Darkest before Dawn
by Warringer
Chapter Three
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Pathfinder rocked as numerous energy beams from the Dilgar Heavy Cruiser slammed into her stern. Several layers of hull material were vaporized immediately, while other layers were heated up and held the energy of the weapons in bay.
There was a short moment of panic in the crew of Pathfinder, but it went by very fast as survival instincts of centuries kicked in. Mankind had changed greatly. Survival was something that was now deeply ingrained into mankinds genes and it was a problem to get against these genes.
Numerous circular hatches all over the dorsal hull opened up and half spherical weapon turrets moved out onto the hull, dotting the dorsal hull with heavy weapons. Force field bearings allowed the turrets to move faster than any normal mechanic system and the turrets swirled around, while Pathfinder rolled around to present its dorsal hull towards the Dilgar Heavy Cruiser.
Countless lenses of lasers and stubby barrels of particle and plasma weapons of the turrets pointed directly at the Heavy Cruiser.
The crew of the cruiser didn't know what happened to them, as meter thick beams of light, gamma and x-ray radiation, neutron and anti-proton beams slammed into the hull of their ship, tearing through the reinforced armor and than deep into the center of the ship, gutting it with just one salvo.
The Dilgar ship started to drift as it lost power and atmosphere leaked from the large wound it had taken from Pathfinder.
Another salvo of concentrated fire ripped into the armored hull, reducing the stern area of the large ship to molten slack. The third salvo finished the dying ship as it reduced the last part of the large vessel to not much more than scrap metal.
The fighters the Heavy Cruiser had launched before he chose to attack Pathfinder now found themselves shot from the sky, as the heavy weapons, swirling around on their forcefield bearings fast enough to track the fast fighters.
The fight wasn't much of it. It was like someone shot a mosquito with the 'Atomic Annie'. The fighters hadn't much chance against the fast tracking, individually targeting heavy weapons of Pathfinder.
Not even two minutes after the Dilgar cruiser had attacked Pathfinder, no living Dilgar remained in the immediate area surrounding the human ship.
Than Pathfinder jumped. It simply disappeared from the spot it had been, before a extremely intense light bathed the Dilgar and Narn ships duking it out on the other side of the planet, with the Narn loosing the fight.
Pathfinder appeared from the intense light and her weapon turrets opened fire again.
Deadly beams from weapons, conceived by the mind of humans having a healthy paranoia born from centuries of survival and build with technology hundreds of millions of years old, tore into the two Heavy Cruisers attacking the Narn.
Another Heavy Cruiser died in the salvo of Pathfinders weapons, before the Dilgar could even react to the attack. The reaction was to fire at the human ship. X-ray lasers and Plasma Pulse cannons slammed into Pathfinders hull, some of the hits destroying weapon turrets.
But Pathfinder continued to fire, her weapons firing at the remaining Heavy Cruiser again scoring a 'Instant Kill'.
As the third and last Heavy Cruiser in the Kotok system exploded in a bright light, Pathfinder turned to face and fire at the smaller Dilgar vessels.
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It was three days later that the Council of Survivors met. In ancient pre-cataclysm times, the Council Chambers had once been the seat of a ruling body of a nation of Earth in the small city of Bonn. Back than the Chambers of the Council had been called the 'Waterworks' and had housed the Bundestag of the Federal Republic of Germany.
There were about a hundred members of the Council and at this important meeting they had all come together on a matter Pathfinder had brought up.
For the last few years Pathfinder had provided the Council and humanity, or Sounansha as they called themselves now in these post-cataclysm times, with a great many of informations.
Pathfinder had visited many of the nearby systems and found numerous places that were predistinated for colonization. In some of the systems Pathfinder had found strange artifacts floating in deep space, close to an inhabitable planet, as the crew of the ship hadn't been able to find out what these artifacts were, colonization of the planets nearby had been postponed until it was found out what the artifacts were.
Some of the worlds had been colonized and the people send there thrived on their new home worlds.
But now something had happened that needed the full Councils evaluation. Two weeks ago Pathfinder had announced that they had meet alien life forms capable of interstellar flight. First Contact had been made as the scientists had predicted. But than something had happened that showed that not all aliens were friendly like the 'Narn'.
The Kotok system where Pathfinder had met with the Narn, had been attacked by another alien race. The Narn had provided Pathfinder with some information about this other race, calling them Dilgar.
The Dilgar had attacked Pathfinder and the human ship had all but destroyed the Dilgar force, but she hadn't done so without damage.
The Council was busy reviewing he information they had gotten from the Narn. The Dilgar had attacked surrounding space and there had been a war between the Narn and the Dilgar, with the Dilgar also attacking several other races, called the League of Nonalligned Worlds by the Narn, and a race called Centauri.
The war had drawn over years and only stopped some years ago, because of the Centauri. But even than the Dilgar attacked systems of the League and the Narn constantly.
The Council saw itself faced with a race that was a threat. If they ever found the location of the Sol system or any of the outer colonies, the Dilgar would come and wage war.
They had already proved that they would attack an unknown ship by attacking Pathfinder. They would clearly attack a human colony if they had the chance.
Survival instincts came through in the members of the Council.
The Dilgar were a threat to humanities survival. They needed to be dealt with before they could find out where humanity lived and destroyed human settlements.
But the Council hadn't much they could use to minimize the treat of the Dilgar. Pathfinder was the only vessel that was capable of extended journeys into other systems and capable of ensuring the survival of its crew. Even than it had cost the lives of ten crewmen to destroy the Dilgar vessels.
They needed more ships like Pathfinder. They needed ships that were capable of mounting more weapons.
Humanity needed warships to make sure that they were to survive.