Hello everyone. It is good to flush a new chapter within a single week. Well, I'm gonna go back home for Tet Holiday vacation. In case you are wondering what "Tet" mean, well, it's Lunar New Year Festival, held in Vietnam. Quite a fun and cheery time, or just simply to lay down on the bed and sleep one's arse off.
Still, being home means under parent supervision, which sounds very strange for a 21-and-a-half youth. However, just say it's my experience and intuition telling me that the freedom I once had while staying in the dorm would be severely reduced. The rate of update during the Holiday (about three weeks) would be very slow. My best guess is that I have a new chapter in the next two weeks or so...
Yeah, definitely much slower than what I want.
Reviews' respond
EchoSentient: Hate to break the news for you, but Putin the Tsar has not been deployed. Yet. All the nuclear deployed so far (including the liberal usage of 27th Destroyer Division in Chapter 6) is "only" within the kilo-ton range (up to 20 thousand tons of TNT to be specific), pretty "small". To put it in respective, it is roughly the same as "Fat Man", the nuclear bomb dropped in Nagasaki in 1945.
The-Black-Prince-Thomas: Thank you, Battle-Brother, for realising the service of Chapter Master Gabriel Angelos. May the Emperor protect.
general-joseph-dickson: Than you for your review
OMAC001: Thank you for your comment. However, I must disappoint you. I do not expect ground-side combat on Shanxi within two chapters, namely this one and the one after. That is even assuming I do not decide to take a spin after three combat-extensive chapters to look at different involved personnel. Blame Gundam UC for that, I'm just hugely impressed with the War Drama of the series/universe
Watcher123: You have basically told out my idea. Desolas, in this incarnation, would be something like Yang Wen-li in Shinji and Warhammer 40K (again, the man is a cameo to the classic space opera anime Legends of Galactic Heroes). Physcially, he is just so and so, but his tactical and strategical prowess knew little boundary. The human admiral, meanwhile, is not as awe-inspiring, mostly because he is playing by the book. However, what set him apart from the other is that he has nukes, lots of them, and in certain scenarios, he appears to be the only sane man in the bridge. The Turian reinforcement would appear within... six or seven chapters (just three to five days in-universe). Then, shit will hit the fan and blast through the roof. Trust my words on that.
CReaper210: Thank you for your review.
Pteaset: Thank you for your wonderful storm of reviews.
And as usual, I have more than one reference and cameo being used here. Some are very clear and obvious, some are not. I wonder if you guys can spot them out.
"They called me a hero, commander. Said that I singlehandedly changed the course of the war. But I'm no hero. I was, in hindsight, mostly just lucky. If someone told me that I would go on to have one of the most brilliant records of any ship in our navy's history, I'd have smiled and told him that was foolish talk. The Yorktown carriers were designed for the express purpose of fleet-based air operations. Of their merits and flaws, it has all been discussed ad nauseam. You know all of that already, commander. I see it in your eyes. You have something else you want to ask, don't you?"
- CV-6 Enterprise, Yorktown-class carrier of [old] United States Navy, moe anthropomorphised in Pacific: Volume I.
Location:
Unnamed system
Other side of Relay 313/314
Under contest
Time:
08:03 - Terran standard time
16 February 2201
The second phase of the Battle of… Uniform-Santa-6969 (boring name, really) began with some people could call "boredom". There was no great maneuver, there was no bright flash of light or death rays, and there were no streaks of plasma or any duel to death. There were just two fleets chasing each other, heading toward the Mass Relay 313. The gap was closing, but it was very slow, and there was no visible sign to show that the two fleets trying to change that. Well, for a civilian watching from afar or through a documentary at least. Combat Group Two was strained to its limit, trying to push itself toward the Mass Relay with sub-light engines. Short of blasting themselves forward with nuclear explosion or equivalent, they had already exhausted themselves of choices.
Hence, it led to a nerve-wrecking experience. Despite the boring and calm outward appearance, two fleets were trying their best to prepare for the battle to come. Even though they had less than an hour of combat against each other, they had already realized the prowess of the enemy. For many commanders, as much as they hated to acknowledge it, they knew that they had found their bane, their worthy opponent.
The jamming of Combat Group Two was constantly turned on, greatly enhanced compared to Combat Group One. However, while turning around, they made a small spike within the enemy' sensor readout. The Turian commander, either blessed by Lady Fortuna or Lord Kreig, or worse, both, was able to act on what little he had and spurred the whole fleet into a pursuing vector against Combat Group Two. The more terrible part was that the was able to co-ordinate a very short in-system jump, rated number three on the "Do not do" list of the Citadel Council. That, and he was able to field-patch his own ships while still sailing forward.
The entire aviation groups muttered curses under their breath. Being insane and reckless were their right and their alone. After all, it took certain… mental conditions to pilot a titanium coffin strapped with… a crap ton of guns, and missiles, and bombs, and nukes… In short, if the Naval ships believed in Macross Missile Massacre, then the Naval Aviation Corp was a follower of Moar Dakka Doctrine.
