Rantemario Skirmish [Ghotha x J_"Kraken"]

[Baracaniguara]

overview

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  The mess hall aboard the Hundred Fires also served as a meeting room, today a meeting was taking place. The Armada of Gehenna, simply known as 'The Armada', lacked the numbers and resorted to drafting private ships, and their captains in their program of expanding the Armada.
  
  Ribaal an-Juk was the captain of the former ice hauler, she was given a few options when drafted, because it was not just the ship that was requisitioned but it's captain as well. To refuse the draft and hand over the ship would still make her a 'draft dodger', a crime punishable by law. By accepting the draft and not handing over the ship... Her ship would have been confiscated anyway and given to someone else.
  
  Thus she now stood, leaning with her back against the bulkhead, arms crossed over her chest, standing, because the small mess hall only had seat for eight. The lack of gravity didn't seem to affect her in the least. The woman was in her forties, her once jet black hair had traces of gray in it, and while her demeanor suggested a lack of professionalism she was an experienced spacer.
  
  Next to her against the bulkhead was another woman who held onto the seat in front of her and pressed her backside against to bulkhead. Unused to the lack of gravity, unlike the captain, the political advisor Sylian Amia was having a hard time. The woman could have been considered beautiful, if she smiled some more. Her shoulder length brown hair, as per regulations, was tied into a neat bun. She had eyes that matched the color of her hair and the reddish brown hue of her skin contrasted nicely with this. The bland and impractical uniform didn't do the woman any justice, the olive green and dull yellow look awful in itself and the uniform was better suited for someone that did not have to worry about maneuvering in space.
  
  The ten seat, three on each side of the table and two at the ends where all occupied by the rest of the crew. The meeting started aboard the Hundred Fires at the same time as another meeting was taking place on another ship in the same system. This other ship though was a genuine vessel of war.
  
  "Yeah..." The hesitant voice of the captain started. "So..." She bit her lower lip temporarily forgetting the information she had canned a few minutes ago. "The Rantemairo system is a red star... A red giant, there is one rocky planet and two gas giants which also have rocky moons." She had forgotten the numbers of these. "The gas bag we're around now has a ring, looks like something blew a moon to bits. Makes a good hiding spot for the moment." The captain added, shifting her weight although her weight wasn't a hindrance in the lack of gravity. "Anyways we know someone else is out there. Unlike our ship it a designated warship and not an ice hauler with plating slapped onto it. They have guns and their own meeting room."
  
  The comment sparked a round of laughter from everyone but the woman standing next to her across from the hatch.
  
  "If the Hundred Fires ever gets in a fight with them we're screwed." Ribaal added.
  
  "Captain, it's unpleasant to imagine such scenarios, it lowers the moral of our soldiers." The crisp soprano of the 'political advisor' cut her.
  
  "You're right Resident Advisor, I was just saying this to point out our strategy." She referred to the other woman by rank, and deferred to her, it was a though job, she hated every second of it. It was mutual. "We know that the enemy is trying to find our homeworld, but they can't exactly scope it through the nebula so we can assume that is their end goal, how they do this is something else. Figuring out how they plan to find us is our number one priority... Fucking their plans would be priority one and a half. The second objective is try and capture any data and technology we can from them."
  
  Fredathan Benle raised his hand and spoke. "It's safe to assume they expect someone to be here too, and to capture our ship or some of our pilots." The middle aged looked at the men and women that made up the squadron, a hand brushed the thick mustache that obscured his lips. "So I should come up with countermeasures for a worst case scenario?"
  
  The Resident Advisor nodded her approval though the question was not directed at her, Ribaal caught the movement from the corner of her eye and responded. "Hope of the best and plan for the worst." She replied and moved on. "Our first task is to locate the enemy, hopefully without him noticing and observe. If they try anything funny we can blow them up but... Realistically speaking we can't, we do have two spare starfighters but no pilots, your lives are more valuable than anything, I don't plan on wasting that."
  
  She remained silent, inviting comment from the rest of the crew, the task they where given was not small nor easy and while the consequences of failure may or may not lead to any disasters, it could easily come back to bite them.
  

 

[ze_kraken]

Vivian Scott

Fixing broken machines was meditation to Vivian Scott. She could speak to circuits, tinker with targeting systems, revitalize engines. She could strip a thirty millimeter 'buzzsaw' magnetically-enhanced cannon and reassemble it in less than three minutes. Very little about flying could rattle the pilot, and so long as she had a ship and a target, she could keep herself rolling along well beyond the human norm.

Put her in a room with a pair of snapping bitches, though, and all that skill counted for shit. The Resident and the civilian captain, a classic story in the making.

