Robotech: The Stargate Saga
Disclaimer: I do not own the characters and universes that I am about to mangle around and mash together for my own demented author amusement – sadly all Robotech and Stargate characters and concepts remain the property of Harmony Gold and MGM respectively – I am merely borrowing them and make absolutely no profit from their use. As a result, please keep the legal attack dogs – also known as lawyers – firmly muzzled and on a leash as I have no money to give to anyone.
Authors Notes: Well, here it is the first part of the Battle of Elysium. This battle is going to be something of a style experiment for me, if it works, I will write future battles this way if it doesn't well I will just continue writing them in the way that I always have. One thing that I would like to remind you all of is that while the Goa'uld are megalomaniacal and evil to the core I will not be writing them as the moustache twirling cartoonish villains that the canon Stargate show had this bad habit of somewhat turning them into. Instead I will be writing them as I feel they should have been written as a powerful and dangerous foe, one that only a fool would underestimate. I hope nobody minds. Finally, conversation in bold represents as always, the distorted voice of a Goa'uld. Conversation in italic represents a host speaking to a symbiote and conversation in bold italic represents a symbiote talking to their host. Well now that that's over with let's crack on with the chapter shall we.
Chapter Eighteen
Goa'uld Mothership
Orbiting Elysium
Sometime Later
Charon smiled as his new First Prime, Kel'nor, finished showing him around his new flagship. To say he was pleased by the new vessel would have been an understatement as this new ship was a massive improvement over the Ha'tak he had previously commanded in Hades' service. Belonging to the brand new Sha'ha'tak-class the vessel around him was far more powerful than the older design, possessing far more powerful shields and far more advanced weapons systems. Not to mention more weapons, he thought noting on the tablet he was reading all the additional weapons that this new ship had available, he was especially pleased to note the addition of plasma accelerator arrays – originally developed by Zeus's pet scientist Hephaestus and provided to the other System Lords as required by one of Ra's edicts that only a fool attempted to defy – on all angles reducing the vulnerability to attack by smaller vessels like the Al'kesh – which had been somewhat notorious for its ability to outmanoeuvre standard anti-ship cannons – and its bigger cousin the Nal'kesh long range bomber. Not to mention the ubiquitous Udajeet fighters which could cause all sorts of havoc if they slipped in through a momentary hole in your shield grid – which could and did happen in battle as individual shield emitters failed – allowing them to hug close to the hull blasting away with their light staff cannons.
The addition of plasma accelerator arrays however reduced this problem significantly since they fired fast enough and were rapid tracking enough to knock down fighters while being still powerful enough to rip away the shields of bombers. Though he noted with approval that another new development integrated into the Sha'ha'tak design was the shields were conformal to the hull – expending only at most a dozen meters above the hull and following the contours of the ship – instead of forming into an elliptical bubble around the whole ship. The Goa'uld had long known that a conformal layout would have been much better, allowing force field coherence to remain longer while also reducing the amount of power drawn from the reactors to establish the field in the first place, than a shield bubble. Unfortunately, until very recently they hadn't been able to make it work.
He just hoped the improved efficiency would help against the Zentraedi when they inevitably came. From Zackary's memory he knew the bioengineered giants to be a very formidable and dangerous foe who possessed immensely powerful beam weapons as well as powerful missiles that used some type of plasma warhead. Unfortunately, due to the fact that he was at the end of the day a simple grunt no different to a Jaffa, his host didn't know much more than that about the weapons. He knew that they were a mixture of charged particle beams – generated from something called protoculture whatever that was – and lasers but that was it. Oh, the information he'd gained on the weaknesses of the Zentraedi battle mecha would be useful - he had already ensured that the Jaffa both on the ships and on the ground knew about them – but it wasn't much use against the capital ships.
A crystalline sounding bleep from the desk caught his attention. He put the tablet – and its reader stone – down and pressed the offending crystalline control. "What is it?" he said.
"Sorry to disturb you my lord but our sensors are picking up the spatial distortions that you told us to watch out for," Kel'nor reported from the bridge. "They appear to be forming near the orbit of the fourth planet."
