Terrans thought they had it all. They had finally begun to spread out into the galaxy. Development of working antigravity and jump drives finally fixed one of the biggest issues faced by Earth: overpopulation. But it wasn't without it's problems. The rapid Terran expansion was far from invisible. It all began when a Terran colony vessel attempted to descend onto the theoretical colony aptly named Foundry. Seemingly uncolonized, due to the high surface temperature and highly active surface, it was selected as a ship breaking and construction facility. But what wasn't considered is subterranean life. The inadvertent takeover of Foundry by the Terrans was considered an act of war by the Aegis. The resulting war was devastating to the Terrans. The measly anti-pirate ships never stood a chance. Colony after colony fell, leaving mankind with only two worlds: Earth and Oase. Oase was hidden, protected by the nebula of its patron star, and Earth was under the protection of the last warships in the fleet.
23 August, 3529 Sol, Battle for Earth
Gunfire erupted around Earth. The last fleet maintained orbit, unloading shell after shell, missile after missile, at the never-ending onslaught of the invading Aegis fleet.
"Mayday, mayday. This is Hel 072, we have sustained-"
Despite Humanity's home field advantage, Earth was still allowing fight, as it always was. Ship after ship fell, lighting up the skies on the surface as countless ships fell. Still, humanity's determination kept them in the losing fight for its birthplace.
A small fleet, lead by a small generation 2 Hyperion Command Vessel, made its way around mars in an attempt to flank the fleet and let its Hels tear apart the enemy fleet from behind with their flash nukes.
"Contact, 30k clicks out. I can't determine the vessel, but they're not displaying a gamma code. Their heading is way off, too," said the radio operator, "They appear to be going to Sol."
"Fuck it, if it's an Aegis ship, charge the Novas. We can't afford to use the nukes on it." replied the commander.
Hyperion 143 changed course to intercept the unidentified vessel, while the 4 Hels continued to flank the main alien fleet. A hum was heard by the crew of the Hyperion while the Novas went online. To anyone watching, it was an intimidating sight. The twin barrels on the bow-end of the ship started to glow blue as the fusion projectile was generated and magnetically confined in the barrels. When the Hyperion closed the gap to near optimal firing range minutes later, the proverbial stars were ejected into space. They raced toward their target, only to completely dissipate before they hit the hull, causing the crew of the ship to stare in shock. The ship that was fired on quickly retaliated, launching fighters by a number never seen. The Hyperion quickly activated the point defense, but the attempts were futile. The Aegis fighters were rapidly making up the space between the two, using the debris as cover for their approach.
"It was an honor serving with you all," said the commander, "Full throttle, aim for that ship."
The Hyperion never was able to reach the ship before it erupted in a blue fireball as the reactors went critical from damage. The fighters quickly swarmed back to their main ship, which was starting to light up as vent ports opened all along its length. A light purple beam was focused on Sol itself.
"What the hell? The Aegis are charging their jump drives!?" The Terran fleet admiral rushed to the display in shock.
The entire Aegis fleet jumped away, leaving nothing but the burning carcasses of fallen ships and the dumbstruck Terran fleet. Sol started to grow brighter and collapsed in on itself. A black hole was formed, tearing the near most planets apart almost instantly and started to pull a large majority of the TDF fleet and Earth itself in. The fleet tried in vain to spin up their jump drives, but the constant fighting for days on end left the reactors overburdened. Numerous ships lit up blue as their reactors went critical, while others were simply unable to even move.
Billions of lives were lost as the planet was ripped apart by tidal forces, along with another million others who lost their lives on the ships.
21 April, 3680
Archangel test facility
"This is test fire number 83 of the Archangel thermal cannon," said a primary designer into a camera, "Let's hope this works...Firing in 3… 2… 1…-"
Coolant vents owned up down the length of the Judgement and started venting the used fusion fuel and coolant as the barrel in the bow of the massive ship started to glow an eerie red. The glowing built until it was nearly blinding, until a massive beam burst forth. Incidentally, the beam collided with another planet in the system, causing the surface to melt where the beam hit.
The designer sat in shock. "Test 83 was… Successful… Oh my god."
04 December, 3689 In orbit around Oase, Judgement Shipyard
A goliath of a ship lay in orbit around the last planet of Humanity, Oase. The one and only Judgement-class Deathstar had officially come off the line. The first 5th generation warship, with state of the art defense and weapons laid nearly indestructible to nearly all weaponry. The ship could be seen from the ground, as the remainder of humanity gazed at the behemoth with a sense of joy. Revenge would soon be theirs.