The call to the unofficial meeting hall had come early, barely past eight in the morning according to the the Hundred Fires' unique timeline. With time being relative to the day cycle of planets, ships usually ran on the time of whatever planet their maiden voyage had been from and the Fires was no exception. Not that her own time table followed the ship's. She was on, more often then she'd care to admit to any superior officer (let alone the Resident Adviser), awake well into the evening and asleep a good portion of the 'working' day. It didn't matter in space - Vivian was trained in atmospheric combat before she had been a spacer, she hadn't learned the need for strict time lines in space.

From her seat beside the captain, Vivian could notice Leonard's whole-hearted attention to the Resident: he adored anything to do with the revolution. For a man that had seen more regime changes, assassinations, and graft than anyone on board the Fires, the worn and graying pilot seemed intent on this particular change above all others. Dedicated herself, Vivian had little morale high ground to stand on, but the necessity for commissars still struck her as off. Politically vested military officers were a liability, particularly ones that snapped at their underlings and captains.

"Glad to see my heartbeat's worth somethin'," Branden Forgrave mused, drawing a glare from his superior.

So new to the unit, forgetting the undistinguished, plain-looking youth was easier than Vivian would care to admit, particularly given her position over the pilot.

"Come on, sir, it's great to see the cause cares, yeah?" And this is why he would never make Decanus.

They don't care if we die, so long as they can make a story of it. But that was part of accepting the cause for what it was. Every revolution needed its martyrs, needed its tinder to the flame.

"On a useful note," Vivian began, calm and collected, "I suggest we launch one of the spare fighters, using its initial momentum to carry it in an arc around the system with its transponder activated. If it is destroyed, that will give us a general gauge of whether or not there is an enemy out and about. Utilizing camera footage before its eventual destruction will allow us to risk no lives with the chance for proper intelligence. While the empty ship is cycling, I will lead the fighters to tag and bag any pursuing vessels we can easily handle. Without fighter escort, I am faithful that we will be capable of taking on a capital ship. Any objections, Resident Adviser?"

 

[Baracaniguara]

The role of 'Political Advisor' was one that was disliked just by the nature of it and the one holding that position was painfully aware of it, it sounded better than being called a watchdog, yet that is what she was. After all, Sylian had to live with them in close quarters for an extended period of time and get on their nerves on a regular basis. The only reason she did so was because she had a superior to report to, the revolution thought it was being kind to her, if this was gratitude she would have preferred they remained ungrateful.

She was the survivor of what had once been a strong opposition party in the same camp as the beloved military revolutionaries, her party was massacred, and they in turn massacred as much of the supporters of the previous autocracy as they could. Her reward was to be sent off into space to watch over 'potential dissidents within our ranks' as the official mission stated. Yet she was surrounded by folk that just like her where tossed into the situation without much choice, while some where competent, others... Left much to be desired.

"I think that is a question you should direct to your Captain." She responded to the Decanus, this one often forgot who she was supposed report to, undermining the authority of her own captain and not so tacitally suggesting that power laid with her... Was it a sort of complain? She could bring it up anytime... She would gladly put her in her place.

The captain gave the Decanus a look, knowing her to be one of the more radical elements on board... Not a traitor, just a woman who spoke her mind. Something told her the Decanus had done that on purpose.

"Well, it's a good plan, we risk no lives, we can get the intel we need..." Ribaal punctuated each point as if counting them with her fingers. "But I think we also risk a lot, what if they don't take the bait? It looks like an obvious bait, why would we send one unescorted ship yelling out it's location and begging to be blown up? Tactically it would be a good trick in a pinch but not strategically, as an opening move I don't think so."

The resident advisor nodded, she was pleased at times that the captain could make sound judgement, the rest of her character was another matter.

"I was going to suggest sending our fighters in force, while the Hundred Fires will be defenseless it is well hidden... I think..."

That is what she Sylian did not like about Ribaal, the captain often spoke in vague terms, it didn't inspire much confidence.

"As far as plan's go..." She started again because it was not useful to shoot down plans without offering an alternative. "...I think the enemy is looking for signs of life, something man made, something that will point them in the right direction. They will start scanning planets, asteroids and the likes, I think they know by now to do it discretely since they know we don't like their snooping around so I'd like to come up with a list of hidey holes they would check and see if we can meet them there. But we don't know what sort of hardware they got, they don't have many toys we don't have but I think their shielding, detection devices and stealth systems are better than ours... I've also heard rumors that their ships have gravity."

