Chapter 1:
First Contact[/u]
“We all envisage first contact with as something beautiful a peaceful meeting. Thing is those fuckers had no interest in peace, they made demands and then they invaded.” – Colonel Garath Briggs, commander in chief of the marine detachment of the Warstar Eternal avenger.
With a flash of light the Galactic Republic (GRN) of Northwind Warstar Eternal Avenger appeared in the solar system named Cetholion Grada. It had 2 inhabitable planet Galactic Republic Star Fleet Command (GRSFC) had ordered that it be colonised for the glory of Northwind.
The Eternal Avenger was a Titan Class Warstar. Titan Class Warstars were the largest warships in the entire fleet at 4200 meters from engine pods to alligator head prow. It was an interesting design with a wide alligator shaped prow running back for just over 500 metres and then it narrowed into a 3 kilometre long main section, before expanding out into a 700 metre long engine section with 8 large, boxy engine pods. On either side of the central section were a pair of stacked pods locked in position. Each pod was about 40 meters high and 60 meters wide and housed the launch tubes and landing decks for the combat and landing craft of the GRSF. The landing deck entrances were rear facing. At the front end of each pod sat a pair of forward facing quad 300mm rail gun turrets. Also built into the pods were 2 gun decks equipped with turrets carrying two 300mm rail cannon. Spaced at 4 dual 300 turret intervals were the fearsome 800mm Quad Rail guns. Dorsal batteries made up of 8 quad 800 turrets in rectangular pastern with 360 horizontal rotation and 180 degree gun rotation in the vertical plain. The ventral turrets were set up in much the same way as the dorsal turrets. The ship’s forward facing armament consisted of 6 dual 800mm rail gun cannon turrets. Also forward facing were the ship’s primary weapon, built directly into the super structure of the ship were 2 3000mm Super Magnetic Accelerator Cannon (SMAC) capable of firing their shells at 3% C. 8 seemingly purposeless spherical pods were mounted at strategic points on the ship’s superstructure. These were the Mk6 anti-missile laser arrays, designed to destroy incoming missiles before detonation. Dotted at random around the ships hull were the AAA batteries. The ship was sheathed entirely in a layered composite armoured design 8 meters thick which could take a direct hit from a nuclear shell launched by an SMAC. Around it the rest of the fleet materialised, Colonystars, Factorystars, Missilestars, Destroyerstars, Combatstars, Carrierstars, Supportstars & even a few Merchant owned Freightstars.
Lord Admiral John Meghen stood in the Command and Control Room or CCR aboard the Eternal Avenger. Arranged around him in ascending tiers were damage control and Command or DamCom, Weapons Control – WepCom -, Sensor and Air Group Command – AirCom, sometimes referred to by the rest of the crew as AgroCom due to the commander of the air wings being extremely aggravating when not in combat, which was most of the time. On the base of the floor, behind him and slightly to his right was helm. John was standing before the holographic projectors which were currently showing a 3 dimensional map of the habitable planet Grada 3. The ship’s AI, Eternal Avenger appeared on a holo-pedestal next to John.
“Lord Admiral we are ready to begin colonisation, all probes have come back clean, recon reports no hostiles. The planets are safe.”
“Very well, begin colonisation immediately.”
“As you command Lord Admiral.”
John smiled, the Avenger’s AI could be so very formal at times, though, he half wondered it if wasn’t mocking him.
He turned to Commodore Sentaric Alenovich.
“Commodore, you have the command.”
“I have the command Lord Admiral.”