"Alert the fleet to prepare for combat and advise Lord Hades of the development. I will be right there," Charon ordered, one of the few things about robotechnology space combat he had learned from his hosts memory was the fact that their FTL system – called space folding – produced gravitons and a subspace distortion before their ships arrived.
"Like I would tell you anything more even if I knew it," Zackary snapped from his prison at the back of Charon's mind.
"You would not be able to stop me now silence you insolent host," Charon shot back, irritated somewhat that the host still had not gotten the message to be quiet. He sent a blast of pain the hosts way even as part of him heard an acknowledgement of the order from Kel'nor on the pel'tac. Somehow, he wasn't surprised when Zackary didn't react, he had already learned that this particular host had a high pain threshold.
"You know that goes both ways, right? You can read my memory and I can read yours. Which shows you are not a god like you claim just a sentient parasite with a bad case of megalomania."
"You don't gain anything about learning about our magic. You will be my host forever."
"Please its science and not magic. The fact that you think it's magic, shows only how deluded your parasitic species is. And don't get too comfortable inside me Charon. When the Zentraedi catch you, my people will remove you from me."
"I doubt your people have the ability to do that," Charon replied as he stood up and began to leave his ship chambers. "And even if they did, I would kill you long before I let you go."
"We shall see about that, Charon."
"Oh, I know it as a fact Zackary now silence." With a thought Charon sent more blasts of pain at his amusingly insolent host, only to scowl slightly when though he could sense he was uncomfortable Zackary not to respond with the satisfaction of a scream. He quietly shook his head as he made his way down the corridors of the ship towards the pel'tac. This host was certainly strong willed and extremely stubborn, it was going to take some time to properly break him and make him accept the fact that he had been granted the great honour of being the vessel of a living god. But then never let it be said that he did not like a challenge.
He put those thoughts as he arrived in the pel'tac. He immediately noted the slight differences in the design of the pel'tac on this new class of mothership in comparison to the Ha'tak. On the bridge of a Ha'tak aside from the throne there were only two stations, the master console from which all main systems were directed and the weapons control station. The Sha'ha'tak pel'tac was a bit different, there were three stations with an additional weapons control station on either side of the master console. He approved of the additional station as Jaffa were only mortals and could only control so many weapons at once from one station.
The holographic HUD in the trapezoidal viewport was active showing the sensor data of the distortions out near the fourth planet. Ships – with the red icons of threats – were beginning to appear out of the distortions as warships erupted into normal space from the subspace domain that the Zentraedi – and his hosts own people – referred to as fold space.
"Status report," he ordered even as the fold distortions began to fade, and the numbers of individual contacts began to form up as the subspace distortions dissipated.
"My lord sensors indicate forty-two individual ship contacts," Kel'nor reported. "They are currently holding formation near the fourth planet of the system. They are far out of our weapons range. All ships report manned and ready. Planetary defences are coming online as well, ground forces also report ready to repel any forces that get past us."
"The Zentraedi will not stay where they are for long," Charon said knowingly, he could see what the Zentraedi were doing. Whoever their commander was he had deliberately come out of space fold where they were to both fully assemble their formation and to give his forces chance to look over their opposition from range.
"My lord the enemy ships are attempting to scan us. We are blocking them."
"Excellent."
For a few more moments nothing more happened then new contacts appeared, separating from the Zentraedi fleet and beginning to accelerate towards them. Each of the craft was roughly the same size as a Nal'kesh long range bomber and Charon knew immediately what they were. Zentraedi reconnaissance craft which Terrans had codenamed Cyclops recon ships.
"My lord we are reading twenty-two contacts leaving the enemy fleet and advancing towards us."
"Reconnaissance craft. Dispatch fighters to intercept and destroy, assign the first frigate squadron to support."
"Yes, my lord. Lord Hades is sending a transmission to the enemy fleet."
"Let us see it."
"Yes, my lord."