The Captain paused as if inviting comment, and some seem to be eager to comment but they could only look at the Advisor, who was looking at the captain which in turn was looking at them unaware of the disapproving look from the other woman.

"How to best do that though is something else. Decanus, I'd like to hear what you think about this... Pairs of two? Or all fighters at once?"

 

[ze_kraken]

Vivian Scott

If Vivian had been in control, the Hundred Fires would not even be in a situation of this magnitude to begin with. Lancers were a potent tool to the revolution, but even they could not carry battlegroups to victory against fierce opposition. Caution stayed what would have otherwise been a hand quick to act.

"We need to assess whether or not this enemy carries fighter escorts. If they do not, then the bait will not be taken, but with a fighter wing on-hand, it will be of little risk for the enemy to send out the drones to clear the area. We can utilize the belt recently created from the weapon platforms to provide cover. At different points above or below one another, the ships will appear as one radar ping, making it look like a pair out scouting: radar projects the objects on a two-dimensional surface, not a three-dimensional one. If they have projecting scanners, then they will have found us out already. Given that we are still here, I doubt they have anything beyond basic radar."

Experience on the ground had given her the knowledge of radar waves and how to use them to devastating effect. In airless space, the advantage was even greater. With limited view outside of most warships for security purposes, the enemy would have to blindly follow its radar or send smaller, more accommodating, vessels out to verify the radar scans. The only situation more beneficial would be a nebula - no scanners, no shields, it would give every Lancer the upper hand.

"Viv's right on this," Leonard added (he never called her by a title or rank, something she found agitating and endearing at the same time). "That said, I don't very well like making this engagement. It'd be better to send a courier back to call for back up, use the spares as decoys so the message can hit home. After that, we hide like little bugs and keep low, disable what we can. If they spot us, it'll be over. Torpedoes don't have a range limit in space, and this pile of junk can't outrun them or out-jink them."

The Decanus nodded, offering a glance to the Resident and then the captain, eyebrow raised in questioning. No doubt the Resident, being as useful as a civilian with a gun, would object, but on board a military vessel, the true personnel had unspoken authority over the party. Let the captain speak, then Vivian would retaliate as necessary.

 

[Baracaniguara]

The captain shrugged after listening to the team of lancers and pondering about their suggestion, ultimately she shrugged which again made their onboard commissar grimaced internally. "Well it's a good plan as any..." She had no better alternative it seems and was about to say something when the comms panel above and to the right of her started beeping. It wasn't a fancy device a mere handheld mouthpiece with a speaker unlike high end civilian variants that included video.

This made everyone in the room stand at attention because firstly, all of them where in this room so the only thing that could have triggered that was one of the automated systems, maybe the autopilot, or the passive sensors, or the self diagnostic program. The captain answered and the whole room fell silent: "FTL exit..." And then the automated voice proceeded to call out numbers for bearing and approximate distance.

"Fred go check it out." Ribaal ordered and as instructed the man got up and kicked himself forward and towards the bulkhead which the captain had politely opened for him. "Well, this got more interesting... How about we postpone this meeting for an hour or two?" The captain gave everyone a look as they hesitated to leave. "C'mon folk go do something I'll call everyone back once we know something."

Sylia agreed with a silent nod as she watched the crew pile out of the mess hall one by one.

"Vivian, madam advisor should we go to the driver seat and check this out?"

 

[ze_kraken]

Vivian Scott

Good a plan as any? Listen to Leonard if you want to save your asses, me if you want to have a shot at winning this...

Then the comms panel started squawking, drawing the attention of the entire room. Even Forgrave's attention was torn from his wrist-mounted pad as the device blinked off and on, playing a high-pitched tone. The captain grabbed the receiver and the mouthpiece and a brief exchange followed, ending with the statement every soldier dreaded.

"Well, this got more interesting."

Just like that, the room cleared as the crew sparked into life, the doldrums of transitional life over: they were in full gear now, threatened by the prospect of an unknown foe with the upper hand. Without having to give the order, Vivian's crew busied themselves by heading to the hanger bay to warm up the fighters and fix the last-minute mechanical faults. Not that they'd find many, Vivian's time was spent more in the hanger than in her own chambers between engagements.

Taking the captain's offer (order, rather) to enter the bridge, Vivian followed as the Resident and her superior managed their way through the low-gravity of the Fires. Acceleration had offered a light pull, enough to wobble across the surface if one desired or to simple launch from wall to wall. Vivian took the latter.

"What do we have here?" Vivian asked immediately upon entering the crammed, dimly-lit bridge, "Please tell me it's reinforcements being sneaky-like. I don't fancy fighting a losing battle."