John walked out the bridge and into the hall, and climbed onto the back of an electro trans-wagon, these little things were shaped like bricks, but were designed to make traversing the length of the Warstar easier as they could go at 50 KPH. The driver smiled and howled off towards the bow of the ship. After five minutes John got off outside his quarters, they were the largest on the ship and like Admiral’s quarters on all capital ships, completely modular, so they could be replaced according to the requirements of the Admiral on board the ship. John’s quarters had 6 rooms. A private Carthia, where he trained and stored his various weapons and custom blades. There was also a meditation room, a bathroom, a dining room, a sitting room and of course his bedroom. John walked through the door into his room and into the meditation room. There he removed his torso uniform sat down and put on some soothing Northwind classics, he changed the lighting in the room to calm, cool colours, before sitting cross legged dead centre of the room. John reflected on his fleet’s rather uneventful entry into the system. Neither of the planets had any sentient life on, which made colonisation easier as there was no one attempting to kill them, or resist take over, then again most of the time the GRN’s diplomats would prevent the problem occurring in the first place by offering them full fledged membership of the republic, in which case they got seats in the Haltutha and they got the opportunity to see the stars. Humans were of course the largest particular species, humans made up 53 of the 81 planets that made up the Galactic Republic Of Northwind. However even with all the technology and opportunities the GRN offered to its new members there were always a group who decided to arm themselves, hell there had even been the odd planet that had replied with violence from the off, for example that place with nuclear age technology. That had caused more than a few problems when an entire planet of insectoid sentients had launched a nuclear strike against the fleet. John had been there, it had been one of his first commands, he’d been on the combatstar Uritha’s Kindness, when the nuclear strike had hit, it had taken out three colony stars and a pair of support stars, the fleet had retaliated with an orbital bombardment that had levelled the planet’s capital and a several other cities before launching a full on invasion, it had take 4 weeks from orbital bombardment to unconditional surrender of the enemy. John had been planet side to celebrate. That had been the day Lord Admiral Agarn was killed in a bomb attack. John had been there, held the shattered body of the admiral, had tried to save the admiral, with what little he knew of medicine, had been there to here his last words. The fleet had Agarn laid to rest according to his wishes and had launched no retaliatory strikes as he had asked, instead they offered full membership of the GRN, told the people of the opportunities that would come if they accepted and they had. 5 days later John had been made Lord Admiral, he had been a commodore before that and this had lead to many of those whom he had been promoted over feeling bitter. It had been six months since that dreadful day, the day he had lost his mentor. He had settled into his command and had got to know 90% of the ship’s crew of nearly 15000. It would be cold day in hell before he was told that midshipman so and so had died and was not able to call the soldier’s face to mind. In his head he began to go through the list of names of the crew, with their faces. He had made it a tradition to write a letter, by hand, to the family of any in his command who died in the line of duty. Most people thought he was mad, but it made John happy and considering just how rare it was for a planet to put up fight, it pleased him that he didn’t have to write them that often. His fleet had the lowest casualty ratings of any of the expansion fleets. He continued reviewing the crew list in his head.
John smiled as the door to the meditation chamber hissed open, there was only four people who were allowed to enter his chambers without his invitation unless it was an emergency. Of those 4 only one would dare to enter his meditation chamber whilst he was inside.
He heard the gentle pad of feet on the floor walking across the room towards him.
He smiled
“Your one of 4 people, the fact that you didn’t buzz me suggests it is not an emergency and then there is the fact that you didn’t knock despite the fact the sign is very clear on the fact I’m in my meditation room. So Brookke, what do you want?”
The strikingly beautiful woman who had walked in on him smiled. She was Wing Commander Brookke Rinard, dressed in her black flight suit, with blue tabs on each shoulder, indicating her squadron. She had raven black hair that curled it’s way down her back and bright green eyes. John grinned as he looked at her, the flight suit was very flattering to her figure. He stood and walked over to her and pulling her into a tight hug and kissing her.
“How was patrol?”
“Nothing interesting. Just scouting a few asteroid belts. There is no one else out here, no aliens nothing. How was the bridge?”
“Other than dead boring? Nothing. I really need to get back in a flight suit, I haven’t been up in a Scar-Rider in ages.”
“That’s true but why take a Scar-Rider when you’re qualified to fly a Chrace as well? I men Chraces are so much faster and you’re right in the thick of it.”
“You’ve got a point Brookke, I do like Chraces, how about next time you’re on patrol I go up with you?”
Brookke smiled
“It’s a date John, just remember I don’t tolerate slackers in my wing.”
