Sorry for the delay. I would have uploaded this earlier, but I'm trying to make do with internet speeds that are worse than dial-up at the moment. Anyway, here's a long chapter to make up for the delay.


The Vaygr did not name their ships by class like the other lesser races of the galaxy, after all why waste time giving a name to a machine, something that cared not what it was called, existing only to do what it was designed for? Instead, they assigned simple model numbers to their ships. The lone corvette patrolling the edge of the vast dust cloud formations that marked the end of Vaygr space and the beginning of their sworn enemies, was thus a Model-18 Long-ranged patrol corvette. Stretching ninety metres from it's blunt armoured nose to the very tip of it's hardened engine casing, the Model-18 was large enough to be mistaken for a small frigate. Two long sensor booms stretched out from either side of the corvette's slim profile, trailing towards the vessels rear like the black whispy antenna of an oversized insect. Each Boom, packed full of sensitive detection equipment, meant the corvette had no problem detecting the energy burst emanating from close to the centre of the dust field.

For a brief moment, the corvette's tired, bored crew feared they were under attack. Image's of a blinding beam of light suddenly lancing out and vaporising the tiny vessel as the Hiigarans springed their surprise revenge assualt on the Vaygr Reaches for the atrocities of the Vaygr War appeared in more than a few worried minds as the corvette's sensors bleeped, flagging the unusal readings for the crew's attention. When no attack came, the crew turned to pondering the source of the energy burst. Somekind of spacial anomally? A hyperdrive malfunction? A weapons test? The sensor readings were unhelpful, mainly a collection of unintelligible values and impossible numbers giving no clue to the cause. The readings did however contain the rough coordinates of where the anomally had taken place.

There was no decision to be made. Something was going on out there. Something possibly dangerous. It was either something that threatened the security of Loyalist Space or perhaps it was a device or weapon that would help the Loyalist's in their struggle against the infidels in their own midsts. Whether the anomally was created by the bastard Hiigarans, the Progenitor or another unknown party with a hidden agenda remainded to be seen, but whatever and whoever the cause, it was the Corvette crew's responsibility to report the strange event. A message was sent to the nearest Loyalist Crusade via the corvette's newly fitted high powered communications relay, a message relaying the event in great detail as well as containing a duplicate of the corvette's sensor readings and current coordinates -so that the response group could jump-in directly ontop of the anomally.

It's duty complete, the corvette's powerful engines surged as it accelerated, speeding off to complete the remainder of it's half-finished patrol. Whilst it wouldn't take long for any Loyalist reinforcements to arrive, it was neither the duty nor in the intrest of the corvette crew to await their arrival. Instead, the Vaygr crewmen set off content in the knowledge that the source of the anomally would be quickly discovered and, if needed, swiftly and severly dealt with, as per the Vaygr way.


Captain Tillus Velaan was not having a good day.

To be fair, he hadn't had a 'good' day since he'd left the bustling markets and crowded bars of Port Yarmshir several days ago. The last two days in particular had been tediously boring. The Naabali woman, Alesha, in all her infinite strategic wisdom, had pulled both his and Raan's cruiser's from patrol duty and had them re-tasked to guard duty over the two alien constructs. She had replaced them with half a dozen frigates, citing that the smaller craft were far less conspicuous than cruisers. Tillus had sent her several messages, explaining how she was squandering her resources, that the two cruisers would be more useful on patrol. She'd answered him once, telling him he was wrong and then after that, she'd completely ignored him.

Thus, he'd wasted the last two days either asleep or drinking in his cabin, or sat on the bridge, staring moodily at the tactical display, watching the holographic progress of the Naabali science teams as they poked and prodded at the alien derelicts, muttering to himself that they were lucky that they had something to do. More than once he'd offered a silent prayer to Sajuuk, asking for a little excitement, just a little, lest he die of total boredom.

By the looks of things now, his prayers had not gone unanswered...

"Gone?" Tillus snapped at his second in command, wondering if the man had actually went insane. "What do you mean, gone?"

