The First Contact War
Chapter 1 First Contact
14th June 2621 Earth Standard calendar, Corporal Jake Fernandez aboard United Earth Government Frigate Normandy briefing room, orbiting Eden en route to a distress signal from an unknown ship.
"At 0800 hours a distress signal was picked up from an unknown ship dead in space. Your mission is to board that ship and discover who is on board. You are to go in armed as we can't tell what you'll run into, take boarding gear as well" stated the CO.
"Sir, what are the rules of engagement?" Inquired one of the Marines.
"Don't fire unless fired upon. The Insurrection hasn't been seen in years and the independent planets don't have any trade with Eden. Now then, we'll come along its port side and dock with it, after that we'll undock and move to a holding position to the rear of the ship. We have only picked up a few lifeforms towards the centre of the ship. We'll be docking in five minutes, Get going to the starboard docking tube. Dismissed"
With that, the CO left the briefing room.
"Okay, Marines let's go! "Yelled Jake.
"Oraah!"
At the starboard airlock.
The twelve Marines stood anxiously waiting for the two ships to dock. The Marines were dressed in their brown armour with their assault XOS-3 exoskeletons with their AC160 assault rifles; it looked like a cross between an M16 and AUG3.
"So, do you think it's inni's? Ten credits say its inni's" said private Jones.
"The Inni's have been gone for thirty-two years, they aren't coming back thanks to Dommel" replied another Marine.
"It could be aliens"
"You fill your head with too much Sci-Fi Rick"
"Yet we have plasma guns and exoskeletons," countered Rickey "Hey, Corporal. What do you think we'll find?"
"Maybe your sense of humour"
"Hey! My sense of humour is perfectly fine! Not my fault that you don't appreciate good quality humour"
"Good quality my ass"
The marines didn't hear any thunk as they expected to as their system sensors revealed that they were slowing down, raising confusion from the Marines.
"Opening airlock in sixty seconds there doesn't appear to be anywhere to dock so we'll be switching off artificial gravity, you'll have to cut your way in" came over the intercom
The Marines donned their helmets Masks and held their breath. The artificial gravity switched off.
"Magnetics on!"
With a Hiss, the Door opened revealing the inky blackness of space and the red ship below them. Mike saw the ship had three cylindrical engines at the back and a large pod to the front; the middle of the ship had sections that extended from it in a rhombus shape. The ship was clearly damaged with black scorch marks covering the ship with a hole in the port side of the ship exposing its systems.
"Basic ship boarding from the Outside, use the laser cutters to make an entrance, keep an eye on your air consumption, make sure your magnetics stay on, don't drift off into space. Let's go, Marines!"
With that, Jake pushed himself out off the airlock towards the stricken ship followed by his squad. Jake drifted towards the ship using his momentum to flip over so he would land feet first. With a thunk, the magnetics in his boots attached themselves to the ship followed shortly by his squad.
"Normandy, were all on the ship can you locate an entry point?" Jake inquired over the comm.
"Scanners show there is a hallway near the top centre of the ship; if you make your way there you should be able to cut your way through. Scanners also show that most the ship is decompressed except for the pod at the front. We're moving to holding point, Normandy Out"
"Thanks, Normandy, we're Oscar Mike"
With that, the marines mad their way to the top of the ship as instructed as the Normandy moved to its holding position to the rear of the ship they were on.
"Peters, Smith, use your laser cutters and get us an entrance"
"Yes sir" they chorused.
Jake watched as they slowly cut through the ship's hull. It took five minutes of cutting but they finally reached a corridor.
"Lights on Marines, Rick with me," Jake said as he switched on his AC160's flashlight and his helmets built-in lights, and jumped in through the opening, Rick followed in quick succession. The first thing he saw when he went through was metal debris littering the corridor.
"Clear!" yelled Jake.
The remaining Marines quickly entered after.