John laughed, no one else would dare accuse him of slacking, in fact it had been John whom insisted that everyone in the fleet, no matter their rank or job, be trained to defend their ship and themselves. This had started arguments until John had been seen to be taking lessons in hand to hand combat and how best to utilise a fire arm from the marines on board the ‘Avenger, John had also been seen to be trained to fly Chraces, he was already qualified in Scar-riders. He had qualified in his final exams on the Chrace with flying colours, thanks in no small part to the extra training he’d received from Brookke.
“Brookke, I’d never slack when I’d got to protect you, go get changed and meet me in the Dojo, I feel like an easy sparring session.”
Brookke laughed.
“I’ll have to knock some of that cockiness out of you, Lord Admiral.”
She turned and strode through to the bedroom. She didn’t bother shutting the door as she stripped off her flight suit then took off the tight fitting body suits all pilots wore. She had a very supple body, pert breasts of a good size, not too large, but not too small either, she had a good arse too. She went over to the chest of draws and opened her underwear draw, pulling out a pair of panties and a bra. She pulled these on before getting into her training gear.
She then strode out and into the dojo where John stood with his mitts on and his gum guard in.
They bowed to each other and then, without warning John went on the offensive. His launched a round house kick aiming for Brookke’s side, Brookke Dodged out the way, caught John’s leg and pulled him towards her, taking him off balance. John tucked into a forward role, leapt up and span to meet Brookke’s right hook to the head, blocking the blow, John retaliated with a knife-hand aimed at Brookke’s solar plexus, Brookke swayed back out of reach and then swept her leg round, pulling John off his feet. In a second she was on top of him, pinning him in place.
“Yield?”
John grinned. “Never.” With a powerful flick of his shoulders John rolled them both over so that now it was him pinning Brookke in place.
“Yield?”
“Nope.” Replied Brookke as she reached up around John’s back jabbed him in the base of his kidneys. John let out grunt of pain, momentarily loosening his grip. It was all Brookke needed, this time she pinned him and put her knee directly over his genitals.
“Brookke, that is cheating, you’ve got your knee over my groin. I attempt to get you off me and I’ll be in more pain than is strictly speaking necessary.”
“It’s not cheating John, it’s utilising advantages.”
At this John couldn’t help but grin. He reached up and pulled her into a kiss.
They shifted on the padded mats, moving into a more comfortable position. John kissed her again, this time moving his hands to her hips, she responded by moving hers up and around his neck, their kissing changed, becoming deeper, more passionate. He reached up and pulled her top off, she grabbed his and pulled it off. He grabbed her hips, lifted her and carried her through to the bedroom, he had a hard time not dropping her, she kept biting his neck. He deposited her on the bed, pulled off her trousers, he leant forward and kissed her on the lips, she arched her back enough for him to undo her bra strap. John removed Brookke’s bra, kissed her on the lips once more then worked his way down to her breasts.
Suddenly the Com system on the wall by his bed buzzed, a red LED lit up.
“What brilliant fucking timing.” Growled John, before leaning over to push the accept button. Brookke moved out from under him and sat up.
“This had better be damned good, Commodore.”
“Sir, I’m afraid it cannot be classified as good in any way. We’ve received new orders from high command. They’re marked as priority Red 1.”
John’s demeanour changed instantly, gone was the look of angry irritation. It was replaced with a look of worry.
“I’ll be there ASAP.”
“Roger that sir.”
John pulled on tunic and his flight suit, they were closest to hand.
Brookke looked at him.
“Emergency briefing Brookke, Briefing room 1, half an hour don’t be late.” John told her.
“Don’t worry, I won’t be hon.”
“I’m glad you’re here Brookke, I’m gonna need you before this shit is done.”
John pushed a button labelled All Ship.
“This is Lord Admiral Meghen, all officers are to report to Briefing room 1 in half an hour for an emergency briefing. Don’t be late. Ladies and Gentlemen, I don’t know what the hell is going on but be sure of this. The shit is going to hit the fan at some point real soon, so get geared up for war.”
