OBT Forum

And one quick sidetrip to HTP: New Dallas to check dates..

Wow, this should be interesting.

Can't wait for more.

“So will your ideals make you destroy this wild card that calls itself your ally? Or will you compromise them in the name of pragmatism, cracking your own foundations? What a choice for you, what a choice.”

I don't get this.
Does he know that Praetorian is no human? Does he think that Praetorian is too brutal even for angered soldiers?

Quote from: drakensis on October 06, 2013, 01:04:17 PM

“So will your ideals make you destroy this wild card that calls itself your ally? Or will you compromise them in the name of pragmatism, cracking your own foundations? What a choice for you, what a choice.”

I don't get this.
Does he know that Praetorian is no human? Does he think that Praetorian is too brutal even for angered soldiers?

I think that's Amaris cracking

Entry #15
Nadir Jump Point, New Dallas,
Terran Hegemony
12:10 13 January 2767

New Dallas’s star is quite small – meaning that the usual jump points are less than four days away from the system’s one inhabited planet. Normally that would be too far out for what I had in mind, but in this instance it opened up an opportunity.

I braced myself for a fight – if the Republicans held the Pavise M-9 station here and if they’d left any substantial number of M-5s to defend it, then I would be fighting a naval battle for my life and an electronic battle for control over the drones.

To my good fortune, only one of those things is true – the Pavise is active but its protectors are only a squadron of M-3 drones – enough for police work on unarmed civilian jumpships but they’ll only threaten me by ramming – something I’m alert for.

Even better, I’ve hit the exact point I wanted to arrive at – just outside the effective range of the station’s weapons. It might mean that I can’t engage them myself – my own range is no better – but it gives the First Royal Swiss Cavalry a chance to detach.

My only real cause for complaint is that once the Rimjobs recover from their surprise, they don’t make the mistake of sending their M-3s out into my weapon range. Instead, as my onboard Strikers launch and stream towards the Pavise the M-3s cluster in and add their fire to its Naval Lasers, hammering shots into the five squadrons (I managed to replenish them from stocks on Zebebelgenudi) that cost me fourteen Strikers in a little over two minutes.

I don’t sit idle, of course, but it takes time for my own engines to accelerate me to the sort of speeds I need for my Plan B – high speed passes to engage the station like the sitting duck that it is – and now the other sixteen Strikers are in range to fire their external ordnance.

Radio channels descend into unintelligible static as more than a dozen five kiloton warheads do their business. Most crash against the thick armour plating, converting the tons of layer metal, ceramic and other materials into plasma but failing to penetrate. Some though, find weak spots and the penetrators function as intended, letting the nuclear reactions commence inside the M-9’s massive hull.

The M-3s drop into standby, quite a relief since they’d been holding out against my intrusions quite well, and a moment later I have them – and the two-dozen Voidseeker Interceptors that had been about to do something very unfriendly to my Strikers. It appears that the Pavise’s tactical computer must be a casualty. Good.

“Major Corvus, we’re in.”

“I’m on it.” The Colossus and the Overlord fan out towards the waiting jumpships Her infantry are vac-suited and the ‘Mechs configured for void operations. If any of those captains have any latent Republican sympathies then they’d be wise to keep them very quiet.

One scan of the Pavise confirms it’s not just mission-killed, it’s fragmented into four large and myriad smaller sections. It’s a design flaw, I think. If they’re going to still be used when this is all over, someone needs to think of a way to reinforce the structures against that sort of hit. Then again, if someone already had then I’d be having a much harder time right now.

Now, there had been two dozen Caspars assigned to each of New Dallas’ jump-points. If the twenty-four assigned here weren’t around then where are they?

Heading for New Dallas is the answer and that tells me a lot. There’s no way they’d be sent there unless New Dallas is holding out still and unless there’s a command ship with them, they must still be operating on direction from the Pavise here. Not on standby, of course, that would be ridiculous at a distance of several light minutes. But even so…

The drive flares of more than twenty warships are detectable at this range – and there’s more than twenty of them! They must have regrouped with the drones from the Zenith jump point and reinforcing warships… probably a full invasion force of the RWA as well. There’s got to be at least eighty capital ships and as many dropships in that formation and they’re less than a day out from New Dallas.