"Peters take Smith, Ryans, Williams, and Itami and continue along this deck towards the bridge, recover maps, navigational data and ships logs, anything that will tell us where this ship came from and who built it. I'll take the rest of the squad to the deck that is below us and move towards the pod at the front of the ship to look for survivors. Rendezvous back at the entrance we made in thirty minutes if either group isn't their call for Evac then come back to neutralize whatever took out the other squad"
A chorus of confirmations came out from the squad. Jake and the remainder of his squad moved towards the stairs that took them towards the lower deck. The corridor the found had a number of rooms to its sides.
"Check your corners; make sure each room is clear"
Jake walked towards the first two rooms with rifle raised and signalled for Rick to take the left side. Jake held up against the wall before turning and entering the room. Moving his rifle from the left side of the room to the right side, seeing nothing dangerous.
"Clear!"
"Clear! "He heard from Rick
"Must be the crew quarters with all the bunks"
Jake and his squad repeated this for all the crew quarters until they reached the last two.
"Clear!" Jake called out for the final time.
"Sir, I think you need to see this!" He heard Rick yell.
"What is it, Rick?" Jake said. What Jake saw next shocked him. He saw a blue female humanoid with a set of weird... well he didn't know what they were; she was wearing a strange brown robe or tunic.
"That's an alien," Rick stated.
"Thanks, Rick once again your observational skills prove to be superb"
"Is this too soon to point out I was right"
All rick got in response was a couple of glares from his squad mates.
"Must have died from the decompression"
"Let's not dwell on it. We'll get the body on the way back so our scientist can study her. Let's keep moving the pod is just ahead"
Jake and his squad progressed down the corridor passing through an airlock that revealed the entrance to the pod.
"Place Harmonics on the door "Jake ordered.
Emily reached into her pack and took out for discs. Throwing two to Jake he placed his on the top and bottom right side the door while Emily did the same on her side. Emily pressed a few commands on her wrist computer, and they activated creating a screen that showed bio-density. The screen revealed several people inside.
"Is there any way to contact them?" asked Jake.
"There seems to be a comm link from that control panel that we can communicate with them from "Replied Emily looking at her wrist computer, then went about collecting the Harmonics.
Jake reached forward and pressed a button.
"This is Corporal Jake Fernandez of the United Earth Government Marines; we are here to rescue you. If you are receiving please respond."
Jake waited for a response. Nothing. He tried again.
"I repeat. This is Corporal Jake Fernandez of the United Earth Government Marines; we are here to rescue you. If you are receiving please respond."
He waited again. This time he got a reply.
"This is Twi'lek senator Alema Olgkru of the Galactic Republic; I'm in the salon pod with several other members of the crew and passengers. We are all that survived the pirate attack and decompression. We made a random hyperspace jump to escape but the full coordinates weren't put in so we've jumped to an unknown part of space. Thank the force someone found us. I've never heard of the United Earth Government?"
"I've never heard of the Galactic Republic or of a Twi'lek before?"
"Very strange then. But we can talk about that later. How do we get out of here when the rest of the ship is depressurised and the pod is jammed due to damage?"
Jake thought for a moment. He had an idea.
"Do you have any spare air available?"
"Yes. We have air recyclers and spare tanks that store air but we don't have much left why?"
"If we combine our air in our Oxygen tanks and your remaining air. If we were to close the airlock on the outside, we should be able to fill it with air, if we are quick we can use the remaining air in our tanks the spare breathing masks to reach our entry point in the ship. If we call for an Evac before we do this, we probably will have enough air to do this."
"That's risky but it just might work. I'll get everyone ready while you call for Evac. Call when you're ready to start."
With that, the line went dead. Jake reached for his earpiece.
"Normandy, do you copy?"
"We copy Corporal what do you need"
"I've made contact with the survivors and it turns out their aliens from another civilization who were attacked by pirates"
"Repeat last, it sounded like you said, aliens?"
"They're aliens"
"Okay... What do you need?
"I need immediate extraction from our primary entry point due to the fact that we are going to be low on air. Be aware we will be bringing along several extra passengers"
"Copy that, Warbird en route now ETA two minutes. Normandy out"
"Good, Peters do you read?" Jake said switching channels.
"I read you, sir"
"Have you found anything?"