He ran out of the door, a trans-wagon was waiting for him there.
“The bridge, as fast as you can, use emergency override 136.”
“Yes, Sir, Emergency Override 136 activated.”
They sped off, John leapt off before the trans-wagon had even finished moving. He ran onto the bridge, the automatic doors closing behind him
“Situation report.” He barked
Alenovich stepped forward. “Sir, at 0900 hrs standard we received a set of new orders, priority code Red 1. I glanced over them briefly. The planet Scar has been invaded by unknown hostiles, a small task force of 40 Stars, including the Titan class Warstar Inviolable were sent to deal with it 8 days ago, only 1 ship returned, the Errant class MissileStar Iron Knight. She was badly damaged and her combat data showed that the task force had been engaged by an enemy fleet numbering between 800 and 1300 Stars of unknown class. Nothing as big as a the Inviolable, but that didn’t matter, they were heavily outnumbered, they took about 90 enemy Stars with them before the Inviolable was destroyed, things went down hill from there. Today a transmission was received from Scar, it was from the officer in charge of defence of the capital. ‘Avenger, play the tape on main screen, with sound and subs.”
The image on the main screen flickered, then words flashed up on screen.
Name: Alec Dravos
Rank: Colonel
Regiment: 1st Scar Highland Guard
Report number: 136
Date: 21st of Rathar (third month) of the year 3121 XN. (Northwind Irivian Calendar)
Time: 0300 hrs Standard Northwind, 0900 hrs local time.
World: Galactic Republic of Northwind Outer Colony world Scar
Town/City: Alidar, planetary capital
The screen flickered once more and the video report began. The man on screen looked to be about 35, he had short black hair, green eyes and about 8 days worth of stubble on him.
“It has been 6 weeks since they came. They look like us, they sound like us, hell we thought they were us. We thought they were part of the GRN. They asked us to join their empire, they called it the Earth Empire or something. We refused, naturally, told them we were part of the GRN, that we were a colony world. We said we were happy to be part of the GRN. They got angry, started threatening us with invasion. We still refused, We told them that if they launched an invasion then the GRN would come to our aid, that they'd defend us. It has been 3 weeks since the invasion began, we've been fighting for 3 god damn weeks, there have been no reinforcements, no R & R, this is it. They smashed the orbital defences apart, then they launched their invasion, they couldn't take the capital, too well defended, to many anti-orbital weapons. So they attacked everywhere else. Now Alidar is all that’s left, the last city that hasn't fallen to these bastards. We sent a call for aid three days into the invasion. About a week ago the reinforcements showed, a battle group of 40 Stars, including a Titan class Warstar, arrived. They were almost totally wiped out, we didn't know, how could we? The enemy fleet was too vast, too numerous. We thought a Titan class WarStar could take on anything. But not that many ships, they managed to get 2 communications through to us, everything but a MissileStar was destroyed. A MissileStar, that was all that got away, all that managed to get away with news of our plight, I pray to the gods above that they made it.
The first communication we recieved told us they had arrived and that they had brought reinforcements. That was a real morale raiser.
The second message was from the captain of the MissileStar, Captain James D. Forge. It told us that there were over 800 ships in our attackers fleet, that they couldn't save us, that they'd be back with more Stars.