Eighty of the two hundred and thirty strike crafts deployed were F-302 "Starfurry", fighter configuration. Each of them was simply a rectangular-ish block of metal with four wings extending in an X-shape, each wing carried three vectored thruster in the end. With three possible exhaust directions on every thruster and an on-board computer to regulate the flow, the craft could achieve unparallel maneuverability. Simulation and field testing had proven that it could turn 180 degrees within the span of a few seconds, moving backward, downward or diagonally while keeping its original direction or its fire arc. Its mobility was backed up by the Moar Dakka doctrine. For close-range dogfight, each craft had four 25mm chainguns, mounted on the top and bottom of the fighter. To thicken the wall of fire, they could also pick a series of other projectile weapons, from simple machine guns, chain guns to gauss rapid-fire cannons or multi-barreled heavy machine guns. However, getting in a dogfight was a risky business, something about ammunition expenditure, the Aviation Corp mainly relied on their missiles. Up to eight missiles could be equipped on the Staffury's wings, and two to four more on either sides of the cockpit if the pilots forsake the additional guns.
The interesting part was that apart from the top and bottom chain guns, all other weapons were installed as external mod, both simplifying the manufacturing process and giving tactical flexibility to the pilots and commanders. Of course, for all of those thoughts, none of them was spared to make the controllers felt comfortable. All they had inside the cockpit as a cold hard seat made of steel and their own hard suit. At least the suit came up with their own… waste management function. If not, well, things would smell foully soon, literally.
Escorted by the Starfurry was her bastardised sister, however, no one spoke that directly to the pilot, for they always had a ton of "fuck you" in nuclear ordnance. Named Starwrath, designated as B-306, she was an up-armed version of the fighter. With the number of one hundred and thirty crafts, they were more than capable of living up to their name. While the Starwrath also shared the same hull as the Starfurry, she had the thrusters replaced by a more standard and simple version and most of her guns removed. However, to compensate for that, she had sixteen hardpoints in total, allowing her to carry enough to sink a full cruiser within a single salvo. Of course, her missiles needed to get through the point defense and the active jamming of her target first, but that was pretty much a given using common sense.
Their missile arsenal was also quite diversifying. Firstly, they had the Bowman, standard void-to-ship missile, a miniature variant of the ship-board Archer. The next name on the list was Crossbow, void-to-void missiles, equipped on the bombers as certain fuck you note to any fighter entering their range without stealth. Of course, they also had Dickery, nuclear missile fully reserved for ship killing and Echo, a seriously upscale anti-ship missile. The list could go on and on with more variants or modifications, but those were their standard ones.
Last but not least was dedicated electronic warfare, the Star Shadow, E-305. Following the same route of the old US of A in the late 20th and early 21st century, the craft was deployed to give extra jamming and stealth capability for the strike force, just in case the total blank out of the fighter and bomber screen and the carrier task force was… insufficient. Of course, it was mostly as an afterthought, but the Turian had already proven that they could brute force. Therefore, it never hurt to be prepared. Each craft was equipped with a package of sensor and electronics array, packed into giant disks installed on the top and the bottom. Not only that they would provide an extra layer of stealth and jamming but also new pair of eyes, picking up any straggler or something hidden. After all, it paid off to be prepared.
Two hundred and thirty strike crafts, eighty fighters, one hundred and thirty bomber and twenty electronics warfare planes, they were a real force to be reckon with in naval void combat. The human could probably scare the hell out of many people more, once they knew that the humans still had the reserves of strike crafts in their carriers. They were just careful, not revealing all the cards in their hand while still lashing out with enough damage to cow the enemy into wrecks. Of course, the bloody past of what could possibly happen when a carrier deployed its entire aviation formation was still fresh in their mind.
Time was ticking by, slowly and slowly. The relative velocity of the Turian fleet was increasing, but at a very slow rate. After all, even if they could speed up and easily overtake the Human fleet, they still need to consider their own inertia and other physical restraints. An acceleration going too fast (at multiple-G level) would see half of their crew turned into paste and the other getting high, both literally and figuratively. In addition, the gap between two fleets was too short for a FTL in-system movement. That had already taken the insanity called humanity into account. Well, insanity only, there was no desperation yet.
Watching the void through their cockpit, the pilots of the Aviation Corp stared in the general direction of the incoming Turian fleet. Their eyes failed to see the tiny specks of light among the vast sea of stars. However, they knew the ships were coming from that direction. Stress quickly began to blow on the pilot, but they were able to endure, after all, they had been put through the fly school. The weak and incompetent had been filtered out within three months of the course already. The ones graduated, well, they still needed a few more years of "intern" flying before earning a spot in the famed "Star" void crafts. While they may not be the cream of the crop for the entire humanity, they were definitely up to par for the job.
Still, no one knew why the human strike crafts had the "Star" in their names. Probably because the Lady of the designer carried the name "Hoshi", "star" in Japanese. And her jealousy and anger knew no bounds, seeing her kicking arse of a full ODST squad once.
At least, that was how urban legend of the Academy went.