Isn’t a just a goddamn shame that a quarter of that fleet isn’t taking orders from Amaris anymore? I may be too far apart to give them tactical direction but I can most certainly give them new targeting priorities.

Quite a number of the Rim Worlds warships are Block I and Block II Lola-class destroyers not so very different from the M-5 and M-5C drones intermixed into the formation. Most likely they were among the obsolete vessels that Richard Cameron sold off to Amaris. Not terrible ships really, but just a bit too fragile to face the firepower that the drones can throw. Particularly since someone considerately loaded them with nuclear-tipped capital missiles for this operation. On general broadcast, Chris Cornell warns them that ‘You Know My Name’.

Two minutes after my little fleet suddenly swerved to bring their broadsides to bear – well before the news can reach the Zenith command station that their drones need updated orders – more than forty Lolas and Caspars have been reduced to tumbling wreckage. Transport dropships scatter in all directions as the Republican command group of three Monsoon-class battleships that I’m fairly sure were not sold off legitimately open fire.

The dropships take pretty heavy losses just as secondary targets – any weapon arc of my Caspars that isn’t firing into the battleships is firing on whatever they can – the main priority is the leviathans that are smashing my four squadrons of renegades. Each has a massive broadside of naval autocannon that laugh at the armour of the destroyer-sized M-5 and they’re fighting at the same point blank range that let the drones cause such carnage in the attack.

Barham, now renamed RWS Arabella Rowe, goes silent as nuclear missiles scorch its armour from end-to end, just as I switch tracks to tell them that ‘We Won’t Get Fooled Again’. RWS Heather Durant, once SLS Rodney meets one of the M-5s head on, adding one last enemy to its score of three destroyed by its broadsides before battleship and drone die in a mutual viking funeral pyre. Surrounded and alone, SLS Thunderer, bearing the IFF of RWS Gregory Amaris explodes under the battering of the surviving drones, all nine of them.

Well… we’ve won. Yay the good guys.

If I had any delusions of immortality though, this kills them as dead as a doornail. I’ve been damn lucky not to expose myself to that sort of carnage yet and if I want to survive, I’d be wise to keep myself out of point-blank encounters.

Some Republican fighters did launch but none of them seem to have nukes so I can afford to ignore them. “Republican transports,” I transmit, via one of the drones. “Cut your engines and surrender or you will be run down.”

And now for people who are hopefully on my side. There are almost twenty drones in orbit over New Dallas, presumably still under loyal control. “This is SLS Praetorian calling Governor Clay. I have control of the Nadir jump point and I’ve neutralised the invasion force. Please respond…”

New Dallas is a true holdout.

Entry #16
High Orbit, New Dallas,
Terran Hegemony
02:30 17 January 2767

Quite sensibly, Governor Clay didn’t let me jump in via any of the three pirate points formed by New Dallas and its two moons, so I approached them the old fashioned way.

This also let them run technical teams out to the remaining drones from the slaughter and reconfigure them to take orders from the planetary SDS networks, which remained in loyalist hands. I could have prevented that, but only by firing on the shuttles, which would have been a bit counter-productive.

“You’ve made quite an impact on my people.” Governor Titus Clay had entered politics after a successful career as an SLDF officer. Given his success in both fields (he’d retired as a full General), I wasn’t inclined to underestimate him.

“If you hold off on deactivating me, I won’t ask you to go ahead and award the medals they’re suggesting. That way both extremes are equally frustrated.”

He snorts. “You’re not much of a politician. The politically correct answer would be to do both, but I’m not fool enough to try the former so you’ll take your medal and be polite about it.” While hardly on par with a SLDF sanctioned Hegemony Medal, the Star of New Dallas was well within the Governor’s authority to award and came with a string of minor privileges upon the world. Most of which would be kind of hard to claim since I can’t exactly go down there, but it’s the thought that counts.