Immediately the holographic display changed from the overall tactical situation to showing Hades sitting on his throne in the main palace throne room. He was not alone as Queen Persephone was sitting nearby and though she was immaculate presented as always Charon could see the masked tiredness in her. He knew that being in the throne room like this, so soon after having completed a spawning cycle, would be the very last thing that the queen would have wanted. Like many Queen Goa'uld Persephone preferred to rest after such things but then spawning – while a sacred time – was always a very stressful experience for them. However, like her sister queen, Hera, was with Zeus Persephone was loyal to her husband and would have insisted on being present in such a situation.
It was then that Hades spoke. "I am Hades, God of the Dead," he said in his most imperious voice, "who is it who dares to challenge me?"
Zentraedi Battlecruiser XL-17401
A Few Minutes Earlier
Standing in the command blister on her battleship Commander Neleya observed as her squadron of ships continued with their defold operation. She was quite pleased with how disciplined about it everyone was being especially as it had been quite some time since they had really done anything beyond patrol near the Terran homeworld – with the only excitement being occasionally destroying any of the wreckage from the battle with Dolza that had drifted close enough to the planet to get caught in its gravitational pull, though the recent arrival of the Asgard had also been a source of excitement and considerable tension given that their two races didn't exactly have the best relationship – and it was good to see that that inactivity had not had any negative consequences. In fact, if anything efficiency among her crew seemed to have improved, no doubt due to the fact that their allies had been teaching them skills that had long been denied them by the Robotech Masters. Skills that let them maintain, repair and operate their vessels far more effectively than ever before.
"Defold operations completed commander. All ships are in position and report ready," one of the communications officers reported from below.
"Very good. Scan the enemy fleet I want to know exactly what I am up against."
"Yes commander."
Neleya turned her full attention to the holographic screens floating in their projector fields outside of the command blister. Each screen showing information on the status of not just her fleet but analysis of the information being pulled in by the sensors on the space immediately around them. As per standard Zentraedi fleet doctrine for flying into an unknown situation she had brought her fleet out of space fold some distance from the target. Not only did doing that allow them to compensate for any unexpected fold space drift – which had been known to happen from time to time though it was usually not that big a factor – but it let them deploy into battle formation without interference from the enemy. Not to mention it let them get a good look at their foes before moving to engage them.
"Commander we are unable to scan the enemy fleet," sensors reported, "the enemy ships appear to be using ECM to block our scans."
"Then we will have to do this the old-fashioned way won't we," Neleya said aloud, "instruct our frigates to launch their reconnaissance craft. Tell them to move towards the enemy fleet and determine their numbers and formation. All other ships are to remain at their current coordinates."
"Yes commander."
For a few more minutes nothing happened then new icons appeared on one of the holoscreens as each of the twenty-two Tou Redir-class frigates that made up the vast majority of her squadron launched the solo Cyclops reconnaissance craft they kept in their main hangar bays. It took only a few moments for the recon pilots to form up and then the Cyclops began moving away from her forces and advancing towards the enemy fleet clustered in orbit above the third planet. With their ion fusion engines running at full power it would not take them very long to make the journey and once they were close enough they would be able to give her all the information she needed on the strength and position of not just the enemy fleet but the planetary defence grid that the Tok'ra had warned them about as she didn't doubt that their sensors – being optimised for such things – would quickly penetrate the Goa'uld electronic countermeasures.
The response from the Goa'uld was immediate.
"Commander sensors indicate multiple Goa'uld fighter squadrons along with a group of frigate-weight vessels are moving to intercept our recon ships," sensors reported.
"Not unexpected, advise the recon units to be prepared to defend themselves. Have all our ships prepare a covering barrage."
"Yes commander."
"Commander we are receiving a message from the third planet," communications reported.
Neleya raised an eyebrow. So, the enemy commander or whoever is in charge down their wishes to speak with me, does he? Well, this should be interesting, she thought. "Very well put it through," she ordered.
