskforce prepare to jump in 5… 4… 3… 2… 1…" And then the first part of the armada jumped out to the first of many waypoints along the route that would take them to their final target… Terra Nova.
And soon after more smaller fleets started jumping out, this was done as they all couldn't risk jumping all together as that could rouse too much suspicion, and most of them would stop at Nova Roma to start to build up the necessary base facilities for a civilization on that remote planet.
At last there were only two fleets left, the commanding officers of the two smaller taskforces contacted each other,
"This is jumpship Tydirium of Taskforce Leprechaun, do you read?" The Adept in charge contacted his fellow on the other taskforce.
"This is Jumpship Apollo of taskforce Baptiste, receiving." The other adept acknowledged,
"I guess it is our turn to jump now, make sure to slave-circuit the ships." The first said,
"I'm unsure of that." The other said,
"How so." The first queried,
"We're picking up some weird readings from our scans of the area." The other explained,
"Probably just some gravitational shadows from the others jumping out. Ready for jump." The first adept reported and then as the Taskforce Leprechaun started its jump sequence… All of a sudden, the darkness of space lit up with lightning storms happening around the two small fleets,
"Some anomaly, sir." The bridge officer reported after having checked the scans that were going haywire,
"Adept, engineering is reporting instability in the jump drive."
"Stop the jump immediately!" The first adept ordered in panic,
But too late…
As the same was happening on both taskforces and soon both flashed out of existence in a wildly unstable lightning storm that seemed as if both fleets simply were torn apart.
On the planet Panpour several hours later when the incident was reported, it was given the same air of space anomalous status as when the Pilgrim disappeared, it would eventually draw the eyes of others searching for answers years later and numerous stories would eventually come into being.
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Unchartered system, late 3049, three months after the second battle of Terra Nova.
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This was a disaster, as Taskforce Leprechaun which had been the largest of the two, but only about half of it had apparently made it, though with every jump drive completely inoperable thanks to the anomaly.
William Clarkson,
The Adept in charge had managed to get things organized, despite not even knowing where exactly they had ended up.
They had quickly unloaded the slaves; this lot had been taken from a world neighbouring Panpour and had been filled with more of those Celtic reactionaries, everyone all but refusing to acknowledge any other language than that gibberish of theirs, luckily on the remaining ships they had brought interpreters to at least be able to tell the slaves what to do… Not that the Adept doubted they at least understood English, it was their near refusal to work that was the problem.
Though the slaves seemed to like the planet despite being slaves on it, William hated the word and refused to use that term.
The two things of significant note were; first the gigantic clover like trees all green that dotted in small forest-like clusters, and what looked like sheep both rams and ewes, the only difference was that these sheep were HUGE, easily the size of small Terran elephants, and at first they had caused some problems for the ComStar troops on patrol until they had managed to get the Irish labourers into building some proper walls.
While the few mercenaries that had accompanied them simply sat on their lazy arses doing nothing.
One of those rams had attacked and taken down a heavy battlemech…
Adept Clarkson was sitting in his office and going through reports of how the slaves had now elected a representative among them, some woman named Michaela Collins, and she had demanded an audience – her own words – with him.
There was a knock on the door,
"Enter." William answered, and soon a relatively young and rather beautiful woman with long brown hair in a braid were let into his office, her frail appearance hid the fact that she looked stern as her eyes was a cobalt blue, and she strode in, her back was straight, and even in the loose-fitting work overall, she looked almost regal to him.
William couldn't help but admire her beauty not to mention her courage, He had heard that the larger part of the taskforce that had been aiming for this Terra Nova was chuck full of mostly disgraced mercenaries or outright bandits, and they weren't known for their kind nature.
William got up and extended his hand in greeting, Collins simply crossed her arms on her chest and stared at him,
"I am Michaela Collins; my people have elected me to speak for them." She said with a voice though soft and lovely – even her Irish accent – did not belittle her beauty, her voice was still full of contempt.
"Ah, Miss Collins, a pleasure to meet you." He slowly retracted his hand,
"Please, sit down." He then said and showed her the chair opposite him on the other side of his desk.
Michaela sat down and crossed her legs,
"Some of your soldiers have made advancements towards many of us, we may be your slaves, and will obey you – To a limit of course. If these advancements continue…" Michaela said getting right to the point,
William frowned,
"I can assure you Miss Collins that if any of the soldiers under my command do anything… dishonourable, I will personally have them whipped." He assured her, she didn't seem very convinced,
"Look, for the record, I do not support slavery, but I have my orders." He said trying to smooth over,
"Obeying orders is a very old excuse Adept Clarkson." Michaela pointed out,
"We are your prisoners, and we will not become friends with any of your people. Our people always had their doubts about ComStar, and it is obvious for good reason." She started and then took on a more softer tone,
"But, at the moment, I'm here to ask your permission to build a temple, not a big one, but enough so that my people can at least feel some normalcy. In return we will obey your orders and those of your people, as long as they are to our benefit or do not infringe upon our human rights." She then said,
William had really no problem with religion even that archaic Celtic thing of these people, despite what some of his superiors thought.
