Chapter One: Sweet Revenge

This archive contains the original story as it appeared on gaia, This is our main story, and what BHotR as a whole started from and builds off of. The setting has gone through many changes, and so the story has many inconsistencies. You can, in this forum, see the evolution of the story and its players as we went from a simple roleplay began in 2006.
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Kai
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Chapter One: Sweet Revenge

Post by Kai »

In an instant, The Battle Hymn Of the republic winked into existance just a mile from the rear lines of the Drathonian battle group. The Command ship and it's two escorts sat there, helpless. Before the lizards even knew it was there, the Battle Hymn unleashed a deadly blow, the Solaris Cannons on either side of the hull unleashing Pure Terran fury hotter than a supernova. The two escorts, and a few past them even, had Enormous holes blown through their entirity, the massive decompressions caused by this made the craft implode and crush as easily as soda cans. next a volley of torpedos were unleashedand sent at superluminal speeds towards the numerous other ships in the Drathonian siege, Causing widespread damage and chaos. Finally the fighters were released, pilots eager to kill as many of their hated enemy as possible.

It was only now that the remainders of the Drathonian fleet put up any sort of resistance, throwing all the weapons fire they could directly at the Battle cruiser, but to no avail, as it's shields had been raised. They did nothing now, but a continued ponding could damage the shields and break through, and of course fighters which could penetrate the shields, but the Hymn's flyboys were out having a party now. The commander of the enemy Drake class vessel felt a great chill of fear wash down his spine, leaving the reptile speechless, making a few of his bridge crew cower in fear, the rest taking over for him.

At the flash of light in the sky, the terrans on Terra IV gave a cheer, the commander there very much relieved, sending some vessels to aid humanity's new found hope. they pounded at drathonian formations, which were now stuch between a rock and a very angry ship.

"Aknowledged." Kurohime replied to the take-off time
After a couple of minutes, the pod with engineering took off.
It manuvered between the debris of drathonian ships and unfortunatly, some terran fighters.
"Well, least more of them are dying." Kurohime said calmly.
She was keeping an eye on the internal systems and making sure the cloaking device was working.
She could see the battle was fierce, and more Drathonian ships had started to arrive, they had to attach soon, or they'd get caught in the cross-fire.
She turned her data-visor (ooc - they have a name now, woot) and took a look at the target ship.
"There," she pointed to a spot at the rear of the ship, "Ok get your weapons charged and ready to fire, we're going in!"

The order finally came in. Steven let out a booming cheer over the comm link, and his squad did the same as they felt the batteries fire. Steven commenced beginning to ignite the engines. At the flip of a switch the Scimitar class fighter lifted up and shot forward. He was closely followed by the remainder of Green Squadron as well as the other squadrons.

“Here we come you lizards,” he shouted. In the corner of his eye he saw the pods successfully launch as well. “Now it’s a party!”

He then flipped another switch, and on came the traditional rock music; which had been a tradition in Green Squad since his Grandfather’s time.

Kai and his marines were part of the first wave off the Hymn, they shot towards the Drake before the Hymn had even stopped firing. Soon They arrived at their target, well before any defenses could get up, and began melting turrets off of the bristling hull. Kai made several passes, taking out airlock doors to make the pod's jobs easier. Withing the two minute time-frame nearly all the surface weapons and airlocks had been taken out by the marines, and Scourge fighters found their way out of the Drathonian ships to meet the Scimitars. Knowing they needed to get ready to board with minimal losses, Kai called his group back then contacted green squadron "Cover our tails, Will ya?" He called on the all hands channel. The trip back wouldn't be so uneventful, as a wave of enemy fighters blocked their retreat "Looks like We'll have to fight Our way back!" he yelled, engaging the nearest enemy.

***
The scourge fighters immediately fanned out, they knew that grouping together would only hurt them. Two went after steven and a large number followed them to attack his squadron, two of the Terran pilots taking hits, one taking one he'd never recover from. One good thing was that the enemy fighters didn't even notice the pods hurtling past them.

***

Back on the Hymn commad was overseeing the battle and coordinating the forces, lights, switches levers, buttons, all flashing, beeping ,moving, what have you, the place was alive with activity. "Admiral Ceres!" an officer called "The Port Solaris cannon has over-heated, if we fire it again too soon we'll lose the ship"
"Shut it down, We're doing fine, Terra IV is sending help for us"
"SIR!"
The cannon was immediately shut down, it couldn't be fixed now. But The Hymn was far from being crippled.

"Come on, I've been waiting for this all day, can't you make this thing go any faster?" Tom asked impatiently. He looked over the rifle. It didn't look like it would overheat. He'd never even seen videos of this sucker in action, and although he knew how to shoot, he didn't know what quirks this particular rifle might have. It was a little too late to worry about that, though.

He did everything he could to ignore the distinct noise of explosions, energy weapons, and screaming engines flying about their boarding pod. He should've taken a shuttle. They'd even launched the thing early. They were at risk, and he'd have to hope that he actually made it to the ship to fire his rifle. It would be pretty disappointing to have come this far...