"We found maps, logs data. Heck we even found a database covering politics, economics and very recent history of this Republic, although its very basic"
"Okay, we've found alien survivors and extraction is in two minutes. Get your ass to our primary entrance point on the double"
"Copy sir, over and out"
"You already"
"Yes, sir!"
Jake reached control panel shutting the airlock and ceiling it then for the comm.
"We're already on our side"
"So are we. Venting air now"
"Vent air" Jake yelled entering the command to his air tank to vent seventy-six percent of his air leaving him with thirteen percent left. Enough for twenty minutes. A hissing sound could be heard from the air entering the room. Once the room was full of air the door to the pod opened and four Twi'leks a strange brown alien that looked reptilian with a spike coming out from his head and two more aliens that were red and white with blue and white stripped horns all wearing robes again appeared. A Marine each went to one of them and handed them a breathing mask except for Jake who handed out a second one to a red and white one.
"Follow me. Once we decompress, we won't have long to reach the transport" Jake instructed receiving nods from those around him. He taped the command to decompress. The air was sucked out and the airlock opened.
"Go!" he yelled, and they all took off the extraction zone. Dashing through the corridor and up the stairs back to where they entered. Jakes had bleeped notifying him that his air was down to ten percent. He instructed them to hold on as they boost jumped through the hole they made to the Waiting Warbird VTOL that looked similar to twenty-first-century v-twenty-two osprey except with thruster engines. Once inside, reunited with his squad and the compartment pressurized again he breathed a sigh of relief. He had just made the first contact with an alien race, with one of its senators no less and saved them. A pretty good day in the office if he did say so. He, however, didn't expect the Twi'lek Alema to hug him crying in relief.
"Thank you," she said into his shoulder crying. All he could do was put an arm around her to comfort her.
15th July 2621 Earth Standard Calendar, President Keith Richards of the UEG, on board the Earth Senate Station orbiting Earth addressing the First contact Issue.
Pacing down the corridor to the presidential seat where he was going to have to address the rumours of meeting aliens that had started three weeks earlier a week after he had been informed about the Normandy's findings. He had spent the past month discussing with his advisers and heads of state and the military, what to do with the information they received from the alien survivors and what was recovered from the Consular Cruiser, the ship that had been found. The decision was made to address the public and the Senate and cast a poll that everyone could take part in, whether to or not to reveal their existence. Depending on the outcome the Senate would vote on if they should join the Republic or stay independent. His address was to be broadcast on every platform so as many people as possible could hear.
"All stand for the United Earth Government president"
Keith moved to the podium just in front of his and the security councils seat.
"My fellow People" He started "For three weeks now, rumours of us making contact with alien life have been circulating. I would like to address these rumours head on. Have we made contact with alien life? "He" paused "Yes, we have."
This raised many murmurs from the senators from each planet and member country.
"We met three types of aliens called Twi'leks, Togrutas and a Zabrac. They come from a galactic body known as the Galactic Republic, and a democratic republic that has stood for a thousand years made up of hundreds of different races. We now face the greatest decision of our generation and arguably of our race, do we reveal ourselves to them or do we hide away. To them, we live deep into uncharted space so it is unlikely we will be discovered soon. The ones we made contact with arrived on a ship badly damaged from a pirate attack, they found us by accident. In one weeks' time, there will be a poll on this issue. Anyone of any standing will be allowed to vote. Once that has been done, should we decide to reveal ourselves the Senate will vote on whether or not we join the Republic if they offer us the option? The military will disclose all the information that we have learnt from the ship the aliens came from and the aliens themselves to allow for a relatively informed decision. Remember. This decision will affect our future for the rest of our existence." He finished before walking off backstage to a stunned and quite room.
"Do you think I did the right thing?" he asked his secretary.
"I don't know sir, I don't know"
22nd July Earth Standard Calendar, President Keith Richards of the UEG, on board the Earth Senate Station orbiting Earth addressing the First Contact Issue poll.