The pilots were keeping calm and remaining in their position. Their discipline held, despite their nervousness. The amount of banter on the radio net was, surprisingly, closed to zero. It was plausible that they knew better than to babbling their mouth and had their positions locked by hostile anti-air. After all, Lord Murphy always punished the stupid and the incompetent as punishment, and then He may turn his sight toward the ones snickering. It was always better not to tempt Him. After all, some USAF squadrons were annihilated in the opening phases of World War Three just because they were stupid enough to chit and chat while getting into another country's airspace.
The time passed by, each second felt agonizing due to the order of waiting and holding position. Many pilots could stand the heat of the battle, but for them, the worst part was not the fighting but the calm before the storm. The waiting was always the most terrible part of a war. Everyone knew the fire was coming, but no one knew precisely when, where and how. The sheer series of what-if questions in their minds was enough to break down lesser men. At least the service personnel of the Terran Federation had enough tempering to reign in their freight.
Then, the radio net crackled to life:
"This is Overlord, the enemy has broken into Yellow Zone, Sector 6. All sortie air units, proceed with Plane Apple One."
The moment of truth had finally arrived. A collective breath was drew by the pilots as well as their comrades on-board the capital ships.
Confirmations were given from the commanders, filtering out to each individual pilot. Instructions and targets were put up on their screens, highlighting which ships they need to blow up. Data on the suspected covering arc of point-defense weapons was also given, which did not really help, mostly because any pilot worth his (or her, thank you feminazi) salt knew that any CIWS would be able to cover every approaching vector on the ship. Still, the knowledge may help, someway, somehow.
Using the left hand to manipulate the touch screen, the Starfurries' pilots flared up their thrusters, launching their crafts ahead of the formation. The acceleration pushed them sunk into the chair, a slight, miniscule pressure was felt upon their chest but most of them quickly shrug off that feeling. Their jobs were to clear out any interceptors and to provide "distraction" against hostile defense system. On the good news, they only had to hold out for ten minutes or so. On the other hand, it was never a good idea to tempt Fate.
Still, it was their job, their mission, there was no way to change it. Therefore, the pilots just simply charged forward at full burn. The acceleration kept building up, giving the pilot the advantage in speed that they needed. The number rose steadily on the screens, first just 0.1G, then 0.5, 0.9, 1… it finally reached the safety limit at 5.5G and then leveled out. That was the acceleration equivalent to five-point-five times of the standard Earth's gravitation acceleration, about 54 meter per second-squared for the ones preferred numbers to physics convention.
The thrust was kept for a few seconds before finally turned off. The velocity obtained during the burnt out was kept due to the craft's inertia and the absence of force in the void environment. That was the opposite of atmospheric fighters and bombers, they needed to constantly fighting off their own weight (or Earth's gravity) by their own thrust and Bernoulli's Effect. For void strike craft, due to the absence of any meaning external forces applied on its body, it shall maintain its velocity until the first part changed. Also known as the law of interita, Newton's First Law ruled the basis of the standard aviation attack in the Terran Federation. All pilot learnt these in their compulsory university education. And all Asian learnt that in secondary school for fun and giggles.
So, yep, in your face, ChemiStore. Those freaking game designers should have spent more time in their Physics class.
The battered Turian fleet quickly appeared on the optical scopes of the human's fighters. Then, slowly, the keen eyes of the hunters were able to pick up the gleaming specks of light in the dark ambient background of space. Of course, the distance was still long compared to the "traditional" carrier battle on Earth, but with nothing between the two opposing sides, the ones with extremely good eyes could pick out the tiny "strange" dots in their sights.
That, and there was always a direct straight line connecting two sides in the void. On Earth, the curvature of the planet had already broken of the direct sight at the distance of roughly five kilometers (three miles for the burger lovers) for a man standing on the ground, and one of the top records was 520km (324 miles, same recipient as above) for a pilot in the U-2 spy plane. Yes, both Earth-chan and Earth were and are NOT flat! They are just Oblate spheroids!
In your face, flat-earthers!
The distance between two opposite formation quickly closed down due to the high relative velocity of one to the other. However, for a mundane civilian, the distance was still simply too far, but for the well-trained pilot, they knew that they had reached the "combat zone". The numbers showed up in the cockpit read out, showing the reducing distance between the fighter groups and the battered Turian fleet.
The pilots carrying their own (light) anti-ship missiles quickly let loose their payloads, lightening themselves to gain a small edge in void combat. The number of missile launched was small, miniscule, especially compared to the massacre launched by Combat Group One. How much did they launch? One thousand, two hundred and eighty for one launch, making it two thoudsand, five hundred and sixty in total. Yes, more than 2500 missiles launched in a single salvo. Welcome to the Federation babe.