Immediately another projector field activated and a holographic screen pixeled into existence. On it she could see what appeared to be two micronians – one male and one female – sitting on golden, gilded thrones. The male was dressed relatively simply but expensively in white and blue silk robes with gold threads woven through it. He wore a crown made from what looked like golden leaves and had a strange device over his right hand, a device she recognised from the Fort Minotaur security recordings. The female sitting next to him was dressed similarly though instead of a crown her hair was covered with a simple appearing golden mesh inset with sparkling points of light that she realized after a few seconds were jewels of some kind likely diamonds. Like the male she had a device around her right hand. For a few seconds neither of the aliens spoke and Neleya got the distinct impression that they were sizing her up. She didn't mind she was doing the same.
Then the males' eyes glowed – as if he had a light behind them – before he spoke. "I am Hades, God of the Dead," he said in a deep, distorted voice that was not in any way human. In fact, it sounded even more alien than the quasi-synthetic voices the Robotech Masters had their triumvirate clones use and those could be as creepy as hell. However, this voice wasn't creepy, it was something more visceral than that. Something that said that this being before her was literally evil, evil in a way even the Robotech Masters could never be. "Who is it who dares to challenge me?"
"I am Commander Neleya of the Free Zentraedi Forces," Neleya said, inwardly smirking at the free bit. For so long her kind had been enslaved to the Robotech Masters – without even realizing that they were – that it was always a thrill to indicate that while they remained warriors, they were slaves to them no longer. "I am here because you attacked a species under our protection and abducted one of their people. You will make restitution for such unwarranted aggression and return the abducted man to us."
Hades actually smiled slightly, though there was no warmth in it. "Your insolence amuses me Commander Neleya," he answered, "but I will do no such things. Not only has your man been granted the great honour of becoming the new host to my Fleet Lord buts gods do not make restitution to lesser beings. However, I am feeling merciful today if you turn around and leave now, I will ensure no harm comes to you."
Host, Neleya thought feeling a note of horror go up her spine at that little bit of information. From what the Tok'ra had told Admiral Chase – who had ensured that they all saw the records of his interviewing the two Tok'ra in his office before they'd completed resupply let alone folded out – she knew what that meant. Sergeant Reeds body had been invaded and taken over from within by a sentient alien parasite. With the most horrifying bit about the whole thing being that the Terran would be aware of everything that was happening to him, everything that was going on around him but wouldn't be able to do anything about it. It was a horrific fate to say the least and not something she would wish upon anyone, not even her worst enemies.
"I cannot do that," she answered at last, "you will remove your fleet lord from Sergeant Reed and return him to us immediately. If you fail to do so we will come and take him ourselves, if that means we have to destroy most of your fleet to do so then so be it."
"It seems mercy is lost upon you but then what can I expect from a windup toy like a Zentraedi? I refuse your demand commander and since you have squandered your one opportunity to leave here alive know I will take great pleasure in torturing your soul for eternity."
"We will see about that."
"That we will. Lord Charon have you been listening?"
The holoscreen split as a new video feed appeared bringing in an image of Sergeant Reed, dressed in leathers and silks and sitting on a throne of his own. The throne was mounted on a dais with two tall statues on either side, each holding what looked like a ball of light. Neleya immediately noticed that he had an identical device to the other two over his right hand though his was silver in colour instead of gold.
"I have indeed Lord Hades," Reed/Charon said speaking in that same, distorted and inhuman voice his own eyes glowing from within. "They will never take this host from me. What are your orders concerning these interlopers in your domain my lord?"
"Destroy them."
"As you wish."
The holoscreens disappeared as the communications links were closed down from the other end. Neleya sighed before straightening her shoulders. She had hoped that the Goa'uld would be reasonable and would return Sergeant Reed – even if it meant taking this Charon out of him – without incident. It had obviously been a vain hope and now she had no choice but to try and capture him by force as battle between her fleet and the Goa'uld was now inevitable.
Something that became apparent seconds later.
"Commander the Goa'uld fleet is breaking orbit of Elysium and beginning to advance towards us," sensors reported, "at their current speed they will be in missile range in ten minutes and beam weapon range within twelve. We have now identified that the fleet consisted of twenty large vessels ranging from cruiser to battlecruiser weight classes and thirty smaller vessels of frigate weight. Enemy ships are launching more fighters and what appear to be bombers or heavy fighters."