"The votes have been cast across one hundred and fifty-two planets. The decision had been made by one thousand and thirty-six vote difference. We are to reveal ourselves to the Republic. Now the Senate will be given Intelligence report made with the help of the aliens describing the Republic government and policies in much greater detail to decide if we should join the Republic should they offer us a place. The decision will not be made until all members have cast their vote"
Minutes passed as senators looked over the information presented to them, talked among themselves and casted votes. It took half an hour to decide but a unanimous decision was made.
"In a unanimous vote, we will not join the Republic should the opportunity arise. Ambassador Ryuko Mori of the Japanese Federation will go accompanied by the Second UEG Expeditionary Force led by Field Marshall Dommel and Commander Sparrow. They will leave next February"
23rd July 2621 Standard Earth Calendar, 2nd UEGEF Fleet recalled immediately from operations to return to Earth at best possible speed.
24th July 2621 Standard Earth Calendar, it is found in blood samples from the aliens that they contain what they call 'mediclorians', a cell that allows them to use the force. It is found white blood cells attack mediclorians.
27th July 2621 Standard Earth Calendar, 2nd UEGEF Fleet arrive at Earth.
28th July 2621 Standard Earth Calendar, 2nd UEGEF briefed on First Contact Voyage.
1st September 2621 Standard Earth Calendar, 2nd UEGEF personnel given leave until 2nd January 2122 to spend time with family before leavening on possibly last voyage despite Republic's Reputation.
26th September 2621 Standard Earth Calendar, UEG authorises the construction of two new Fleets the 6th and 7th fleets encase the Republic is proved hostile.
3rd October 2621 Standard Earth Calendar, Ambassador Mori requests that Personnel and unit history be given over to her so she can trust the people she be staying with on the journey, UEG complies.
11th November 2621 Standard Earth Calendar, Ambassador Mori meets with Field Marshall Dommel and Commander Sparrow to get to know each other better as they will have to work together on a voyage. Ambassador Mori openly discriminates against Commander Sparrow for being a clone saying he is 'beneath her', Tensions build between the two.
8th December 2621 Standard Earth Calendar, Field Marshall Dommel Request that UEGEF Fleets are upgraded from five ships to ten. Construction begins a week later but they won't be ready for 8 months.
3rd January 2622 Standard Earth Calendar, All personnel of the 2nd UEGEF return, all ships fully supplied.
19th February 2622 Standard Earth Calendar, 2nd UEGEF makes warp jump to the Republic with heavy media coverage. The seven survivors of the Republic ship also come along as well as the crew and passengers that didn't survive so they can be returned to the Republic.
21st February 2622 Earth Standard Calendar, Commander Luke Sparrow aboard UEG Terra part of the 2nd UEGEF.
Commander Luke Sparrow stood aboard the bridge of the UEG Terra, a liberator class star destroyer, part of the UEG 2nd expeditionary force. He watched the men go about their many different jobs in their grey BDUs with the beeping of consoles and other sound effect buttons and noises associated with the bridge. He looked outside at the blue, white and black vortex that the ship sailed through.
"Sir we're coming out of warp shortly" called out the chief navigator over the noise of the bridge.
"Put us and the rest of the fleet on combat alert, we don't know what we'll meet out here is hostile or not"
"Aye sir"
"Smith, alert the Field Marshall and the ambassador we are about to exit warp," ordered Luke
"No need Commander, I'm already here," announced Field Marshall Dommel.
Field Marshall Dommel was a brilliant strategist in his early forties. He had won many impossible victories against the Insurrectionists in the second interplanetary war. He had grey hair and was fairly tall and his men would follow him anywhere.
"Good, now I don't have to be responsible for the fleet anymore"
"Being in command isn't that bad"
"Sir coming out of warp."
A portal ahead seemingly appeared from nowhere ripping space apart revealing the blackness of space in front of them in contrast to the blues with white and black splotches that coloured warp space. The UEG Terra was the first ship to appear followed by 4 other star destroyers. In the distance, a mid-sized green planet with two moons could be seen.