Steven and his squad were have a blast. He had just shot down a lone Scourge when he recieved a message from Kai to cover the tails of the marines who were falling back.

"Don't worry Cappy, you got us covering you," he stated confidantly in the reply message. Seconds later him and the rest of the squad flew right past the marines, with literally feet in between them.

"You hear that boys? The marines need us to watch their hindquarters for 'em," he joked with his squad on their private channel.

They rolled into formation as another song came on the speakers.

"We've got some boogies on our ta..." Green 4 said just before his comm went out.
"We've lost Green 4!" yelled Green 3 as he took a hit as well.
"Green 3, stay in formation. Green 1, could you kindly get these cold-blooded monkeys off our back?" he ordered as he turned off the music; in memory of their lost wingman.

Soon the first wave of pods began slamming into predetermined spots on the hull of the Drake battleship, jolting the marines and few engineers inside. once pressurization was complete, the doors opened to the bewildered stares of unarmed Drathonians caught completely by suprise.

***

the fighters outside, however, were not unprepared for their own battle. the superior numbers were beginning to gain an edge over the Terran's superior fighters. The scores more even, it was up to the pilots who would win and who would lose. Green squadron was showing themselves to be quite a threat, and were being targeted by larger and larger numbers of Scourges. This wouldn't be a walk in the park.

***

Kai launched a volley of micro-missiles from his pods at the ships between him and his destination, not really doing to much damage, but still scaring a hole in the formation for him to shoot through and get home. Most of his squad did likewise, having trained in this tactic quite a bit. It worked rather well, disorienting the enemy pilots and even causing a few to hit each other. Soon, the second wave of marines would be launching for the enemy command ship, and Kai wasn't going to miss it.

After a good deal of fighting, the strain was starting to show on Green Squad's ships. Steven's Scimitar had the tip of it's left wing missing, and and the other ships were not fairing much better. But they kept fighting as if the ships were brand new.

"Green 2, Green 3, split formation and flank my and Green 1's advance. Green 1, follow on my tail, we're taking it right to these scaly freaks." Steven ordered.

Greens 2 & 3 went to the left and right, Green 1 was right on Steven's tail. And Green Squadron shot right into the heart of the enemy formation.

needless to say, the enemy formation was taken completely by suprise with such abold move, and scattered into little defensive clumps of one or two fighters. throughout the battle, the superior terran pilots had been taking quite a heavy toll on drathonian ships, have a kill ratio of 8 to 3 in the terran's favor.

"Pleasant day, eh?" Tom told the open door, before throwing himself forward shoulder first, the rifle pushed against his other shoulder, facing upwards and spraying energy down the corrider. It stitched a pattern towards the opponents down away from him, his weapon spitting fire.

As Green Squadron shot towards the enemy at top speed the enemy ships began to scatter.

"Haha, they're running scarred boy's! On our advance, don't fire just pass through the openings, then wait for my command," Steven ordered as they neared what was left of the opposing formations. Then the men of Green Squad flew right through the enemy and came out behind the battle line.

"Green Squadron scatter!" Steven yelled on the comm. link, "find a target and send them to the abyss!"

The men scattered and struck out at the exposed flank of the lumbering enemy.

Meigan was launched out with the first wave, and her take off was less than perfect. She followed Kai around for a bit and then broke off into her own killing spree. She weaved her scimitar through multiple other ships, shooting them down as she passed. Her speed and control over her ship left a few drathonians amazed.

But as soon as she let her guard down to look for the captian again to catch up her ship's left wing was scraped by a shot from an enemy ship, luckly it wasn't criticaly damaged. She quickly shot down the ship that hit her and swirved around some more enemies, looking for Kai. Come on you can't be that hard to find with your bright, lime green-- She saw him not far from where she was and imediatly set a course to join him and the rest of the squad.

Odd thing was that there were no enemy ships in between them, had they already taken out that many of them?

Darian sat in the cockpit of his ship. On his screen he was watching the battle progress. He drummed his fingers on the control panel, impatient to get out into the fight. The initial wave caught them by surprise, but we didn't get all of them. So where did they vanish off to? he thought. Suddenly a multitude of red blips appeared from behind a nearby Drake. Impossible, they shouldn't have that many Scourges in reserve! Green quad won't be able to last that attack without help! Right as he thought this the orders came. "Blue Squad is go!"

Blue squad blasted out of the launch bay. Once clear of the Battle Hymn the Darian accelerated to flanking speed. Over the com Blue Commander said, "Hawk formation. Hit them on the left flank, then proceed to engage one on one" Complying with the orders, Blue squad banked swept into the massing horde of Scourges, raking them with a wave of turbo blaster rounds.

As Darian broke off from the group to find a target he thought to himself, Now things are getting interesting.