Within hours of learning this we discovered that Erysian Peak, our primary command centre, 300 kilometres north east of my position was destroyed by an orbital strike. They'd started jamming us the moment the invasion had begun so it didn't really matter, I'd been the ranking officer here because of the jamming, I'd controlled our every move. They invaded the city 8 days ago. They came in by ground, whilst we don't have any air cover, we still had the most formidable anti-air/anti-orbital defense array on the planet, they'd tried an airborne assault about a day before that, nothing had got through the defence grid. So they came on foot, in walkers, tanks, mobile artillery. No missiles though, they just got swatted out the sky by the grid. We've been fighting for all 8 days, no respite, in that time they've managed to advance 500 metres into the city. 200 men have been killed in action in those 8 days, 200 KIAs in 8 days, I've got 40,000 men defending this city, 200 hundred of whom are now dead and another 2,000 who are injured. 8 days of the most gruelling combat I've ever come across. Their casualties are far higher, we’ve got the home terrain advantage. Tac-Log calculates they've lost about 6000 since the ground invasion began of the city began, but available Intel suggests they still out number us 20 to 1. We can't win, the troops know it, I know, we all know it. Tac-Log reckons we can hold out another 100 days, if things don't change. I’m certain they will so we've probably only got a quarter of that, maybe less. I don't know if reinforcements will make it in time to save us but if I'm still alive it'll be a fucking miracle. We won’t surrender and we’ll take as many of the fuckers with us as possible, the civilians are all in the subway system, away from the bombs. I hope they survive, though the few reports I’ve had of the fall of other cities says that a larger number of them will be killed to prove a point. If I'm still here in a month's time I'll send another report. May the gods look favourably upon us.”
John stared at the screen in stunned silence for a moment.
“Alenovich, get every military Star’s commander in the fleet here for an emergency briefing in 20 minutes time, Briefing Room 1. Tell them there will be no excuses. They will be here or face court marshal. Those orders are priority code Fleet Red 1. ‘Avenger brief me on the orders from High Command whilst I go change into something more suitable.”
“Aye, Sir.” Came the reply from both the AI and Alenovich.
“People, I don’t 100% know what we’re up against but whatever it is be damn sure of this, We are going to be in the thick of it.”
20 minutes later and John strode into Briefing Room 1. All the military commanders were there and they had responded in record time; it had taken them 15 minutes from the order being broadcast to arrival on the ship and a further 2 minutes to assemble in briefing room 1. There was a hubbub of voices as the various captains, commodores, commanders etc. talked. John noted the presence of all ranking officers on the crew of the ‘Avenger. As he stepped up to the podium at the front of the room a silence fell.
He addressed them, “Ladies and Gentlemen I apologise for the threat of court marshal, but we are here to discuss a matter of the utmost importance.”
He paused for breath, then continued.
“3 weeks ago on the 1st of Rathar, the GRN encountered another galactic power for the second time, most of you will remember the last time we met with a galactic power, it wasn’t messy, but things didn’t go as well as we could have hoped. Well this one is messy, actually that’s an understatement. Ladies and Gentlemen, we have a full blown crisis on our hands. A power has taken Scar, a colony world on the very edge of GRN space, specifically it’s 500 light years to the galactic south of Northwind. We have little information on this new threat, what we do know is that they are aggressive, have a technology level similar to ours and that there is a hell load of them in orbit over Scar at the moment. We’ve been detailed as part of the fleet that is being sent to liberate Scar from the invaders. There are 2 other Lord Admirals in this fleet, which of us is commanding, I don’t know, that will be made known when we rendezvous with them over Rethinar. There resupply will occur, along with 48 hours of shore leave. After this we will leave and make the jump to Scar, we can expect in excess of 800 hostile Stars. Lucky for us because they are combining three full sized Battle Groups there will be in excess of 700 ships including 9 Titan class WarStars, If 1 WarStar alone is a match for 40 of this new enemy’s Stars then 9 will be perfectly capable of taking out 360, then of course there are rest of the ships in the fleet, consider, I won’t lie, I expect losses of ships to be heavy, but we’ll win this, after all, we’re the best Star fleet in the entire quadrant.”
There was a cheer.
“Now, this report from Scar is all the information currently available to us on the situation on Scar. Avenger, put play the video on main screen.”
The report of Colonel Alec Dravos played on the screen, John watched it again, listening for anything that might give him a tactical advantage in the combat that he knew would come.
Once the report ended John turned back to the assembled officers of the fleet.
“Right now I’m going to brief you on Scar.”
A 3D hologram of Scar appeared.
