Theirs not to make reply,
Theirs not to reason why,
Theirs but to do and die
Into the valley of Death
Rode the six hundred
"Attention all ships, this is Fleet Admiral Williams in command of Hammer fleet," the Terran's voice blared through the intercom. "We are unable to damage the gateway, repeat we have no ability to damage the gate."
Ruby felt a knot tie in her gut as the ships of Hammer fleet turned and began their ponderous advance towards the bulk of the fighting.
"Admiral Williams," Ruby called. "If we can't destroy the gate, what do we do?"
"We fight to our death," the Terran replied. "There's nothing else we can do. We can't retreat, because the radiation coming from that gate is scrambling our jump computers, and we're not going to be able to defeat them since they don't seem to have any limit to their numbers. So we just have to keep fighting until we all go down."
Ruby stood there as the noises from the ship's communicator faded into the background. She watched as all around them, ships both friend and foe exploded as they were torn apart in the largest battle in the history of the Remnant Federation.
"There has to be some way for us to win, though," Ruby muttered to herself. "It can't just end like this."
"Not every story has a happy ending, Ruby," Weiss replied as she walked up next to the young Captain. "I guess this is just one of those times."
"Still, though," Ruby replied, turning to face the woman who, in another universe, she might have been marrying right now, "All of that work, all of our planning, and we just have to die here?"
Weiss nodded. "Looks that way."
Ruby kicked the tactical display in frustration. "This isn't fair!" She yelled. "Why can't we just win this? Why do we need to die?"
"Sometimes our fate is unavoidable," Weiss replied. "Do you believe in destiny?" Ruby cocked her head slightly. "Well, sometimes, it's our destiny to die fighting a hopeless battle."
Ruby sighed. "Yeah, I guess you're right," she replied with resignation.
Weiss pulled Ruby's shoulder so that she was looking Ruby in her eye. "I love you Ruby," she said, giving the woman a gentle kiss.
"I love you too, Weiss."
Ruby watched as the battle continued to unfold around them. Terran and Remnant ships' shields flared a brilliant blue with each hit they absorbed before seemingly shattering as they faltered under the weight of fire from the Grimm fleet. Fighters ducked and weaved between salvos, torpedoes streaked through the stars, and cannon shells, particle blasts, autocannon barrages, and particle beams tore into the Grimm.
Ruby sighed slightly, pulling up an image of the Vale on the tactical display, showing the ship's damage and shield status. All of the ship's shield facings were starting to falter under the weight of fire. Another display showed the status of each of the ship's fighters, and Ruby felt a small knot in her gut when she saw that more than half of the ship's pilots were lost.
Just as she felt the last little glimmer of hope start to fade, however, her eyes passed over the ship's reactor output display.
"Weiss," she called, "we have one of those new Semblance class antimatter reactors, right?"
"With the Aura containment field, yeah," Weiss replied.
"What's the maximum output the containment field can survive?" Ruby asked.
"Up to 1000% capacity, why?"
"What happens when the containment field fails?"
Weiss shrugged. "Winter told me that they're not sure. When the Schnee Aerospace tested the new system, safety measures forced a reactor shutdown before it could overload. They then tested it remotely in Shadow of Light, and the facility reported a sudden spike in output on the level of a supernova just before their sensors went dark."
"What if we ejected the reactor so that it went through the gateway to the other side? If the other side isn't shielded, it might be enough to destroy the gate. And, even if it is, looking at the shield on this side, something like a supernova might just be enough to take it down."
Weiss thought for a moment. "I don't know. Either way, we should probably send a probe through the gate to investigate."
Ruby nodded. "Launch a probe at the gate."
The small object spat out of one of the Vale's torpedo tubes and sped off towards the gate, leaving behind a small ripple in the water-like portal in the center. The Vale's tactical display shifted, showing the mass of Grimm ships on the other side of the gate. Surrounding the object were six long, thin ships with what appeared to be giant knobs on their front.