Anyway, the attack of the fighters had a much smaller number, just one hundred or so. However, they were launched at a much closer range, and the acceleration of the thruster on top of the already high initial speed gave it quite an edge in approaching. It was estimated that its approaching velocity was three times that found on the ship-board missile. Half yield, the times the speed and a third profile, fighter-borne anti-ship missile was pretty scary. The enemy would not even se…
The laser from the Turian fleet lashed out, simply cutting through the blanket of missile, cutting off the lines of thoughts of the pilots. Their baser batteries simply pointed forward, shooting in the general direction of the attack (or the heat sources), or worse, they aimed down the barrel with the superior optical sensor. The number of missiles thinned down heavily, number at less than thirty now. However, the surviving thirty percent did its job beautifully, ramming themselves on the "cruisers". Interestingly enough, their shields were now non-existent, probably because their shield generators were too bang up for the job.
The frontal armors on four extra cruisers were stripped away, revealing the interior inside. One frigate and another cruiser, somehow, had the luck of a few missiles slamming right on their main gun port. What happened next was… spectacular. It was probably due to a missile or two had enough luck to travel into the barrel and detonate inside. In the end, implosions were seen, tearing apart the unlucky ships.
Encouraged by the success, the fighters quickly approached the Turian fleet and began their strafing runs. Their targets were the CIWS turrets installed on the enemy ships. While peashooter would be just… peashooter on the meter-thick armor plating, they would be sufficient against softer targets like sensor arrays, optical cameras or CIWS turrets. After all, giving them the same treatment of meter-thick armor would be not only expensive but also counter-productive. After all, a sensor could barely gathering information if it was hidden behind three meters of stalinium.
However, the idea was easier said than done. The enemy had definitely done something with their power system and their aviation unit. Sure, their fighters/interceptors still dropped like flies before causing considerable damage, but the part where they inflicted casualty on the about-eighty fighter group was terrible enough. They should not even have that kind of power. Hiding behind capital ships, using the ships' own signatures to fool the incoming fighters? Hell, they did not even linger around to fight, just shoot and scoot. Their accuracy was crap, sure, but they did not need to be accurate. Luring the Terran fighters into the range and sight of the laser batteries was enough.
The whole area around the Turian ships quickly became a field of chaos elements with human fighters dashing in and out, trying to get a lock on their Turian counterpart long enough for their missiles to reach the target. Eight out of ten times, they failed though, the enemy planes had higher speed, giving them the edge in initiating and finishing an engagement. In addition, this was the Turian home ground. They knew how their capital ships would be laying and where the turrets would be built, for the defending team, that was enough advantage in their deck card to fight.
A few Starfurries were lost to enemy fire, both by laser pulses and defending interceptors. Debris and wreckages splashed forward, they were almost oblivious to the damage and destruction to their original bodies. A few Starfurries were hit but a few stray bolts, however, and quickly showed their smokes and sparks on the bodies. They were given the order to retreat, a limping plane had little value in a fight. Of course, whether they could reach the safe ground of the carrier was another question. The enemy, if nothing else, was as vicious in fighting as humanity. That was something to say, considering that war had finally on-up mosquito in the list of most lethal reason to die.
Laser slashed out, aiming at the Starfurries. However, instead of the coherent and continuous beam like in previous fights, the batteries had already reverted to pulse mode, most likely to conserve their own power and heat capacity. It sounded stupid, because a constant beam would deal a greater amount of damage. However, it came with the condition that the batteries must be able to lock on the target, which was quite… impossible thanks to human's jamming. However, their fighter-based guns could still work just fine. Sure, they had to get within a few hundred meters to score a reliable kill, and the insane maneuverability of the Starfurries even made it harder. But they had the home field advantage and they could make their own killing fields. For that, they could give the human a bloody nose.
However, the loss of the Starfurries was well-justified, and they were not actually that bad. Sure, twenty percent loss, but only two planes were lost as "killed in combat", the remaining fourteen had to retreat to patch up their severe damage. The rest of the fighters also suffered various degree of damage, none critical, thankfully enough. Such a level of loss was still deemed "acceptable" in military expenditure. After all, it was not as bad as the one suffered by the Eighth US Air Group in World War Two.
In addition, the real showdown finally arrived. The full formation of one hundred and thirty bombers had finally reached the combat zone. Turian air defense was quickly overwhelmed. Sure, not as overwhelmed when they had 2500 passively jamming missiles gunning toward them, but just as terrible because every single strike craft had their own active jamming system. The range, in addition, was much closer. Not to mention that the missile density was also increased a few times, further straining the defensive system of the Turian.
The combined power of the Terran Navy was quickly show. The Starshadow targeted the sensor arrays of the Turian fleet, further blind and disrupted their sights. The accuracy of the laser turrets drop significantly, and short of a very close fly by (less than 1km), no Starfurry was threatened by them. The coordination with the interceptor was also severely damaged with them showing loss of cohesion and lack of aggressiveness. In the same time, unseen by naked eyes, more than five hundred missiles were concentrated into a single mass, gunning toward the Turian fleet.
The missiles, dedicated anti-armour and equipped with highly yielded ordnance, were extremely effective in battering down the Turian fleet. The two dreadnaughts got more of the exterior being forcefully tear away, the injured cruisers got explosions within their jax, a few frigates were sucker punched in their guts. The air strike of the Terran Navy, still undergoing, had robbed away ten more frigates and make sure eight more cruisers were incapable for combat. The dreadnaughts, however, were even stranger. By all account, they should not even be able to fly!