"Then let us move out to meet them," Neleya said, "all ships break orbit and begin advancing towards the Goa'uld fleet. Launch all fighter pods and prepare for combat. How long until our recon units encounter the enemy?"
"One minute and thirty seconds commander. All lasers are ready for covering bombardment."
"Very well. Let the Goa'uld craft take the first shots then burn them from the sky."
"Yes commander."
The forty-two warships of Commander Neleya's squadron turned slightly from their previous position above the fourth planet of this star system and began moving towards the Goa'uld fleet. Gnerl fighter pods began launching from their hangar bays and formed up around and ahead of the ships of the fleet, preparing themselves to once again engage in battle. The fact that this time they would be doing it to aide a friend and ally, a friend they in their ignorance had previously hurt badly, was not lost on the Zentraedi pilots and to a soul they were eager to get a grip with their new foe in the name of their Terran allies.
Travelling ahead of the Zentraedi force the twenty-two Cyclops reconnaissance vessels were the first to draw blood. Flying ahead of the Nar'kesh frigates the swarm of Goa'uld fighters opened fire upon the Zentraedi sending bolts of golden glowing plasma towards their foes. The response was immediate even as the plasma bolts slammed into dense green armour and shattered, splattering across the armour leaving blackened smudged where the bolts hit but otherwise doing no damage to the dense armour. Being from a race that had been designed to be warriors for generations the Cyclops recon vessels were not unarmed, far from it in fact. Something that they proved seconds later as everyone let loose with their missiles, each firing four of their twelve onboard missiles into space. In an instant space became a hailstorm of powered ordinance as eighty Rotpaen Touwhaug missiles – known to Terrans as Minstrels – shot towards the death gliders with nothing but homicidal mayhem on their electronic minds.
For a moment the Jaffa pilots stared in stupefied astonishment, both from the fact that they were coming under attack from powered projectiles and that there was so many of them, then they began reacting to defend themselves. Switching modes on their staff cannons – sacrificing power for a higher firing speed – the Jaffa opened fire on the incoming projectiles while also beginning to take evasive action. Missiles immediately began dying, punched into hazy balls of disassociated ions by the superheated kiss of plasma fire. It did little good as the missiles accelerated to terminal attack velocity and locked onto their final targets smart targeting systems – a slight but highly useful upgrade to the missiles from their Terran friends – ensuring that no missile locked onto the same target. More missiles died, vanishing in momentary bursts of flame as plasma consumed them.
Then the Jaffa ran out of time as the missiles began impacting. Designed as they were to penetrate the advanced nanolaminate materials used in robotechnology armours the Minstrels made short work of the slightly more flimsy death gliders. In an instant entire squadrons of the vaguely bat-winged fighters vanished inside the expanding yellow-white sphere of an explosion in space as the missile warheads annihilated them, leaving the rest scattered and shaken by the sudden death of so many of their fellow warriors.
Seeing the survivors, the Cyclops prepared to launch a second salvo only to suddenly find themselves coming under fire from the Nar'kesh as the Goa'uld frigates came into weapons range themselves and opened up with their forward staff cannons. Immediately Cyclops began dying as the bolts of the frigate grade cannons, being denser, faster and hotter than the bolts from the gliders, ripped through their armour like superheated sledgehammers smashing eggs.
Fortunately for the Zentraedi recon pilots and their crews the battle was close enough to the leading ships of Commander Neleya's fleet for the starship crews to aide their beleaguered fellows. Intense bluish-white streams of supercharged, highly compressed photons shot out of the hybrid laser/particle combination cannons that had for centuries formed the standard anti-ship armament of the Zentraedi fleets. The leading frigates were hit immediately, the beams slamming into the defensive force fields surrounding them making the shields glow brilliantly and reveal a quasi-crystalline structure that hugged close to the hulls as like on the new Sha'ha'tak the shields on the just as new Nar'kesh frigates were conformal.