"What are those?" Ruby asked.
"I think I might have an answer for you, Captain Rose," Admiral Williams stated as his image appeared in the tactical display. "Those look like shield support vessels."
"What?" Ruby asked.
"Ships designed to drastically improve the shield regeneration rate of a friendly vessel," the Admiral replied. "We tested them about thirty years ago, but never managed to get them past the prototype stage. The ships never managed to provide a significant enough improvement over the ship's built-in shields to be worth investing in. They did manage to drastically improve planetary shields, but we would rather not have to deal with having something outside of the planet's shielding envelope deal with improving the planetary shields."
"We believe that the reason for the shielding providing little improvement to the ship's shields while providing a significant improvement to planetary shield is the shielding beam scatters, causing negligible improvement for anything smaller than planetary scale."
"And the shield ships are why we can't breach the gate's shields?" Ruby asked.
"Very likely," Admiral Williams replied. "Chances are the gate acts in much the same way our phase drives do, allowing matter and energy through virtually instantaneously."
"Including shielding," Ruby finished.
"Which means that the only way to destroy the gate would be to take out the ships first," Admiral Williams confirmed.
"This might work then," Ruby said. "Comms, close the channel. Weiss, will we be able to use the emergency batteries to power the maneuvering thrusters long enough to bring us to a stop when we eject the core?"
"Yes, we should," Weiss replied. "Once we're stopped, we should have enough power remaining to keep life support online for about a couple of hours if we're running at minimum power."
"Then that's our plan," Ruby, said as she nodded her head. "Engineering, start looping the reactor output."
The deck of the Vale started to rumble gently under her feet as the reactor started to funnel more and more power into itself. Inside the core, the containment shield started to glow slightly as it contained what amounted to small supernova held within. The Vale's main engines flared a bright blue, gradually pushing the ships towards the Grimm's gateway.
Admiral Williams stared incredulously at the image of the Vale in the Strategic Command Center of the Athena, watching as the Vale broke off from the battle. What is she doing? He thought. There's no way they'll be able to damage the gate unless...
"Sensors, show me the Vale's power levels," Admiral Williams called over the chatter of the ships communications.
"Bringing it up now, sir," the officer replied.
The strategic display shifted slightly as it placed a line graph over the image of the Vale. The line graph was almost completely steady, with only very slight dips and peaks until the very end, at which point it started to sharply increase compared to the rest of the graph.
"She's actually going to try it," Admiral Williams muttered before tapping a control on the edge of the display. "Attention all Terran ships, this is Admiral Williams with a priority Nexus order, repeat, belay all orders prior to the following. All units, commence Ender's Gambit, target R.F.S. Vale, repeat, Ender's Gambit, R.F.S. Vale. Captain Rose," he called switching channels so he was talking to Ruby, "You have as much time as I have ships. Good luck."
All around the Vale, the massive, bulky forms of the Terran ships broke off of their current engagements and turned towards the Vale. As the ships approached, they started to pull into parallel courses on all sides of the ship, leaving no gaps for anything to get through, almost as though they were forming a shield for the dreadnought with their own hulls.
"What are they doing?" Weiss asked as she stared at the mass of rough, gray ships surrounding them.
"I think they're protecting us," Ruby replied waling to the window at the front of the bridge, "so that we can get to the gate."
The Vale silently pushed through space as its main reactor started to grow ever more unstable. Around the ship, Terran vessels shuddered under the weight of the Grimm warships pulverizing them in a desperate attempt to stop them from getting to the gate. Yet, despite the onslaught, the Terrans pushed through, even as their ships started to falter beneath the weight of the fire being thrown at them.
Finally, after what felt like an eternity, the fleet approached the gate. Grimm ships continued to pour through, being shredded by the Terran fleet almost as soon as they left the water-like portal in the center.
"Reactor's about to go critical, Ruby!" Weiss shouted.
Ruby nodded. "On my signal, eject the core," she said, watching the display carefully.