Their hulls were virtually torn away, leaving multiple sections of the interiors bared. Those areas, obviously, were hammered hard by strafing attacks of the human strike crafts. New information and orders were constantly shared on the net, analyzing the data to prepare for the second launch of the bomber formation. Then, it was given. Just like a wolf pack, every single craft of the Terran turned their sights and guns on a dreadnaught, planning to bring it down with combined concentrated firepower. Light missiles and chainguns sung up first, focusing on the exposed areas. Meanwhile, other fighters quickly turned on their laser designator, painting certain sections of the hull that needed to be brought down. The second salvo of the bombers, which accounted for nearly fifteen hundred missiles in total, peppered the dreadnaught hull, covering it in fire and explosion. They just launch the entire of the remaining payload, after all.
The dreadnaught, in typical big ships' fashion, went down in a series of implosions and explosions. Poor bastards.
The commanders pondered on the odds of fighting. Their ordnance had been spent, their crafts, while still functional and combat worthy, required maintenance. In addition, the enemy had been sufficiently battered. In total, the Turian had lost further one dreadnaught, six cruisers and ten frigates in this phase of the battle. In combination with the loss from previous fight, their lost was astronomical to say the least. Pressing onward with the current force would be foolish, they had already exhausted and battered. Ten Starfurries and ten Starwrath had been lost. It was miniscule compared to the Turian's, but still, each lost stung.
"This is Overlord. All units, Rasta – Tango – Bravo. Over."
Rasta – Tango – Bravo, RTB, Return to base. It was a simple phrase, but its power was not. The humans, knowing that they had earned the tactical victory, quickly retreated. Like a swarm of insects, the Starfurries and Starwrath glossed over the burning ships of the Turian, gunning as fast as they could to get back to their mothership. None of them lingered around, trying to score a few more lucky random hits on the failing ships. They did not even try to attack the combat capable ships neither, those ships, for unknown reasons, did not attempt any counter-attack. May be they could not, after all, the electronic warfare planes were still within the area, hidden from everyone's eyes.
For a few surviving Turian officers, they watched the scene directly with their own eyes through the exposed bridges. Through the hazy sparks of failed computers, through the void of space, they watched the sight with fear filling in their eyes. They failed to score any meaningful casualty on their enemy, yet, they suffered catastrophic loss on their own. One dreadnaught, sixteen cruisers and fifty frigates were destroyed completely, effectively a 50% rate casualty. The other half suffered various degrees of loss and injury.
To think, it was just a single battle…
What would happen next time?
Location:
Unnamed system
Other side of Relay 313/314
Under contest
Time:
2501 - 8th Month - 4th Day
10:50
The atmosphere of the dreadnaught Hyperion was a somber one. Being the flagship of the responding fleet, she had to see and hear her sisters being gut or going down in flame. Normally, that would be standard for a normal space ship, considering their purpose: kill enemy vessels, or die trying. However, today was anything but normal. The fleet she headed was tasked with a policing mission against a former Citadel-affilianted race, a new alien race they initiated First Contact with and an illegally activated dormant Mass Relay. Sure, it was over simplifying, but it would suffice, for the sake of sanity.
But even then, it should be a fairly normal and easy job. Number for number and weight for weight, no race in the galaxy had enough power to take on any Turian task force, let alone win. Even in the off chance that they win, the probability for them to escape relatively unharmed was very small, borderline zero.
Then… today happened. Eight dreadnaughts and twelve cruisers of the enigma alien races faced off against two dreadnaughts, forty cruisers and one hundred frigates. Sure, they had the edge in dreadnaught counts, but it was still less than what the Krogan had in Battle of Septimus, which ended in Turian victory. Yet, for being outnumbered, they still slaughtered the Turian. Not killed, not destroyed, slaughtered. It was an outright slaughter!
Now, they only had a functional dreadnaught, fifteen combat-worthy cruisers and thirty-five frigates, only a third of the original fleet. To think it was the result of only TWO fights, both of them happened while the Turians were a little more than just being blind, mute and cripple. There sheer level of pragmatism and competency (translation: danger level) of the enemy was extremely visible, and the only thing kept most Turians from speaking it outright was their own rigid code of honor and pride. The one that just had been shattered in less than an hour of combat.
The casualty rate of the current task force was equivalently terrible, the list of intact personnel was much, much shorter than the ones who were not. Spirits, even if one could count the "scratched" and "bruised", they would only account for only one in every ten service personnel of the formation. The only saving grace was the relatively low loss on the ground force was zero, mostly because their transports were not included in the fight.
The young Turian officer grimaced when compiling the report. Even in the most curb stomp battle during naval training, his team only had to suffer a 20% casualty rate, death and incapacitated. Sure, the opponent was his trainers, they had the experience and the penchant for cramping their trainees, but they definitely only suffer an outnumbering ratio of one-to-two, and they did not have such… sadistic tendencies like the hoo-mans here. Who in their right minds would launch torpedoes as opening move? It was a waste of money and material due to the defensive GARDIAN laser system.