Tillus had been present on the bridge when the silver-hulled alien derelict had suddenly, inexplicably, started glowing the same dark blue colour as it's core. He'd watched the glow grow, warp around the constructs hull before speeding off along it's impressive length, whilst, simultaneously, a large object had been fired off into deep space at speeds so great even the ship computers couldn't track it. He'd never, even for a second, considered the object in question was one of Kiith Naabal's assualt frigates...

"Sir, I don't know what else to tell you." Lieutenaunt Kim Haal replied, struggling to explain the phenomenon. "That... thing, just grabbed one of the frigates and threw it off towards the outer rim, towards the edge of the galaxy even, at speeds that, basically, should be nigh impossible."

"How fast?" Tillus muttered, barely thinking about what he was saying in reply. Instead, his mind was fixed on the Naabali frigate or more precisely the safety of it's crew. At the speed it was alleged to be travelling at, even had the crew survived the vicious acceleration, any contact with even the tiniest piece of rock or debris, would shred the frigates armoured hull to pieces.

On the other hand, a tiny part of his mind wanted to see Alesha's reaction to the sudden change of events. At least her theory about it being a jumpgate was true...

"Fast enough that it left sensor range almost instantly." Lieutenaunt Haal continued. "We're talking FTL speeds, sir."

"Maker be damned." Tillus shook his head, ignoring the quiet muttering and shaking of heads amongst the command crew. The chances of the frigate and it's crew having survived those kind of speeds were practically nil. The acceleration alone would have undoubtably killed them, reducing them to mushy red paste smeared across the frigate's walls. He quickly dispelled that unpleasant thought.

"I cross-refrenced our sensor readings with readings from the sensor suites aboard the Morning Star and the Farseer at the moment the Alien jumpgate activated." Haal continued, handing his Captain a datapad containing a copy of the readings. "Look at the readings a few seconds before activation."

Tillus raised an eyebrow. According to the sensor readings, the frigate had sent a communications message, whether intentionally or accidently, to the jumpgate. The jumpgate, surprisingly, had sent a message back. The frigate replied and then the gate had activated moments later.

"The frigate activated it?" Tillus asked, checking and re-checking the datapad's readings, hoping that his XO had made a mistake whilst examining the data.

"I'm not one hundred percent certain. But at this current moment, that's what it looks like." The Lieutenaunt replied with a shrug. By now, the usually quiet, subdued bridge was awash with nervous, hushed chatter as the command crew discussed the fate of the Naabali frigate.

"Forward the readings to Alesha Naabal aboard the Paalan." Tillus snapped after spending a few seconds rechecking the data. "After all, it's a Naabali frigate. She'll need every piece of information she can get her hands on if she wants to at least find out where it was sent."

Where it was sent... Tillus supressed a snort at that choice of words as he spared a glance at the bridges tactical display. The display had been zoomed out until it showed a crystal clear image of the known galaxy. A thin, flashing green line had been placed on the map, beginning at their current location uncomfortably close to the edge of Vaygr space, spearing straight through the heart of the Vaygr Reaches, before passing beyond the rim of the galaxy, off into the darkness beyond- a computer generated guess at the lost frigates possible trajectory. Assuming the impossible feat that the frigate hadn't been torn to shreds by space debris, locating and recovering said frigate would be beyond impossible.

"Of course, Captain." The Lieutenaunt replied, turning to and heading towards the communications officers station. "I'll inform the Paalan immediately."

Tillus gave a nod of approval to the junior officer, watching him as he made his way over to the communication officers station, before turning his attention back to the tactical display that dominated the centre of the bridge. For a fleeting moment, he was content to simply stare at the holo map of the galaxy. His race was surrounded on all sides by enemies -nations that sought to destroy them out of sheer hate for how much they'd lost to the upstart Hiigarans, or for revenge, a crusade to avenge the loss of a leader who could have united them. He, like many Hiigaran's, wished only for peace, no matter how fragile. An end to the constant hardship their race had faced since leaving Kharak. Sajuuk, however, had not seen fit to grant their wish just yet.

A few keystrokes later and he'd reconfigured the display to show the dust field his cruiser currently resided within. A dozen different shaped green identification icons clustered round the hulking form's of the two distinctly alien derelicts. Zooming out ever so slightly revealed four more green hollow diamond's travelling evenly spaced around the research sites perimeter -the four Naabali assualt frigates tasked with ensuring no one blundered across the site by mistake.