"Sir, The Midsummer Night, Savannah, Sydney, and The Dawn report all systems green and combat ready if need be"
"Understood, order them into delta formation and have us move towards the planet"
"Yes sir"
The five ships moved into formation, three at the front and two behind and began to move towards the planet.
"Sir Scanners are picking up seven ships!" yelled one of the crew.
"Open up channels on all frequencies; let's find out who we're dealing with"
The Communications Officer Michael Philips taped a few keys on his command console.
"Okay sir whenever your rea-"
"This is the Resolute, we are under attack by separatist ships we need immediate help, anyone please respond"
"Have all ships move to combat speed and launch Lightning fighters and zeros to help!" ordered Dommel
"Sir how will identify which ship is the one we are helping and the ones we are destroying"
"Look for the ship that is taking fire and attack the ships that are attacking it"
As the Lightning Fighters and Zero Fighter/ground attack craft raced forward to engage enemy fighters and ships while the star destroyers moved in to engage the enemy ships, they saw a wedge-shaped ship shooting blue lasers at the attacking six ships that shot red lasers. The fist the droids new they were under attack was when their Fighters were destroyed suddenly by four hundred unknown spacecraft and the firepower of five liberator class ships opening fire. The long range shock cannons stuck first, their blue lasers spinning and combing into a single blue beam that tore through the frigates destroying one, superheated Plasma from the Plasma Cannons slammed into the second CIS frigate melting its starboard side crippling it while a third had its reactor breached and went critical, exploding in a mini supernova as the two of the remaining three CIS ships turned to engage this new threat unleashing there main guns upon five mysterious ships that had suddenly appeared while the fourth continued its attack on the republic ship. Luke watched as the zeros unleashed their payloads of rockets and torpedoes upon the ship destroying its shields and life support systems. Lightning fighters engaged droid ships in intense dogfights, although slightly slower they could take more hits, unlike their enemy.
"Field Marshall enemy ships are engaging us"
"Are they in range of the Turbo Cannons yet?" inquired Luke
"Righhhht about... Now, Turbo cannons opening fire"
Luke watched the Turbo cannons join their fire with the longer-range Plasma Cannons. He noted how the UEG ships fire was slower but seemed to be more accurate and more damaging while the enemy ships fired faster but less accurately as a result, but those that hit the ships shield did some damage but not too great, but the sheer weight of fire was depleting the shields at a rapid rate. The CIS frigates not able to withstand the superior firepower one by one were destroyed in a mixture of fiery explosions and melted hulls. The first one took a direct hit to the bridge sending a ripple of explosions down the spine of the ship, the second took fire to its engines immobilizing the ship and was torn apart being unable move and the first ship seeing its weapons had no major effect on the mysterious ships rammed the Savannah at full speed causing Luke to look on in concern at the attack that left the Savannah with a depleted shield and destroyed some of the left-hand sides of the ship. The lightning fighters moped up the remaining droid fighters while the zeros pursed the now heavily damaged remaining frigate. He watched the Zeros weave in and out of the enemy ships fire harassing it until cannon shot destroyed the bridge, sending the ship into a dive towards the moon. He watched the ship go up in a massive ball of flame as it hit the moon
"Sir all enemy ships destroyed, we lost twelve fighters and a zero fighter, the savannah is venting atmosphere and will need to be repaired at the next opportunity," read out Philips
"Send a message to that ship we saved, request to come aboard I want to know what we walked into. Luke you and your squad are to go, and take the ambassador with you"
"Do I have to take the ambassador with me?" whined Luke.
"I know you don't like her but still, she is going like it or not, you might need her diplomatic skills," Dommel said in a stern tone that made no effort to hide his annoyance at the relationship the two had acquired over the week-long journey.
"Understood sir," Luke said dejectedly.
In the starboard hanger ten minutes later.