Shuddering under heavy fire the Nar'kesh changed their focus from the Cyclops and increased power to their engines as they attempted to bring the Zentraedi capital ships within range of their own cannons. Another volley of laser fire slammed into the frigates shields making them flare brighter as the stress on them grew though they continued to hold. Again the Zentraedi fired this time the heavier particle cannons also fired sending out dense light-blue streams of supercharged subatomic particles that were anywhere from two to ten meters thick.
For the Nar'kesh frigates it was too much.
Already stressed shields failed allowing the Zentraedi particle beams and lasers to rip into the hulls of the vessels. It was here however that a difference in the weapons impacts became apparent as much as at Linkotis when particle beams struck the unshielded frigates the frigates immediately erupted into fireballs as the naquada in their hulls amplified and conducted the destructive power of the particle beams. For those hit by the lasers though the effect was different as the naquada resisted the intense heat imparted by rapid photonic decay for several seconds before melting allowing the beams to cut deep into the hulls. The lasers disappeared and the wounded frigates staggered and fell out of formation bleeding debris and the bodies of dead and dying crew members into space.
Zentraedi Battlecruiser XL-17401
Commander Neleya's raised an eyebrow in a very Vulcan-like fashion as she observed the performance of the five Goa'uld frigates they'd just engaged. She was surprised to see the difference in the shield technology compared to the records of the battle over Linkotis between Serval and Lord Solec that she had seen. Unlike the shields on Lord Solec's ship – which had been admittedly still quite impressive since they had withstood the heavy firepower of a Thuverl Salan-class heavy cruiser for quite some time – which had formed a bubble around the ship these shields seemed to be almost like another layer of armour over the hull. The sensors showed that this configuration was far more resilient against their weapons systems though eventually the power of robotech weaponry – especially protoculture generated particle beams – showed itself by collapsing the shield and cutting into the hull.
Though even then the effects had been different depending on what weapon hit what ship. Three of the five ships had been hit by particle beams and had instantly erupted into massive explosions in the same way Solec's ship had when its shields failed. The other two however had been hit only by their lasers and while both had ultimately been disabled, falling out of formation trailing bodies and debris from the molten-edged holes cut into their hulls, they hadn't been destroyed. Interesting, she thought glancing over at her advisor who until this moment had remained quiet and in the background.
"Did you notice that Tashka?" she asked.
"Indeed, I did," Tashka confirmed coming up to stand beside her. "The shields on these frigates seem to be far more advanced than those on the Goa'uld ship Serval encountered over Linkotis. Though the way the ships reacted depending on which of our weapons hit them is even more intriguing. The naquada-based alloy used by the Goa'uld must react very differently between lasers and particle beams for some reason, though what that reason is I would care not to speculate at this time."
"It is an interesting puzzle," Neleya agreed, "make a note of it for investigation later would you. Maybe Admiral Chase will be able to get an answer as to the different effects out of the two Tok'ra guests aboard the factory satellite."
"Yes commander."
Neleya turned back to the comm scopes. "Sensors how long until the rest of the Goa'uld fleet are within weapons range," she asked.
"Commander the enemy fleet will be in missile range in five minutes, seven minutes to cannon range," weapons reported immediately.
"Wait until they are in beam cannon range then all ships open fire. Destroy all but the command ship, I want them disabled not destroyed. Tell the STORM Commando units we took aboard to prepare for a ship-to-ship boarding action."
"Yes commander."
Charon's Mothership
That Same Time
Sitting on his pel'tac throne Charon scowled slightly as he observed the advanced wave of frigates sent to support the first wing of gliders be destroyed by the Zentraedi cannons. While the frigates had weathered the initial volley of laser fire very well, the new conformal shield matrix standing up to the powerful Zentraedi guns far more efficiently than he had expected from what he knew of robotech energy weapons, the following salvos of laser and especially particle cannon fire had quickly depleted the shields and destroyed the vessels. At least the particle beams had as the two hit by lasers had only been mission killed, rendered drifting dead in space with severe damage, and not outright destroyed.