The question was debated heavily in the Academy, after all, even the worst GARDIAN operator was able to shoot down twenty incoming torpedoes before any of them get through his defence. The number for the best cadet was fluctuating between five hundred and five hundred thirty. No one would think that the way to counter that was pretty simple: throw up a few thousand missiles and blanket them in the deadliest jamming blanket the galaxy had ever seen. It may be wasteful, but the problem was that it worked, in a beautifully horrible way. Even the worst gunner could not be fault in that situation. And to think the one doing its worst was Legion Legate Desolas Arterius himself… How was he able to advance on his career anyway?
… Right. By pulling out miracles from his proverbial backside. Evacuating over twenty thousand colonists to escape a pirate raid (which may or may not link to the Batarian Hegemony) which was swept under the rug a few days later. Then, during training, his varen pack frigates, somehow, was able to severely damage a dreadnaught with little loss of their own. Then not to mention a few narrow escapes against the pirates outnumbering him five to one. The only "loss" known to him, so far, was a somewhat protégé of his failed to capture a Quarian captain. The poor bastard lost his life even before joining this battle.
It may be a blessing in disguise. He did not have to see how the human simply tear apart a full Turian fleet with almost ease, nor the
Closing down the report on his omni-tool, the young (but competent) officer moved toward the office of Legion Legatus. As all other staff officers had been killed or incapacitated, he was the one next in line to temporary in charge of making the gist of the reports and statistic, turning meaningless rows of numbers into something more comprehensible. He was not sure if it was a good thing though, most of his friends were now in infirmary, and the part where his (former) superior stayed in was now vacuum.
Still, he had a job to do, a duty to fulfill. After and only after finishing it, he would have the right to shed them a tear or give them a toast, in silence. Such was a prize he had to pay as a Turian, a prize which he hopefully was worth everything. Their anthem was "Die for the Cause", but… when the entire team had died with a moment, no one could remember how they would sing the song. Being a young officer, however, he just hoped that the commander had something under his sleeve to save the whole fleet from annihilation.
He forgot one crucial note, though. Desolas Arterius was a highly competent banner officer, but his personality was quirky at best and contradicted to his own brilliance at worst. When he opened the door, the commander was tending to his aide's wounds while sparing occasional glances toward a omni-screen.
"Tribuni Angusticalvii… Puvius Arterius?"
"Yes, sir. I'm here to deliver the statistic of the battle."
"Before you do that, just curious, is there any connection between you and Fatus Arterius?"
"No, but Pubius Arterius is my great-grandfather, sir. I believe that he is Fatus's younger brother."
"Correct, so it would put us… what, on the same level in the family tree?"
"Possibly, sir."
"OK, it is just my curiosity there. Obviously, I cannot promote you or give you any preference treatment here."
"Sir, with all due respect, I rise to this rank thanks to my competency, not having someone covering my butt."
The young officer flushed, anger swarming inside his mind. The leader of the fleet obviously had little tact or care about the… Hang on, why did the room look like it had been turned upside down a few times, then visited by a Krogan for "down time"? The whole furniture was crashed, crumbled into wreckage. The chairs and tables were nothing more than a mixture of scrap metals and cotton at this point. The ceiling was collapsed, turning the room from a box shape into an inverted V-shaped one. The lights were half dead at the moment, which meant that the room was relying more on the emergency light and the personal torches of the inhabitants than on the original lights of the room. The less talked about the walls and the floor, the better.
"Oh, yes, my room was given quite a re-design by the aliens. Humans, I believe, are how they call themselves."
Understatement of the century. It was like calling Primus Pilus Sorus Vakarian "a bit over enthusiastic", the very one being called "Blood Boots" by the Batarian pirates.
Still, considering that the two commanders graduated from the same course, he should know better than assuming they were normal Turians.
The more pressing problem, however, was why the freaking commander of the fleet was bandaging for his aid himself? No medical specialists, no fancy technical equipments that may or may not exist. He just simply cleaned the wounds on the aid's head, then bandaged them over with a piece of cloth. Classic, yes, but it always worked. No, thinking about it, that was not the problem. The problems (yes, plural) were that, one, the aid was watching him with a critical pair of eyes while caressing her own sidearm (yes, she was a woman, and no, no one had seen her fighting before, not the ones alive and talkative, at least), and two, his distant-cousin was surprisingly gentle while taking care of his aid. Too gentle for a superior officer toward a subordinate of his, in fact.
"Sir, permission to speak freely, as a member of your extended family."
"Granted."
"Why don't you just marry her?"
"One, paperwork, two, it will be seen as a form of nepotism, three, she is the first-daughter of the Fifth Primach."
"What?"
"Still, I have already fucked her."
"What?"
"Three times per week, each time, well, all night long."
"What?"
"She has just promised to talk her father down when I ask for her hand in marriage after this… problem."
"What?"
"You are invited, if you want."
"What?"
"And I only tell you that because you are a part of my extended family."