Luke and his squad were donning armour and checking their weapons. Luke used a modified M416 with an HD-33 scope with times two magnifier, green laser sight and ergo grip with a heavy barrel, he used an M1911 pistol as his sidearm which had a flashlight attachment, both were modified to fire plasma. He wore standard marine armour, which was brown. To his right was lieutenant Jake Crawford who used a standard issue marksman rifle, the MR-T5, that looked similar to the MK11 Mod with times twelve scope and bipod, he wore a stripped-down version of the marine armour, he had blue eyes and blonde hair and was quite tall. Next was Simon Riley the heavy weapons man he used a Light Machine Gun similar to an M249, the LMG-5, and his marine armour had extra protection and areas to keep his rocket launcher and extra ammunition for the squad, he was a really tall man with brown eyes and hair. Lastly the new member of the squad Amy Winters she was small with black hair and green eyes. She used a standard issue assault rifle, the AC160, and had Spas-35 shotgun that used armour piercing slugs. All of them except Luke used the XOS-3 exoskeleton; Luke used the experimental XOS-9 exoskeleton.
"So, we have to bring the ambassador with us and are we bringing the guests with us?" asked Amy.
"Yes, we do, and no we are not as we don't know who we are dealing with" replied Luke.
"Isn't that a bit risky, what if we are attacked at some point, she could be killed," piped up Riley.
"Let's not get our hopes up before the mission. And as much as it pains me to say she is an amazing negotiator."
"You two still can't get along, I know she knows about your past and looks down on you because of it but you've thought she would have gotten over it by now," said Jake, as they were talking Ryuko Mori walked in through the entrance into the hanger.
"Is the Transport ready for departure?"
"Yes, we were just waiting for you to show up"
"Good, let us get going clone" disdain evident in her voice.
With that, she turned on her heel and walked up the ramp and into the Warbird VTOL.
"She is such a bitch isn't she" commented Jake.
"On our way princess" mocked Luke receiving an annoyed growl in response. Grinning he entered the VTOL with his squad.
"Welcome to air Marine Corps, this is your captain speaking. The temperature outside the ship is below freezing, in the event of an emergency there is nothing you can do about it as we will be dead, once again I would like to thank you for flying air marine corps even though you don't have a choice. Our ETA is approximately 5 minutes," announced the pilot over the intercom.
Anakin Skywalker aboard the Resolute in the main hanger with Senator Amidala and clone captain rex
Anakin was nervous, firstly six separatist ships nearly destroyed his Venerator, then five unidentified ships suddenly appeared from nowhere and destroyed those six ships and now they wished to come aboard as this was their apparent first time meeting another species. Padme was excited by this prospect of meeting a new people and welcoming them to the galactic community, the two had briefly argued about how many clones should be there when they arrived and had compromised with having Rex and nine other clones.
"General, the admiral says they'll be landing in a minute"
"I still don't think this was a good idea"
"I won't disagree with you but were not in any position to make demands with the state of our ship"
"I know, that's what worries me"
"You really should stop worrying Ani they seemed pretty sincere on the message they sent us, besides if they wanted to kill us, they would have, you saw what their ships did to the separatists."
Anakin sighed knowing she was right, but it did little to stop his concerns. Just then the main hanger doors opened causing everyone present to turn and see the transport come in. What they saw was a craft that was bigger than one of their LAAT gunships, it had a large main section with two wings coming off the top middle of the craft with two engines of the tip of each wing which had a sliding door on each side with a ramp on the back, the whole thing was coloured grey. It flew in through the doors and manoeuvre to the allocated section of the main hanger its engines then turned in opposite directions spinning the craft ninety degrees to the right allowing it to reverse in and land with a thump on the deck. Then with the wir of the hydraulic system, the rear ramp opened revealing four soldiers and what Anakin assumed to be a negotiator. But what shocked him most was the fact they weren't a different species but that they were... human. The woman had black hair and eyes and was shorter than all the others except the female marine she, wore a black and white suit. Looking at the marines with strange brown armour with a strange metal exoskeleton, he saw two of them in their thirties and the other male looked to be in his early twenties and the female marine looked nineteen.
"I am Ambassador Ryuko Mori of the United Earth Government and Commander Luke Sparrow of the United Earth Government Marine Corps and you are?"
So, this is my first fanfic so all constructive criticism is welcome. I do not own Star Wars The Clone Wars, it belongs to Lucasarts and Disney.