"Captain." Kim called from his position beside the communications officer. "Miss Naabal offer's her thanks. She says that the data will be very useful in finding out what exactly happened to her frigate."

"However." He continued, pausing for a moment to re-read a part of the electronic reply. She hadn't even bothered to open a comm channel to them and reply in person. "There appears to be a situation aboard the alien warship. One of her research teams are not responding."

Tillus was about to respond -make some sarcastic remark about the womans abilities- when the tactical display chose that moment to suddenly light up. Beeping in warning, the display was filled with dozens, possibly hundreds of unknown contacts as confused sensor suites picked up and then lost what they believed to be multiple vessels, a sure sign of electro-magnetic interference. This sudden activity was accompanied by the loss of one known contact, something Tillus almost missed in the chaos; one of the patrolling frigates had disappeared.

"By Sajuuk." Tillus quipped aloud. "What is it now?"

No one answered. Probably because no one knew. Dozens of nervous eye's were instantly locked to holographic screens, watching for the smallest hint of danger. Faces lined with worry, the bridge crew automatically began their assigned tasks, a wordless order to prepare the warship, a precaution in case they needed to defend theirselves from the harsh, unpredictable nature of the galaxy.

They weren't the only one's that had noticed either. A kilometre ahead of them the Morning Star's fusion torch engines blossomed to life, bathing the Baal-Tiel's bridge in a soft blue glow as the cruiser quickly spun on it's axis, positioning itself to face the unresponsive frigates last known position. Three assualt frigates vectored away from their guard positions over the alien jumpgate, moving to the flanks of the larger, slower cruisers, ready to provide support if needed.

"Communications from the Morning Star, Captain." The comm. officer called out, craning his head around the side of his console.

"Patch it through then." Tillus snapped. He'd have thought, after all the time he and Raan had been fighting together, the comm. officer would have learned to just patch through the Morning Star without asking.

"Tillus, are you seeing this?" Raan's deep, hard voice vibrated through the bridge speakers, making the question seem more like a demand than a request.

"Yeah." Tillus replied, eye's remaining fixed on the tactical display as the sensors continued chasing ghosts. "We can't get a lock on whats out there though."

"We can't either." His fellow naval Captain replied. "Whatever form it takes, it is certainly hostile. It had already destroyed one of our frigates. They are cowards, hiding in the dust, unwilling to face our guns."

"Nice description." Tillus murmured. However, Raan's rant did raise a valid point. What kind of foe engaged the perimeter patrols and then hid from the main force? Either a foe that was unprepared to fight them... or one that was smart. A foe that knew exactly what they were doing. But what advantages could an enemy force possibly have in a dust cloud? And then he had it. As he stared at the tactical display, brow furrowed in thought, he'd noticed something. Inside the dust cloud, sensor range was limited to around one hundred kilometres, give or take a few. Anything beyond one hundred kilometres might as well have been invisible, the dust was that thick, the sensors were unable to penetrate deeper. Detection, targetting... nothing could see further than one hundred klicks.

If the enemy knew that... they would be able to proceed to point blank engagement range before revealing themselves, allowing them to take the Hiigaran's by surprise.

"Sensor's, can you clean this up?" Tillus suddenly ordered, gesturing towards the display. It was a slim hope at best, but trying was better than nothing. If they were about to fight, he would take any advantage he could get.

The reply however, was in the negative.

"No, sir." The sensor's operator replied, shaking his head. "It's the dust, sir. Nothing I can do will clean this up."

The curse the Hiigaran Captain was about to mutter died on his lips as he was thrown violently to the floor. The cruiser's hull groaned in distress as the vessel was struck once, twice, three times by what had to be weapons fire. Although the reverse engineered shields absorbed the destructive force of whatever weapon had struck them preventing any damage to the hull, the kinetic force was still enough to push the cruiser out of position... and drop Tillus on his backside.

"Where are they? Who are they? What class? How many?" Tillus shouted, a rapid fire stream of questions directed at the momentarily stunned command crew as he slowly picked himself up off the metal floor. The fall had done nothing for his dignity.

