10: Dawning Alliance
by Chaoseternus
When Enerina is sent to investigate why every gate in an area of space will not establish a wormhole, she finds something totally unexpected...
ThirteenDodge grinned, a feral look that many would not have recognised on the old submariners face as the Stingray jumped out of hyper, perfectly bouncing the unidentified fighters.
Before the fighters even reacted, they began dieing, the pulse laser batteries firing constantly and devastatingly at the surprised fighters. But, they didn't break. Despite their losses, the fighters just turned and disengaged from the Del, to them she was no longer a threat. The Stingray was.
It was then that, with some horror, Captain Dodge realised exactly how few casualties they had caused and how many dead F-302's were showing on the ships sensors.
Stingray rocked, her more powerful shields, based on Asgard technologies and boasted using other technologies seized by or granted to the Tau'ri over the years were far stronger than those of the Del Shakka Mel, capable of taking far more damage but still, they dropped.
Shields at 80
Dodge resisted the urge to curse; a few of his crew weren't so restrained.
Divert power from the gauss batteries and the torpedo tubes to shields, these sharks are nimble enough for them to be any use anyways Dodge paused, and while you're at it, send a sit-rep and a request for support to the fleet and our allies
Captain! the shout came simultaneously from two different officers and Dodge glanced straight at tactical, giving tacit permission to speak, they were in combat after all so tactical had priority, lots of blips appearing, looks like support craft and they are all fleeing the Del wait, picking up instabilities in the Del's Naquadah reactors now sir
Helm, move us away from the Del, but try and keep us between the hostiles and the evac
Dodge then glanced at engineering, waiting for her piece of bad news as the ship shook once more, fire in main engineering
Captain, shields are now at 35, and we've still got 13 fighters out there
Swearing, Dodge ran across to tactical, the engineering, checking the status and tactical displays for himself. Then, he stopped and dived back to tactical. He glanced at a lone blip, one that so far had stayed out of the fight and smiled, tightly.
Helm, make flank speed to the mothership, tactical, make all tubes ready in all respects including opening the outer doors, lets see how hard they fight with a clipped wing, we're taking out their mothership people
We don't have power to spare captain; it's already all used to shore up the shields
Then use the manual launch procedure if you have too but I want that carrier dead!
The ship rocked once more and Dodge stiffened, this time it felt different, ominous.
Shields down!
The ship shook, the whole frame shuddering and groaning, a sound that reminded Dodge far too much of a submarine under far too much pressure. Only here, the idea was to keep the pressure in, not out.
For a split second, the lights flicked out, then flicked on dimmer as the whooping sound of the hull breech alarm filled the air.
Torpedoes are ready captain, and we have range
Fire!
The prow of the Stingray glowed momentarily, the burning heat of the four Sparrow missiles lighting up the hull as they leapt from the tubes.
Then, the engines flicked off, conserving their fuel for the terminal homing phase of their attack run. The Drakh fighter pilots weren't fools, they knew their only way home had come under fire and they charged forward, ignoring the Stingray in their haste to destroy the missiles before they destroyed the Drakh carrier.
The Pilots after all, knew the carriers greatest weakness. It had no weapons of its own, relying on its fighters for all of its offensive needs and much of its defences. Indeed, the carrier itself only had a thick armoured hull and a relatively weak gravitic defence grid for its own protection.
But they had a problem, the Tau'ri were all to aware how vulnerable their missiles were to interception by fighters and in response had painted them black, making it much harder for the pilots to see the missiles whilst they were coasting, indeed, it forced the Drakh to check their sensors constantly just to confirm that there were missiles out there.
In their anxiousness to destroy the missiles, they didn't notice that they were being allowed to charge past the Stingray at ranges that placed them lethally close to the Dauntless class Heavy Destroyers Pulse Laser batteries.
They found out suddenly, abruptly.
Ten fighters died in mere seconds, leaving three frantically evading fighters trying to escape the wrath of Dodge, but they may have had weapons powerful enough to rapidly erode the vessels shields under their combined assault but they were not very manoeuvrable. In truth, their efforts to escape were truly an act of futility.
The Drakh carrier, seeing its fighter wing abruptly die sensibly decided to turn and flee, but the Sparrows had just hit terminal homing range, their engines lighting up again.
Three detonated on the escaping carrier, blowing the thick armour plate into shreds, the sudden outpouring of atmosphere and pressure collapsing several bulkheads and crippling that sector of the hull.
The fourth sailed right through the debris, impacting directly on the carriers hyperdrives, releasing the massive energy build up triggered by the ships preparations to escape to safety.
The resulting shockwave threw Stingray tumbling ten thousand kilometres from their last location, and triggered the Del Shakka Mel's already critical reactors.