The difference in the effects of the weapons was quite confusing. And in this instance his hosts memories were no use as Zackary didn't know how robotech weapons did what they did, he was trained to use them especially those of a Tomahawk-class destroid, just that they were utterly lethal.
"Orders my lord," Kel'nor asked from the main console.
"Stay on course prepare to engage the Zentraedi," Charon ordered, "instruct all ships to deactivate their hyperdrives and transfer the power to their shields. Also instruct the Al'kesh and Nal'kesh to prepare to begin bombing runs on the enemy fleet."
"Yes, my lord," Kel'nor acknowledged and relayed the orders to the other ships. Abruptly an advisory came across the communications link, and he smiled slightly. "My lord we have received a message from Lord Orpheus. He is inbound with the second fleet. They will arrive within five minutes."
"Excellent. Tell Orpheus to be prepared to drop out of hyperspace behind the Zentraedi. But only when I give the order."
"Yes, my lord."
Charon allowed himself a slight warriors smile as he leaned back on his throne. When Orpheus arrived, he would have the Zentraedi fleet trapped between two fleets of ships though Orpheus' fleet was far smaller than his own consisting only of six Ha'tak and two dozen Nar'kesh. It would however be enough as it would force the Zentraedi to split the fire of their admittedly formidable weapons systems. Which would quickly enable him to destroy them.
Soon this battle would be over and then, well the time would come to pay the Terrans back for their insolence in sending the Zentraedi here. He was quite looking forward to seeing what Thanatos latest inventions, the Javelins, were capable of doing to a planet. The Terran homeworld would make a very good test subject for the weapons and seeing it die would be another tool he could use to break the will of his host.
"They'll never get through," Zackary told him. "We'll shoot your missiles down before they enter the atmosphere."
"Really and how will you do that since your people don't have the ability to detect a cloaked ship. The Tok'ra they won't give you that information or technology. Even if they did you will have no time to implement it. No Zackary Reed your world will die for its insolence, and you will be mine forever more."
"We will see about that parasite."
"Indeed, we will."
Charon dismissed his host and looked back at the holographic tactical display. They were getting closer to the Zentraedi fleet, in another few minutes they would be in range and the final phase of this battle would begin.
And the Zentraedi would burn.
Authors Notes: Well, another chapter bites the metaphorical dust. I hope you all enjoyed it and I am sorry to leave it on such a cliff hanger but the chapter was starting to get a bit too long and unwieldy so I have decided to split the battle across multiple chapters. Next chapter the Battle of Elysium will really heat up as Charon doesn't yet realize – mostly because Zackary doesn't know them since he's an army grunt not a fleet officer or starship crew – that the Zentraedi guns have a considerably longer range than his do. Will that be enough to give Commander Neleya victory in the battle to come or will the transfer of power from hyperdrives to shields have more of an effect than Charon realizes especially with the frigates and his new flagships new shields.
On the issue of the shields before anyone accuses me of overpowering the Goa'uld remember that by this point there has been a massive war raging in the Goa'uld Empire for several years. As a result of this war Goa'uld technology has improved as projects that were very much on P'tah's back burner so to speak have suddenly gotten higher priorities. Projects that have given rise to the upgraded shields – which only the new Nar'kesh frigates and Sha'ha'tak motherships can use as the shield emitters and generators are a different design – as well as the two new ship classes and types i.e. the above mentioned Nar'kesh and Sha'ha'tak. The former being a cheaper, quicker build alternative to the latter which due to both its size and complexity is a much more expensive ship to build than even the Ha'tak, hence why for most Goa'uld the Ha'tak will remain their mainstay heavy capital ship with the Sha'ha'tak only appearing as a command or flagship.
I am hoping to have the next chapter done within a week or so but I cannot make any promises as I do have some real life issues to take care of. Not to mention that I have another chapter for Into The Fire partway done, so that might get finished first before the next part of the Battle of Elysium. We will have to see what happens. Until next time.