Ahead of them, the Morning star's shields flashed to life as it too was hit by weapons fire from the unseen attackers, her shields flickering golden at the points of impact. The Morning Stars four top mounted double-barrelled heavy guns swivelled slightly, elevated their chunky barrels and returned fire, each flash illuminating the Baal-Tiels bridge for a fraction of a second. Tillus grimaced as he climbed to his feet, pain shooting through his body from his injured buttocks. The attackers were above them, giving them a terrifying firepower advantage until the Hiigaran cruisers could maneuver to bring their four belly mounted guns to bear.

"Vaygr Loyalists!" One of the crew called out, though Tillus didn't look to see who. "Four cruisers, three destroyers, six assualt frigates. Multiple assualt craft squadrons, probably a carrier supporting them. Their vectoring down to engage us from above."

As though spurred into action by crewmans announcement, a holographic representation of the Loyalist force appeared on the tactical display, replacing the chaos of changing icons from before. Sure enough, a wedge formation of four cruisers led the attack, escorted by destroyers and frigates and supported by multiple fighter squadrons. Tillus' mind went into action. A standard Vaygr Model-30 cruiser mounted six kinetic weapons; four heavy guns in a fixed-forward mount in the cruisers nose and one lesser turretted weapon located on either side of it's tall, thin hull, just before the engineering section. A medium-yield fusion missile launcher mounted along the ships spine, lance lasers and point defence guns rounded out the vessels fearsome armament. Thanks to the fact the Model-30's four heaviest guns were fixed-forward however, as long as one remainded mobile, it was easy enough to stay out of it's narrow firing arc. The only problem was, there were four cruisers. The destroyers and assualt frigates were another problem alltogether.

"Helm! Get us moving before those cruisers tear us apart!" Tillus shrieked, limping slowly towards his command chair.

As if too prove his point, one of the Naabali assualt frigates faltered under the wrath of one of the enemy cruisers guns. With shields and armour designed to withstand weapons fire from other frigates, the four heavy kinetic slugs tore through the frigates shields and armour like tissue paper, each round punching clean through the smaller warship leaving trails of debris in their wake. The frigate floundered, dropping downwards out of position. Clouds of artificial atmosphere leaked through four jagged holes in it's hull like blood flowing from a wound. Then it exploded; a blinding white flash as it's damaged fusion reactor went critical, momentarily blinding the crew of the Baal-Tiel, vaporising the frigate and it's crew in the process.

"We need to break their formation." Tillus grimaced, lowering himself slowly into his command chair. The cruiser shuddered as the deck guns finally returned fire, the barrage of heavy slugs smashing against the lead enemy cruiser. "Target the nearest destroyer, and quickly!"

"Also, get the Paalan on the line!" Tillus continued, even as his ships guns tracked and fired at one of the escorting enemy destroyers. By now, the Baal-Tiel was facing the enemy formation. With an extra eight guns, the cruisers kinetic barrage was devastating to a vessel even as large as a destroyer. Shields falling to the sheer number of heavy slugs, the destroyers distinctive off-axis hull was buffetted by the massive barrage, jerking left and right from the kinetic force generated by each impact, armour shattering off with each hit. A massive fireball engulfed the destroyers oversized starboard prong as a particularly lucky shot struck the vessels fusion missile battery, the force of the ensuing explosion almost ripping the hull apart. Billowing atmosphere, smoke and debris, the destroyer turned and ran, breaking formation and abandoning it's comrades.

"Captain Velaan." Alesha announced over the communications system. Instead of the uncaring monotone she usually used, her voice was strained, the voice of someone who'd watched everything fall apart around them. "I assume you haven't contacted me for a friendly chat?"

Tillus winced as his ship vibrated, several missile's detonating against his cruisers protective shields.

"We're outnumbered here, there's no way we can hold them off." He replied, sparing a glance at the tactical display. One of the enemy assualt frigates vanished from the display, disabled by fire from two Naabali frigates. "We can stall the Vaygr advance, but not for long. You need to get your people out of there now."

A fireball erupted outside as one of his ships pulsar lasers hit one of the many roving Vaygr assualt craft, turning the dagger-like vessel into a funeral pyre for it's single occupant.