"You have it, I will make a proclamation to my soldiers about this, and I promise that about the advancements… they will stop. I'll even make sure those mercenaries are kept on a tight leach." He promised, Michaela nodded and a faint smile lit up her face and she rose from her chair and now she extended her hand,
"I believe we have an accord Adept Clarkson." She then said,
William took her hand and smiled as well as he could.
"We do." He replied.
"If only everything went this well?" He thought…
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A few weeks later, it was early morning, William was awoken by pounding on his door.
"Yes, what is it?" He half yelled as he was stumbling out of bed trying to get his uniform on.
He managed to get moderately presentable and opened the door that slid to the side with the usual electronic swoosh sound.
"What is it?" He then queried to the soldier standing at attention before him,
"Sir, we have picked up a transmission coming from the outer system,
"A transmission, by whom?" William asked, he was immediately filled with hope
Maybe the greater taskforce had finally found them?
Months earlier they had used the equipment they had and set up an orbital tracking station by dismantling two of their largely derelict jumpships, and a third that acted as a relay station farther out the system, to act as an early warning system.
William walked back into his quarters and quickly dressed properly and then walked to his command centre in the middle of the primary settlement which had been the primary slave camp, though William refused to call it the latter and had ordered his soldiers to do the same as well as respecting the labourers.
The orders had been very unpopular and there had been reports of mutterings among the men and women of his command.
When they got the command centre he was quickly briefed by his second in command of the situation,
"We just got the scan data back from the relay ship, and it looks like a corvette just jumped into the outer system and it seems to be heading here – fast." The second reported,
"Have we tried opening coms with them?" William asked, but the second shook his head,
"Yes sir, but they aren't responding." The second replied,
"Could it be something wrong with either our or their equipment maybe?" William asked,
"No, our equipment is working fine and so are theirs, they are receiving our coms – they just don't answer." The second said with a worried look,
Adept William Clarkson looked at the data and frowned,
"Hey, this ship looks like one of ours." He mumbled,
"Contact the relay ship, and have them do more scans." He ordered,
"Yes sir." The second responded.
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On the Relay ship the commanding officer Adept John Thompson received his orders,
"Not much else we can do in any case." He thought glumly, this assignment was boring.
Adept Clarkson had sent many of the dissenting ComStar personnel here as they had protested against treating those damned reactionaries nicely.
"Well, as soon as we re-establish contact with ComStar, I'll make a full report on Clarkson's treasonous behaviour." He thought and ordered more detailed scans to be made of the oncoming vessel,
"Sir, readings and visual indicate a corvette sized warship, the scan comes back as… it's one of ours." The scan technician reported and the bridge erupted into a chorus of whoops and happy shouts.
"Quiet down." Thompson ordered and then as the corvette came in closer they could see it was loaded with three dropships – and one of the dropships detached from the warship and approached the relay-ship.
"I don't recognize those markings though." Thompson noted as there were markings of a yellow or golden… dinosaur looking creature on the sides – almost like heraldry of some kind.
"Sir, they're hailing us." The com tech reported,
"Put it through." Thompson ordered, though he had a bad feeling about it all, ComStar usually did not allow crews to paint their ships like this…
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On the planet, in the command centre, Adept William Clarkson was getting impatient,
"Why don't they respond?!" He wondered,
"Sir, I lost contact with the relay ship." The com officer reported,
This was getting worrisome as all they could do was watch as the warship came closer,
"Sir, by the speed their going, they're going to be here in less than six days." The com officer noted.
There was some commotion outside, and soon after the door to the command centre opened and Adept Francis Graham, a fifty-year-old bald man that had come along largely as a political officer came marching in followed by some of the few mercenaries that had been on the fleet along with some of the dissenting Com Guard soldiers.
"Adept William Clarkson, by the authority that Precentor Henry Radcliff gave me, I'm officially relieving you of your command." He said and before anyone could do anything his soldiers was pointing their weapons at Clarkson and his subordinates,
"This is mutiny Graham!" Clarkson growled,
"You are the mutineer, as you went against orders about the slaves." Graham retorted and pointed his laser pistol at Clarkson,
"Now, do us all a favour and surrender so that at least your men won't come to any harm." He then said smiling,
Clarkson knew about Graham, that he was as corrupt as they come, Graham was basically a stooge to Henry Radcliff,
Clarkson and his Com Guard personnel raised their hands up in surrender…
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Well, this was the first chapter of the sequel to "The Dragon and the Wolverine".
Please review and tell me what you think of it.