The ship had quickly earned the nickname "Hand of God" in its test phases, in which it was able to singlehandedly annihilate the large uninhabitable planet orbiting Oase's patron star in mere minutes.
"We are gathered here today, not in sadness, but in joy. Humanity will finally be able to spread into the galaxy, for Judgement shall be dealt swiftly," exclaimed the President of Oase to thunderous applause. "The maiden voyage of the ship you all helped build will soon be underway."
At that very moment, people who were gazing at the massive ship above saw the massive engines start to light up. A collective gasp of awe was heard as the massive ship started to pull from orbit.
15 April, 3722 Judgement
Nearly two centuries had passed since the destruction of Earth. The promise set forth by the President of Oase in 3689 was nearly filled. Judgement was indeed swift. It swept through the enemy colonies, leaving nothing but an asteroid belt where the colonies used to be, even in the heavily fortified locations. Judgement was getting old, however. She was starting to have her hull was beginning to weaken from decades of bombardment. As humanity was closing on the last planet they had to find before the promise was completely met, her crew noticed something odd with her jump drive. It was starting to go unstable. Her engineers were easily able to fix the issue, but it would be much easier to knock it completely out of alignment. Judgement had only one task ahead of her. One final battle before the 200 km behemoth was retired. Without a shadow of a doubt, the Jacks* jumped her to the last battleground.
17 April, 3722
Aegis Homeworld
'Field shutdown in T-10.'
'Weapons online.'
'Hull integrity at 56%.'
The 160 kilometer long behemoth, The Judgement, appeared blue to any outsider as the ship dropped into relativistic space. As soon as it appeared, a wall of flames erupted around the ship as flak shells flew from their turrets to defend the ship from swarms. Almost immediately afterward, numerous Aegis carriers deployed hundreds of thousands of fighters to overwhelm the Judgement's defenses. Beams from both sides crisscrossed the system, both sides attempting to destroy the other at range. It wasn't until the Judgement got within range of the fighters that the real battle started. Chunks of armor already missing from the Judgement showed that the Aegis scored multiple hits on the Judgement's 100 meter thick armor.
'Hull integrity 47% and decreasing, their missiles soon will be able to penetrate the outer layers'
'Increase flak density by a factor of 5. Do not let a missile through,' responded the lead combat Jack, 'Align all shields forward. Brace for incoming ordinance.'
As soon as the flak cannons increased their output, the first Aegis missiles were launched. The flak field easily tore them apart before they could detonate on the hull. In response, the combat Jacks launched their first massive volley of Flash nukes. While some were destroyed, the hundreds that got through showed why they were still in use. Multiple flashes of light along the volley showed the missiles reached their target. Thousands of Aegis ships with inadequately hardened electronics were set adrift, if not because of the lethal radiation dose released killing off the crew.
'Begin charging the Archangel cannon,' commanded the ship's captain, FADM Isaac Hawkes.
'Ready to fire in 20 seconds,' responded CPO Erin Zephyr, lead combat Jack.
Vent ports opened up down the length of the ship for one last time as the inside of the barrel began to glow read from the heat. Gasses escaped from the ports, both coolant and spent fuel as the reactors recycled to begin the charging.
Those twenty seconds seemed like an eternity to the crew on board. Numerous missiles got past the shields and detonated on The Judgement's armor, forming craters or blowing holes clean through the hull, killing thousands in the area between the bulkheads as the massive holes vented the atmosphere they used to keep in, and causing massive stress on the internal structure as gravity and antimatter warheads threatened to rip the ship apart. But those twenty seconds soon paid off as a massive red beam, dozens of meters thick, impacted on the planet, slowly turning the surface into a melted pool that used to be the Aegis homeworld.
The remaining Aegis fleet began a suicide run at the Judgement, hoping to board the vessel in one final act of war against the Terrans. The thousands of vessels still in the system faced forward, few dodging the anti-air and successfully breaching, but the vast majority went so lucky. In the pressurized rooms in the Judgement, security teams lined up at the bulkheads, prepared for the moment when the Aegis rushed them, railguns at the ready.