The young officer quickly regretted asking. His commander, clearly, was not a sane and normal Turian. However, it was unknown whether despite of or because of his quirkiness that his orders were able to save a large number of lives. First was the order of sending the frigates through the Relay first instead of dreadnaughts and frigates. He suspected correctly about a planned minefield of the enemy, he just failed to consider the chance for the said minefield to be high-yield nuclear ordnance. To be fair, no one criticize him for that, after all, which race was stupid and insane enough to deploy hundreds of nuclear weapons on such a mass scale?
Right, the humans. They just proved it soon after that with their mass launch of missiles. Those were not nuclear, not all of them, at least. They mixed enough number of "normal" missile in the mix, using those as fodders against GARDIAN system to make sure the nuclear ones reached their marks. The Turian fleet was hit hard, very hard.
Only a handful of officers were able to shook their shocks and surprise away, Legate Arterius was one of them. However, he was the only one able to act on his own plan, which gave the second precious order. Instead of relying on the battered frigate formations to remove (blindly) the hostile torpedoes/missiles wave, he switched to brute force of the dreadnaughts and cruisers, bringing them to the front line. It worked reasonably well enough.
The third order, strangely enough, was to attack, which went against all traditional tactics. However, the reason for that was pretty simple: the enemy lacked the speed and maneuverability to escape. It was proven right, again, as the enemy had to break off, moving backward while using their own counter-intertia of the main gun launches to escape. Sure, they escaped by using an unknown form of FTL (which involved a heavy dose of radiation and high fluctuation of graviton reading), but the lull in battle allowed the Turian to patch themselves a bit, preparing for yet another battle.
For the second battle, however, it just completely threw the doctrines, strategies and tactics refined by over a thousand years into the void. Every race knew the value of atmospheric strike crafts and their value in securing aerial superiority, supporting the ground forces. But there was no information suggesting the prowess in naval engagement, let alone void combat. The human, somehow, knew otherwise. They just deployed more than two hundred strike crafts, the number equal to the composition of nearly four fleets, and hit the Turian fleet hard. Very hard…
Even with putting the dreadnaughts in forward position, even with enveloping the above and bottom of the combat plane with varen packs of frigates, even with powering down the shields and other non-critical systems to divert the power to CIWS, the fleet had to watch the impossible: a Turian dreadnaught being killed in action.
The last time it happened was… Actually, no one quite knew if a Turian dreadnaught could be killed in the first place. Technically and theoretically, yes, every ship could be destroyed in combat. In reality, however, there was a major trouble in making it happen. Many had tried doing so, and none had succeeded in a thousand years. The humans? They showed up for less than a week a score it, while losing no capital ships in that particular engagement.
Shock and somber were probably the best the fleet could experience now. No one knew what to do, including the… love-struck commander. He just ordered the fleet to hold position and rescue to survivors of the killed ships while patching up the salvageable ones. In their numb, the fleet did just that.
The two… lovers seemed to be lost in their own worlds, or worst, with each other. The young male Turian just hoped that they were empathically talking to each other to find out a solution. If not… things would be very terrible.
"Actually, my cousin, we cannot talk empathically to each other. Despite all the rumors, that is still impossible for all known sentient and sapient races, let alone us."
"So… how did you two co-ordinate with each other on the bridge?"
"We trust each other, and we knew what the other would do."
"But how do you earn that ability, really?"
"Sing three Hails the Lord, eat my vitamins, have sex with this guy five times a day and fight until I no longer feel horny if I cannot. Spi~rits."
…
The one said that was the female aid. And she spoke it with a perfectly straight face and calm voice, which made the whole thing became even more ridiculous. The situation would be much more hilarious if it was not as dire. Both the two males were shocked by that statement, though in different ways. Desolas tried to keep himself calm, façade and not to grin, and fail miserably. His distant cousin, meanwhile, was wondering if and how he could make a brain bleach, Krogan-variant. He was not even sure if his sanity would be the same after this mission, to be honest.
"Any way, sir, ma'am. I'm here to deliver the report on our loss."
"Please, sum it up for me, as short as possible."
"… I can do that in a single word, but it will be very… unpleasant and impolite to speak with the presence of the lady. In other word, sir, our situation could be summed up in a very rude word."
"Oh… Understood."
It appeared that Legatus Desolas had done bandaging his aid, because he finally patted her back and put the medical supplies away. He then sat on the… remaining of something resemble a chair and accepted the report, musing over the numbers. Meanwhile, his female aid stood diligently behind, waiting for any instructions… or she just proceeded to massage his shoulders. Huh? Was that not over-stepping the bound? Still, considering that they had already had sex with each other and publically acknowledged and confirmed that, it should not come as a surprise. Normally, such an information would make other raising their eyebrows, however, this was Legion Legatus Desolas "The Miracle", no one would be crazy enough to criticize him. Sure, he lost half of the fleet, but considering the situation, it would be better to say he was able to save half of his fleet, or he "only" lost 50% of his force.
It definitely did not sound good at all.
"How are our men doing, Tribuni Angusticalvii Puvius Arterius?"
"… Shock and sorrow, sir. But still combat able. The ones alive, that are."
"And the rest?"