"Then it's as I thought..." There was no bitterness in Alesha's voice. Infact, she sounded... sad. For a moment she was silent, allowing him to clearly hear the background noise of the Paalan's frantic bridge. However, when she spoke again, her voice had regained it's business like, uncaring edge.

"However, we have another problem. I've lost contact with all but one of my science teams aboard the alien warship." She sighed. "Usually I'd insist we mount a rescue operation, but as you can tell, time is not on our side."

"So whats your plan then?" He replied. Alesha struck him as one of those people that always seemed to have a backup plan. Thankfully, the Vaygr had decided to keep their distance, engaging from around the eighty kilometre mark as well as ignoring the Paalan and the Farseer.

"I instructed my science teams to install several remote detonated high yield fusion bombs I... acquired from some nearby sources, to be used in the unlikely event someone found us." She replied coldly. "The bombs should hopefully vapourise the alien vessel, preventing the Vaygr from learning anything about it. I'll detonate them as soon as I'm done extracting the surviving science team, but I'll need a few minutes."

Tillus gritted his teeth. For some reason, it didn't surprise him that she'd gotten her hands on such powerful weapons. Fusion bomb's were capable of crippling or destroying the largest of capital ships, and were usually only used by dedicated mine-laying vessels.

"Fine, we'll stall them for five minutes. Thats your window." Tillus replied. "Once those five minutes are up, we're out of here, with or without your science team."

"Thank you, Captain." And with that, she killed the link.

Great. Now he had to hold of an enemy force that out numbered him and out gunned him. For five minutes. By Sajuuk, it would be an achievement just to survive. As if to highlight the point, another allied frigate died, engines flickering on and off, white-hot plasma spewing from a ragged hole in the engineering section.

"Target the destroyer on the left side of their formation." Tillus commanded, even as a couple more missiles detonated along his cruisers flanks. Over the din, he heard someone shout that the shields were barely holding at 30%. The Baal-Tiels guns rotated towards their victim and fired, each shot vibrating through the deck plates.

Their target however, was more astute than the last destroyer to fall to their guns. The destroyer rolled over at the last moment possible, causing the majority of the heavy slugs to miss completely, whilst returning fire with it's own guns and missiles. Thankfully, the Morning Star had targetted the same destroyer and every one of it's slugs hit. It's engines crippled, the destroyer turned and limped from the Vaygr formation, seeking safety in the depths of the dust cloud.

"Sir, enemy vessels are accelerating!" Kim called from his position near the observation windows. "We only have three allied frigates left! The Farseer's fighter squadrons have been reduced to half their number!"

The Vaygr, fed up holding position and trading fire with the Hiigaran defenders, split formation and charged, dividing their cruisers and remaing frigates into two groups in an attempt to divide the Hiigaran fire and crush them in a pincer move.

"Send a firing solution to the Morning Star, we need to thin out those cruisers!" Tillus bellowed at his XO as his ships guns roared once more. There was a distant flash of white light as the rounds punched through the reactor of enemy frigate. The guns rotated towards their new target; the Model-30 cruiser leading the enemy formation that had went 'left'. The other group having disappeared behind the cover offered by the alien jumpgate's bulk.

The enemy cruiser fired first, a barrage of fusion missiles leaping forth from the cruiser launch tubes as it swung around to bring it's main guns to bear. It was too slow.

The combined barrage from the two Hiigaran cruisers -thirty two heavy slugs in total- ripped the enemy cruiser apart. The cruiser was thrown from formation, shields long gone, great shards of armour and hull flying off it's body as it flipped over on it's y-axis, engines dead, mangled bodies, smoke from internal fires, debris and plasma billowing from more hull-breaches than one could count as secondary explosion's lit up it's black and white stripped hull as concussion missiles detonated in their pods, the concussive blasts engulfing the few lifepods attempting to escape the doomed vessel.

A beautiful kill.

"Hah! Look at the cowards burn." Raan snorted over the comm channel. "This is what they get for their cowardly surprise attack."