“I guess I’ll grin and bear it.” Plus, the public support might be a factor if someone follows up the idea of shutting me down later.

“Colonel Corvus sings your praises, by the way.”

“No longer a Major?”

“General Kataga issued her a well-deserved promotion. Granted she may have to wait a while for SLDF HQ on New Earth complete the paperwork, but I don’t think Kerensky will disapprove of her.”

“Me, on the other hand…”

“Kerensky’s a practical man and you’re a valuable asset. Granted, he’s not ecstatic about SDS drones in general but you’ve proven yourself. So what are you planning next?”

“A plan? Little old me?” My face on the monitor grins.

“Son, I know full well what a junior officer with a plan that requires more balls than brains looks like and the white hair doesn’t fool me one bit.” But Clay is also grinning.

“I’ve sent word to the Eighth and Eleventh Armies, I’d be appreciative if you’d do the same. They probably don’t have the manpower or the shipping to liberate the Hegemony but if I can bust open a salient, I’m fairly sure we can keep it open long enough for reinforcements to arrive and turn that salient into a path right back to Terra.”

“That’s an ambitious plan. Of course, Amaris will do everything he can to crush you.”

“I’m sure he will. Which will make his claims to be a legitimate, benevolent ruler look a bit threadbare, not to mention pull troops away from their busy schedule of oppressing the rest of the Hegemony.”

“The problem with your plan is that if he does crush you, he’ll crush us too… and probably salt the earth of New Dallas.”

I shake my icon’s head. “You’ve been resisting him for a couple of weeks now, Governor. I’m pretty sure he’s not going to invite you around for tea and cakes any time soon. But if we can demonstrate that Amaris’ grip hasn’t tightened yet then maybe we can convince the Commanding General that he can take the Hegemony back on the run, rather than some slow and ponderous siege that gives the Fat Man time to get the SDS networks back online.”

“I suppose I see your point. So what’s step one?”

I bring up a map of the Hegemony, centred around New Dallas. “Tyrfing. We don’t have good intelligence – surviving elements of First and Second Fleets are working on that but I’m not back in contact with them yet – but it’s a provincial capital so the Rim Worlders would have had to knock it out hard and fast. There’s a very good chance that they didn’t manage to capture SDS control intact. If I can recruit some scratch navigational crews, I should be able to bring most of the M-5 Drones there back here. That’ll give the orbital defenses of New Dallas near parity with the entire fleet at Amaris’ disposal. It makes you too tough a nut to crack.”

“I like that part. Of course, if Tyrfing has been compromised, you’ll be outnumbered dozens to one. I don’t like your chances.”

“It is a risk. War’s like that. And I have a Lithium-Fusion Battery, so I may be able to escape if things don’t go well.”

“I’m not in a position to refuse you, I suppose.” Clay stroked his chin. “And what will we be doing while you’re running around playing hero?”

“Oh you’ve got the best job of all: logistics and politics.”

“You merciless sonuvabitch. I knew you’d get me back for pinning a medal on you.”

“Some of us are made for bigger roles, Mr. Interim Director-General.”

It takes a second for my words to sink in. “What did you call me!?”

“You’re the most senior government official I’ve found that I’m sure isn’t compromised and Amanda Cameron isn’t old enough to rule. Kerensky’s already shown he’s not got the political chops for the job even if he didn’t have a major war to fight. Who else is there?”

“…there’d have to be an election.”

“Of course, thus the word ‘Interim’. But in the meantime you’ll have much more weight with Generals Watanabe and Nagenda, given your military credentials, than anyone else would. That’s going to be quite important since New Dallas is probably going to be feeding most of the SLDF for the next few years – not to mention serving as their headquarters.”

“Are you sure you can’t find another couple of hundred Caspars? Or a spare SLDF fleet?”

“You’d have to ask the Generals if you can borrow their transport fleets, but more Caspars might be possible. That’s phase two, right alongside you re-establishing the Hegemony Armed Forces.”

“You want me to do what?”