"The injured and wounded are being recovered from the wreckage or being treated at the moment."
"Understood… Send them… my condolences and apologies."
"Yes sir…"
"What do you think about our enemy?"
"Sorry sir?"
"What do you think about them, the humans? The way the fight, their retreat, their attack… What do you think about them?"
"I'm not sure if I'm the best, sir. I'm more of an administrative officer than a combat one."
"And I fail half of my navy combat test in the Academy. Please, just tell me, there is simply no right or wrong. We are only speculating here."
Being encouraged by the words of his superior and the sincerity within, the young officer slowly shared his idea. However, his mood, still tainted by the heavy loss of the fleet, was a dark and desperate one. The enemy, somehow, despite their lack of Element Zero (yes, that was a fact, confirmed in triplicate) and their slumbering movement, was fearsome. It was as if they had spent the better part of their history trying to kill each other.
It sounded terribly wrong. The only race doing the same was the Krogan, and they had already destroyed themselves before reaching to the stars. There were also rumours about another race having the same characteristic, the said First Contact was botched by an Iron Age alien due to the aggressiveness. Sure, it was just guess work, but if it was true, well, things would go haywire very soon. An aggressive, combat-craze star-faring alien race would bring a lot of troubles, galactic genocide was one of them. The idea alone was able to make him getting into "panic mode" with the crow on his head vibrating slightly and the hand gestures becoming wildly with the passage of time. At least he was able to put the second under control quickly before losing his own speech coherence.
The speculations of the young officer were getting into the wild side now, but Desolas made no attempt to stop him. From his own experience, the ones with the least specialized training would be able to notice obvious and simple answers for many questions, up to and including a First Contact gone wrong. Besides, he was still massaged by his lover slash aid, and there was no need to stop it. The general order had been given out already, and there was no need for his own personal involvement. The only job left required his participation was to report to the superiors and the Primarchs about his (not so) legal mission. But even for it, he still needed to wait a while longer for the full list of reports to arrive.
Until then, he had nothing else to do but wait and try to kill the time. At least the young officer had been proving himself as frightening source of entertainment, not because he was a lunatic or anything of sort, but because Desolas himself was thinking the same. It was a pity that the young man had to leave, taking care of his own jobs – something about requisitioning radiators and capacitors for the GARDIAN. Talking (or rather, hearing him talk) had been rather fun.
The moment his distant-cousin disappeared after the door, however, Desolas turned his gaze into the corner and called out:
"Come out Saren, we need to talk about your brother's private issue."
His aid suddenly stiffened her body behind him, one of her hand trailed down on her thigh, preparing to pull out the sidearm. It was just an unconscious move, however, because she realized who this "Saren" was. In addition, the said figure also stepped into the light while decloaking himself, showing that he had no hostile intention.
The said Turian was no one other than Optio Saren Arterius, younger brother of Legion Legatus Desolas Arterius, and he was probably the only sane one in the room, sans his occasional brooding. Of course, no one would officially acknowledge or confirm it.
"Brother, how do you know?"
"I did not, you just do it for me."
"… Cheeky py'jack."
"From you, it is probably a compliment. What do you think sweetit?"
"He let loose a twelve-syllable curse last time with much more profanity, so… yes, sugar, it is probably a compliment."
"There is so much sweetness here that cancer is formed in my nose. Why don't you guys just marry each other?"
"Because you would be sad, missing my homecook sweet pie?"
"… I hate you."
Yeah, just sibling love together. Desolas missed time like this. Despite the constant swearing and sarcasm, Saren was actually a GHOST, special operative of the Turian Hierarchy. Spirits, he was also one of the youngest man of the force to boot. The battle here would be his real baptism by fire, unknown enemy, unknown intel and the only thing he had as back up was the navy in orbit, for a few days at least. He was also able to attract quite some female attention – of course, he had not realized it yet. Teasing him about it should be fun.
Saren quickly sat down in front of his brother, taking out a bottle on his belt. In respond, the elder brother brought out three glasses for Saren to fill up. Despite all murky details, the GHOST had already considered the aid as his sister-in-law, mostly because she was the only one able to keep his brother in check, and because she was the first one getting through that thick crown of Desolas.
The three of them silently raised a toast for the fallen, a tradition of the Arterius family, before pouring the first shot down the ground. They felt themselves as "undeserving" of the first shots, so to speak. After that, each of them was only allowed a single small sip, enough to feel bitter and spice, but also enough to stay awake and sober for the battle to come.
"Brother, so what do you think about our distant-cousin's idea?"
"I think that I should be the one asking that, considering that you are the commander."
"Well, just say I'm asking for a second opinion."
"… I'm praying that he is wrong."
"Same here. Though…"
Both Saren and the female aid eyed Desolas, who looked haunted, empty and afraid somehow. That was a new one, they had never, ever seen the man like that before. The man they knew was sarcastic, humorous and pretty much a genius despite his own insanity. Now, he had somehow turned into the totally opposite of what he was normally. If the battle was not enough to make them taste fear, this change should.
"… Though I'm an atheist."
Actually, scratch the last part, Desolas was still fine.