Sparks hissed from the bulkheads that the Aegis we breaching. Kat's team crouched, waiting at their door. As soon as the Aegis breached, gunfire erupted throughout the massive corridors of the Judgement. The thick but light armor of the Terrans process to be effective at its job as the miniaturized graviton beams cut holes into the outer layers. Both sides were at a stalemate. Neither would push forward it give up ground.
"Cover me," Kat yelled over the radio as she raced forward. She was gonna take the fight to them. Lighting her plasma blade, she jumped right into the midst of the Aegis breach team and seemingly danced around the team, red blade arcing through the air hypnotically. As soon as she had raced in, it was over. The Aegis team lay scattered behind their cover with numerous plasma burns all over their armor and bodies.
"This is team 2," Kat said into her radio, "Our corridor is secure."
'Prepare to jump us back home,' said FADM Hawkes.
Unnoticed by the still living crew, field generators 2-4 had gone unaligned farther than the safe limit to jump. The ship generated the jump containment field and entered nonrelativistic space, only to notice massive shudders throughout the ship. Giving no warning, the back three quarters of the ship twisted wildly, ripping apart the ship leaving only the front quarter of the ship still in the stream while the last three laid throughout a dozen systems and the space in between. The sudden loss of response from the back three generators resulted in it overcompensating for the loss, sending what was left of Judgement through interuniversal space until the backup reactor burned the last of it's fuel, dropping what was left into a collision course with a truly unknown planet with its moon completely shattered.
DATE UNKNOWN
LOCATION UNKNOWN-UNCHARTED SPACE
The remnant of Humanity's greatest ship was barely alive. Less than sixty crewmen were on board after the ship tore apart. Only the forward most three Jacks, part of the security detail, and a lucky few engineers were still alive. All of the hundreds of thousands of crew were lost from the Aegis bombardment or the ship falling apart.
"Status!?" yelled FADM Hawkes.
"Sir, we have barely any power left in the backup. Engines have barely enough to land what's left. We don't have enough crew to do anything except land," explained Lt Jacob Conway, bow navigator.
"Shit… Try to land us on that planet. Avoid the developed areas. Try to land us on the coast by the mountain range. That'll be a good point to deploy the distress probes."
"Yes sir."
What was left of the once great ship started to descend into the atmosphere drawing global attention as it slowed to make a soft landing on the opposite side of the mountains near Vale.
Moments before breaking atmosphere
Atlas Academy, Atlas
Warning lights and sirens filled the hallways of the Atlesian military base. Soldiers rushed around to get to their stations while General Ironwood sprinted to the radar station.
"Somebody tell me what the hell is going on, now." demanded General Ironwood as soon as he burst through.
"We've picked up a massive asteroid approaching the city of Vale," answered a technician.
"How big is it?" Ironwood asked again.
"At least ten times the size of our airships."
General Ironwood turned to the radar in disbelief. Something of an unheard of size was en route to Vale. "Where is it approaching from?"
"It's approaching from the south-east of Vale moving around- What the hell? It's… Slowing down?"
"I need a team out there, NOW"
A.N.
Special thanks to the user Astronomiae for helping me edit the prologue for Blazing Glory. You should check out his story, Of Metal and Magic.
And now some explanations.
-Graviton weapons use the power of gravity itself to inflict killing damage upon everything in its way by drastically increasing the number of gravitons around where it impacts, forming a black hole if enough energy is applied for long enough.
-Flash nukes are high-powered nuclear weapons with a shaped charge that emits a powerful beam of gamma rays, overwhelming the IFF on most ships, giving it the nickname.
-Humanity (terran)-
Homeworld: Oase (Terra destroyed)
Statistics: 95% are modified either biologically or genetically
~70% of human population hybrids
~17% of hybrid population "full" hybrids, rest solely having selected traits (similar to Faunus)
~25% of human population mechanically modified, enhancing strength, speed, and perception.
-Aegis- Bipedal, favor geologically active areas.
Pioneered the use of gravity as a weapon through use of a "graviton" weapon on the assault on the Terran Homeworld.
Primarily subterranean, resulting in white skin, however are on the surface enough to develop eyes
-I figured that it would be beneficial to explain the two species of my "design" along with the weapons to everyone. I hope you all enjoyed the prologue chapter.. Also, this is an A.U. from the initiation, in which the Judgement touches down.
*Jacks- the primary control system of Generation 4 warships onwards, they are humans who have meshed themselves with the ship and control it directly via their mind. Appearance wise, they look very similar to Hybrids in BSG, except more sane.
-Saber out