“Scar has 2 continents, Pantera and Thythera and a smattering of Islands. Scar’s capital city is Alidar and is on the continent Pantera. Pantera is 6000 km across and 4000 km tall, making it the larger of the two. There are 8 cities on Pantera, most of them are on the coast. However Alidar is nigh on dead Centre of the continent, the only reason it isn’t is that dead centre of the continent is a 14 km deep lake. The orbital/air defence grid protecting Alidar is very much capable of taking out a WarStar. So that makes aerial insertion utterly impossible. The planetary command centre was Erysian Peak, now, there isn’t one. Thythera is pretty much a barren ice continent on the south pole of the planet. There are a few small ports, but beyond that there is nothing, we’ll still have to check that the enemy hasn’t established any bases there. Reports indicate a force of roughly 600,000,000 enemy troops on the ground, with a lot of armour. Go back to your ships and brief you’re men. I’m telling you everything I know, because that way we all have some idea of what we’re up against. Good luck, jump coordinates for the rendezvous will be sent to you in 5 hours. Be ready to go as soon as those coordinates come through.”
People began to filter out of the room. John stepped off the podium and walked over to a side door, glancing at Brookke who followed him through.
He turned to face her, the façade of calm disappearing, replaced by agitation, anxiety and stress.
“Fuck it, why, why the fuck does this always happen? We had 2 months shore leave next month, 2 weeks of just us. Seketh damn it!” He shouted, invoking the name of his favoured god Seketh, the God of war and, rather oddly, life.
“John, calm down, we can have shore leave after this. You know that.” Brookke told him, as she pulled him into a hug.
He sighed, a look of worry appearing on his face.
“That’s the thing, Brookke. I’m worried one of us isn’t going to make it out of this. I couldn’t handle loosing you.”
“I couldn’t handle loosing you either, but you know what? I’m certain if you lost me, you’d only fight harder to take this enemy down.”
“Wiping everyone of them out wouldn’t be enough to salve you’re loss and you know it.”
They stood there, locked in an embrace.
“Come on John, one of us may die, let’s go make the most of our time together before then.”
She lead him out of the room and they walked to John’s rooms, holding hands.
Commodore Sentaric Alenovich had returned to the bridge immediately after the meeting, the Admiral had decided to have a video of the briefing broadcast through out he ship. Sentaric, or Sent, to his friends, knew that John was not happy. He had known John since John was 16, Sent had been 15 at the time. The two of them had forged a strong friendship, when John had signed up to the fleet, so had Sent. When Sent had met John, John had still had a family, that had been before the holiday the year John had turned 18, they’d decided to go to Metablast 3113. It was metal festival, the line up had been amazing, the weekend had been amazing. It wasn’t until the Anday that they had discovered, the last day of the concert, John had received a satellite call. John’s family had been killed in a pirate raid on their ship to Cattar, a holiday world where John’s family had a house. Sent had never seen anything like it. John had broken down, Sent had never seen John cry, John had always been a pillar of strength to everyone around him. 1 week after the death of his Parents John had joined up and Sent had joined up with him, believing John had joined up to die. John had, initially, wanting to be put into the marine corps and put on the most suicidal of missions. The training staff had denied him entry to the marines. This had pushed John over the edge, he attempted to kill himself. John spent the next 8 months in a psychiatric unit in a military hospital under going therapy and counselling. Mean while Sent had passed basic and been assigned to the fleet. After he’d come out of the Psych unit John was a reformed character, he applied to do officer training and had been accepted. People who had known John before the loss of his parents, said he had returned to his old self, but Sent and his closest friends had known better, John would never be his old self, the man John had become now was much more terrifying. Utterly driven by a need, a desire to put an end to piracy in GRN territory. Everyone in the academy had heard John’s name, he was the rising star of the GRN military. Everyone knew that this young man would be commander in chief of all GRN forces, he had been marked out for fast track. It had taken John 3 years to be given his first command of a ship, a MissileStar, the Vendetta, Sentaric had been John’s first officer, Those had been the days. They’re job was to hunt pirates. John had set to the task with zeal. Within a month of being given command of Vendetta John had taken on 30 pirates’ ships, all of them had either surrendered or been totally annihilated. Within 3 months John had taken 4 pirate strong holds. The Vendetta’s crew were hardened veterans. The vendetta’s compliment of 100 marines were ranked as the third most experienced unit in the entire GRNDF. Then the Vendetta had been ambushed whilst on patrol. Sentaric remembered that vividly. 