The other cruiser however, was not as happy as Raan at the lose of it's comrade. The Baal-Tiel's bridge shook violently, warning tones screaming as the cruisers weakened shields collapsed under retaliatory fire. With nothing to stop them, two heavy shells crashed into the Hiigaran cruisers light-blue armour, penetrating deep into the hull.

"Damage report!" Tillus cried, body and head recoiling from the two violent impacts.

"Hull breach in deck one through three!" Someone shouted towards his right. "Sealing them off now!"

"Turret number one is not responding." The weaponry officer called calmly, ignoring the stream of blood running from a gash in his forehead. He was lucky. The communications officer on the other hand was out-cold, his head having met the surface of his console.

Turret one was the forward deck gun. Tillus couldn't afford to lose even one turret in this fight.

"Sajuuk damn those sand-cursed sons of whores to hell." He growled, the colourful display of insults surprising his crew. The remaining cruiser and it's three frigate escorts had ceased their advance, though the cruiser was now trading fire with the Morning Star. One of it's escorting frigates, already badly damaged, lost it's duel with two of the remaining four Naabali assualt frigates. The small concussion missile launcher on it's back exploded, shrapnel tearing into the bridge. With no one to command it, the out of control frigate accelerated out of formation, disappearing into the dust. The return fire from the other two enemy frigates was more than enough to disable one of the damaged Hiigaran frigates, forcing the other one to retreat.

It was then, as the two sides battled fiercely around it, the alien jumpgate activated itself once more. However, this time, instead of hurling an unlucky nearby ship to it's doom, the constructs activation coincided with the arrival of a blur of blue light -a light which dissipated to reveal a ship; the missing assualt frigate.

Tillus' jaw dropped open, an action that was mirrored by many others across the bridge. How... how was this possible? That ships should have been long gone... there was no way it should have survived such extraordinary acceleration...

Yet there it was, floating just beside the alien jumpgate as if nothing out of the ordinary had even happened to it. However, the state of it's hull told a different story. A clear hull breach could be seen, a jagged hole right at the front of the small vessel that had punched all the way through, emerging on the otherside. A wound like that had to have been caused by a heavy mass driver. As well as this, numerous scorch marks criss-crossed it's hull. Before anyone could contact the frigate and ask just what in the name of Sajuuk had happened, the frigate contacted them on the open communications channel.

"Listen to me, there's not much time." The frigates exhausted sounding Commander announced. He sounded like he'd been through hell. "They'll be here any minute."

"By the maker, what happened?"

"I'll explain in more detail later." The frigate commander continued, not even pausing for breath. "We arrived in a dust field, as dense as this one but much smaller, beside an identical jumpgate, just like the one here. We decided to explore a bit as we tried to figure out how we'd activated the jumpgate in the first place. As we cleared the dust cloud we were attacked without warning by several ships. No communications. Nothing. They tried to disable us instead of destroying us though. We returned fire and disabled one of them with our pulsar lasers. Thankfully by then our communications officer had worked out how he'd activated the jumpgate. We ran for our lives."

Tillus didn't know what to say. Infact, no one knew what to say. It was a story so fantastic it wouldn't have been out of place in a particularly far-fetched science fiction vid. Yet, here was a frigate, hull smattered with battle damage, claiming to have just encountered an alien species. And not just aliens, hostile aliens too.

Then they arrived. Deccelerating from the same insane speeds as the Naabali frigate, encased in the same blow glow. Five of them, in perfect formation arriving just beside the jumpgate, four smaller vessels and one larger one. They were a mish-mash of designs; some sharp and deadly, almost predatory like, others more rounded and sleek, possessing an almost aerodynamic shape, though they were all connected by one feature -the dirty, bedraggled look they all bore, as though they'd not seen the inside of a shipyard in months.

For the second time in minutes, Tillus stared at the sight before him, mouth hanging open in shock. His mind screamed in confusion. Part of him was stunned by the alien arrival, another part wanted to disbelieve it. It wasn't possible, what was the chances? The tactical display had classed the alien craft by size, marking the smaller ones as frigates and the larger one as a destroyer. However, they just hung there, silently, as though observing the battle before them. As though making a decision.