The Terran fleet broke away from the Vale, giving the mighty dreadnought a clear view of the gate. The gray substance in the center rippled peacefully with each Grimm ship that passed through, almost as though a rock was dropped into a pond.
"Now!" Ruby shouted.
The Vale's engine nacelles rotated, and both the main engines and several of the ship's maneuvering thrusters all flared at once, pushing the ship so that its bottom was facing the gate. A small hole in the ship's center of mass opened up, and a slightly smaller object sped out and towards the gate. The Vale's engines flared again, this time desperately attempting to stop the dreadnought before it passed through the gate itself. The reactor, meanwhile, held its course, and, with a ripple that was almost unnoticeable, disappeared to the other side of the gate.
Almost as soon as the reactor passed through the gate, the containment field finally gave out, releasing a devastating shockwave through the sector with the intensity of a supernova. The gate was the first thing to be engulfed, completely annihilated as antimatter met matter, and the two opposites exploded in a wave of light and energy. The shield ships protecting the gate fared little better, as they too were ripped apart by matter and antimatter reacting in a deadly lightshow. Finally, in the ever-expanding blast, the nearly endless Grimm fleet was caught, and their ships exploded in brilliant fireballs. Any that were not caught by the initial blast were quickly torn down as their fellows detonated around them, until there was nothing left but empty space.
Admiral Williams stared at the gateway as the portal in the center dissolved. The shield surrounding the gate shimmered a brilliant red before appearing to shatter, and the glowing, red trim slowly dimmed. All around the Athena, Grimm warships all stopped their attacks and slowly started to drift slowly through space.
"Holy shit, she did it," Admiral Williams muttered. "All ships, this is Admiral Williams, target the gate with everything you've got and fire at will. Repeat, all ships, fire at will on the gate."
The Athena's autocannons spat out barrage after barrage of bullets, her railguns flung shells against the gate, and the ship's particle beams spat out ruby-red blasts of death. All around, the remaining warships turned their weapons towards the gate, and they unloaded everything they had. Energy and ballistic weapons slowly carved and pitted the massive, white object. Each and every shot that found is mark continued to slowly tear away at the structure, until, finally, it started to silently collapse.
AS the structure broke apart, a cheer want up from the Vale's surviving officers. Ruby stood there and smiled slightly, allowing her crew their brief moment of celebration.
"All Sword fleet ships, this is Fleet-Captain Rose," she called finally, "Target the remaining Grimm ships and fire at will. Let's finish this."
The Vale sat silently in space, almost completely dead without its reactor, as the remaining Sword fleet vessels turned their guns to fire on the remnants of the Grimm. Beams and pulses of energy lanced out from the ships, and high-caliber cannon shells sped away from their barrels, tearing into the unshielded and dead warships. Finally, after almost ten minutes of nonstop fire, the final few ships crumbled and exploded, marking the end of the Grimm. The Vale's crew let out another cheer, and Weiss walked up beside Ruby.
"So, did we win the war?" she asked as a small smile started to work its way across her face.
Ruby shrugged as she started to smile as well. "I don't know. I guess that'll be up to history to decide."
"True," Weiss said with a chuckle. "What happens now?"
"Well," Ruby said thoughtfully. "I guess we can go home now. As soon as Uncle Qrow gets a support ship here to help us jump, of course," she finished, chuckling slightly.
Both soon-to-be-married officers turned and gave each other a smile. With a contented sigh, they pulled each other into a gentle, loving kiss.
A/N: So, sorry if this wasn't the ending you folks were looking for. Honestly, though, I kinda wanted to get this finished so that I could focus on my other two stories. Honestly, working on 3-4 at a time is really a lot more difficult than it sounds. So, sorry if this wasn't exactly the ending you all were looking for, but that's why I'm doing the epilogue.
Anyway, up next is chapter 13 of Rose Guardian! So stay tuned for that, and don't forget to check out the Legion205 podcast on Podbean and on iTunes! See you all next time!