12 pirate ships had attack the Vendetta, destroying her both her sub-light and Faster Than Light engines. With the FTLs and Sub-lights gone, all they’d had were manoeuvring thrusters. John had still fought and won, though know one could ever figure out how. Most people thought it was something to do with the fact that John had still fought, even though he couldn’t win, even though his ship was badly damaged he’d still fought the pirates tooth and claw. The Vendetta’s crew had been dangerous under John when the ship had been in full working order. With the ship damaged and everyone on board knowing that if they surrendered they would all die, painfully, the ship’s crew became utterly ruthless. So they had fought like a wounded, cornered animal. Every boarding action the pirates had launched had been met by the marines head on, the marines were veterans of ship to ship combat, the pirates’ only real experience was small freightstars and pleasurestars. If the fighting in the boarding actions had been brutal then the one that had been fought between the Vendetta and her attackers was even more so. John had targeted 1 pirate star at a time, firing volley after volley of anti-ship missiles at the targeted star until the target’s reactor went into overload. By the time reinforcements arrived 2 hours after the engagement had begun the Vendetta was out of missiles and covered in ragged holes torn through the hull. The Vendetta’s crew had been 1000 men, of those 200 had died, including 63 marines, everyone else had injuries to some extent, John had laceration on his shoulder, a cracked rib and a broken arm. During the final half hour before the arrival of reinforcements Sentaric had been in command, John being too injured to continue commanding. The reinforcements had been a trio of combatstars, they’d chased off the 6 remaining pirate ships before rendering assistance to the Vendetta. John hand wrote a letter to the family of every member of his dead crew’s family. He the entire crew put forward for commendations and medals of bravery. Marine Captain James Harnan had been in command of the Vendetta’s marine contingent. John had had Harnan and 6 other marines put forward for the Crystal Sword, the highest military honour in Northwind. Harnan had died in the fighting along with 3 of the 6 other marines recommended for the Crystal Sword. High Command accepted and upheld every one of the commendations. John himself received the White Cross for his actions as commander.
The Vendetta had been scrapped. The crew assigned to a new ship, the combatstar Angel of Retribution. The Angel of Retribution was the first of its class and this was her first crew. The crew soon unofficially rechristened it the Vendetta 2. He smiled The Angel had been a fine ship, Sentaric had been John’s first officer on board that, like he had onboard every other ship. Of course new crew had come aboard, but then it was only 4000 extra men, the Vendetta’s crew integrated well with the new members. The veterans from Vendetta taught the new members of the crew everything they knew. John had seen to it that the two halves of the crew, old and new, forged a tight knit unit, John showed no favour to the members of his old crew or the new members of the crew. Brookke, John’s girlfriend, had been part of that new uptake. From the beginning Brookke had proven to be the pilot in any of the Angel’s 4 squadrons. She had met John on numerous occasions and they had forged close friendship within weeks, when John and Brookke had started dating none of the crew so much as batted an eyelid. It was very clear from the way they behaved towards each other. John showed her no favour, if anything he was harder on her because she was his lover, she only gained promotion when the wing commanders of all 4 squadrons had come to John and told him that they would resign if she wasn’t promoted to Wing commander of the 4th squadron. John had asked why the wing commander of 4th wanted someone promoted into his position. Wing Commander Nelosk Zedelar then revealed he wished to transfer to planetary duty. John had taken a few moments to agree.
“Commodore! We’ve just received orders from command to move out.”
Sentaric snapped out of his reverie.
“Thanks for that ‘Venger, relay coordinates to the rest of the fleet. Nav-com lay in coordinates for Rethinar, tell the crew to prepare for shore leave, it’s the last they’ll be getting for several months to come.”
Lights blinked in the darkness as the fleet disappeared, leaving only stars. Only 1 Combatstar and 3 Missilestars remained as protection for the small fledgling colony world.