Their in-action lasted until the second Vaygr cruiser group, having spent most of the battle so far hiding behind the jumpgate, showed themselves. The leading Vaygr cruiser (comically large and bulky compared with the smaller, sleeker alien craft) flanked on either side by an assualt frigate, found itself under the gaze of a dozen alien guns as it crested the top of the jumpgates curved hull.

As one, and without a moments hesitation, the alien ships fired.

The 'frigates' fired first, dropping (to Tillus' surprise) the cruisers shields easily but failing to penetrate the vessels heavy armour. Instead, the mass driver rounds smashed uselessly against the cruiser's several metre's thick armour leaving jagged craters in their wake. The 'Destroyers' weapon proved far more effective...

Tillus shielded his eye's from the blinding white light as the cruisers port-side fusion reactor exploded, followed then by the starboard, removing both the cruiser and it's frigate escorts (Who'd been too close to it in the first place) from the realm of the living. The second cruiser crested the jumpgate and immediately dived away from the alien formation, firing it's portside lance laser arrays at it's new enemies. The red-tinged laser beams punched through the nearest alien frigate's armour (one of the ugly, almost predatory shaped vessels with alot of jagged, sharp lines) doing a surprising amount of damage. The small vessel lurched as something important within exploded, floated sidewards for a moment trailing smoke, and then exploded again, though this time the explosion ripped the vessel in half, sending large chunks of debris flying in every direction. The Vaygr, seizing upon the aliens apparent weakness to their lance lasers, targetted the next alien frigate in-line, though they fired several fusion missiles from their launcher as well. Like the frigate before it, the alien craft floundered as lance beams slashed through it's hull, severing critical systems, leaving it hanging helplessly in space even as it's comrades fired at the cruiser in an attempt to defend it. A heart beat later, the detonation of several fusion missiles removed the disabled alien vessel from existence, leaving blackened shards of twisted hull in it's place.

"Captain Velaan, we're leaving. Now." Tillus almost jumped at Alesha's sudden announcement. "I'd advise you to do the same."

Four rectangular hyperspace portals popped into existence as the Paalan, the Farseer, the missing frigate and the other surviving assualt frigate activated their hyperspace jump-drives on Alesha's order. The Naabali vessels quickly slunk into their portals, though not before one of the alien frigates pinged two mass driver slugs off the Farseer's shields. At the exact moment the hyperspace portals collapsed, the fusion bombs within the alien warship exploded. For a few seconds, the vessels nightmarish black hull contained the blast, it's hull warping and twisting in only a few spots. However, even the unbelievably strong alloy the alien armour consisted of could not contain the wrath of three fusion warheads. All at once, the warship shattered, it's already heavily damaged hull flying to pieces as the nuclear fireballs finally burst free, spreading out until they resembled minature suns.

"Get us out of here." Tillus finally commanded, drawing his eye's away from the spectacle. At the last moment possible, the three surviving alien ships had run, tail between their legs, back through the alien jumpgate just as the fusion powered fireball had washed over it, eradicating the Vaygr warships that remained around it.

"Set course for Hiigara." Tillus continued. His mind was a mess, struggling to comprehend all of the events that had happened in such a short timespan. A Vaygr assualt. An alien Jumpgate. Aliens... It was too much to take in.

However, as his cruiser slipped into hyperspace, the tingling sensation of hyperspace transition washing over him like a cold shower, one thought stood out amongst the chaos that was his current state of mind. Even as he damned Alesha. Damned her research, her money and her Kiith for good measure, there was one thought that stood out, a thought tied to his sense of service to Hiigara.

"We have to get to Hiigara." He muttered, almost to himself, but he was sure more than one his crew heard him. It had to be done. Damn Alesha. Damn what she thought. Let her take his money, he had to do this. They would not be taken by surprise again.

"We have to get to Hiigara. We have to warn everyone."


Will the Relay remain in Vaygr hands?

Was the battle too one sided? (I tried to make it as equal as I could, in terms of losses, etc.)

Who was it exactly that emerged through the relay? Turians? Asari? Reapers? *cough*

How will the Hiigaran's respond?

The wrecked Reaper had been blown up, but is it forgotten?

Will Oriontic speed up his update pace? Will People leave Reviews?

Find out next time an update is posted!