Most of Kai's squad managed to make it back unharmed, many of the fighters unscathed from the rather short flights with minimal opposition. Kai landed his Scimitar and hopped out, as one of the ground crew hopped in and took it to a maintenence area. Kai's squad followed suit, though Meigan appeared to be lagging a bit. I won't worry abot that right now kai thought, rushing to his squad's boarding pod and gearing up for the fight on the ship. He soon had on his armor and was just grabbing a Sugar rifle as the majority of his squad entered and did likewise, though they all grabbed BR-O's. Kai liked the power of the sugar over the rapid fire of the bro.

Five minutes into the fight and Darian had only taken a minor graze. He had accounted for three ships so far and was now being tailed by a fourth. He banked down and right in an attempt to shake off his less maneuverable opponent. However, it seemed whoever was driving the Scourge had not been told that Scimitars were supposed to be more maneuverable, for the attempt failed. After a few more failed attempts to shake the Scourge, a wild shot clipped the wing of Darian's scimitar. Two of his turbo blaster ceased operating. Darian had to do something fast, the enemy fighter was closing in rapidly. Darian dove and flew straight towards the nearest Drake. Right when he was about to hit, Darian fired his front thrusters, reversing his ships direction, and reverted all power to the rear thrusters. The sudden switch in direction caught the enemy fighter by surprise, and as Darian blazed past him the Scourges pilot learned that Scourges really weren't meant to turn on a dime. In the rear view screen darian watched as the Scourge collided into the drake and exploded.

That done Darian called to his commander, "I'm damaged on the right side, turbo blaster one and two are offline and thruster power is running at 54%. Orders sir?"
"return to the Hymn, you are a liability in that condition" called Blue commander.

the hangar bay was notified of Darian's predicament and got out the nearest, readiest Scimitar for him to switch to once he landed the damaged one. The one they got out just so happened to be lime green and say Capt. K. Nakamura next to the cockpit.

Green squad was just finishing off the last of the exposed scourges, when Green 1 yelled, "Sir large amount of Scourge reserves on route." Steven turned his ship for a look, for he trusted his eyes more than a computer screen. He froze when he saw how many were aproaching their vacinity.

"Sir, what should we do?" asked Green 3.
After long moments of thinking Steven gave the order, "Fall back near the Hymn, as much as it pains me to say it, we'll need support."

Then Green squad turned around to get closer to the Hymn.

"Sir, look! Blue squad has finally shown up!" Green 3 said over the comm.

Meigan landed quickly, got out of her scimitar and immediately checked her left wing. It had a very large dent and it was totally black now, Not gonna be able to get that out easily she thought.

But there was no time to worry about it too much right now, she ran down a few corridors and caught up with the captain and the rest of the squad. She immediately marched up to him and said, "So, can I have my blasters back yet?", she had wanted to say that to him since he took them, "And I'll need the remote safety taken off this one!"

"here you go" Kai stated simply, tossing the pistol to the woman. He stood up and pointed towards the gear on the walls of the pod "Suit up" he then went to the control panel and started launch procedures, closing the hatch behind them. Soon the Pod had made it's way into a rapid launch tube, to be literally shot at the Drake class that they were to board.

Finally Darian limped his ship back to the docking bay. As he clambered out of the cockpit he surveyed the damage to his wing and whistled softly, amazed that it hadn't done more damage. Darian almost objected as a crew of mechanics swarmed his Scimitar, but he thought better of it.

"We have another ship primed for you in pad A3." said one of the mechanics.

After thanking the mechanic he walked to the med station in the bay. He had obtained a nasty bruise and wanted to to make sure it was just that before he went back out.

"Why is it you never come back in one piece?" the med officer asked as he scanned the bruised area. "Anyway" the man continued, "you are good to go."

As Darian approached pad A3 he noted how decidedly ugly this scimitar was. He walked up to the vessel and and did a quick look over for any damage or shoddy workmanship. Then he noticed the name by the cockpit.

"This is a captain's ship." he called out to the nearby crew manager, "Why do I have a captain's ship? Did he die?"

Green squad reached the position they had designated, and turned around to prepare for the wave of scourges coming right at them.

"Sir, Squadron in position. What are your next orders?" Green 1 stated.

Steven sat thinking while looking at the fast approaching enemy. Green Squadron's ships were being battered. His ship now had holes and burns along the wings. Green 1 had taken a hit just to the left of the cockpit which was causing him to drag a little on that side. And Greens 2 & 3 weren't doing much better.

"Sir, what are your next orders?" Green 1 said again.
"Green 2, Green 3, how many missiles do you guys have left?" Steven asked.
"We have enough for another payload," said Green 3.
"Here's what we're gonna do. Green's 2 and 3 are gonna split formation. Green 1 is gonna go in high, while I go in low. We're going for a four-pronged pincer move. Then we hope Blue Squad gets the picture and follow suit. On approach wait for my command. GO!" Steven ordered.

And Green Squadron shot off again right at the enemy. Then for the first time in a while Steven felt worried.

"it's the only one that's ready now" the mechanic replied simply, pointing out all the other damaged scimitars sitting nearby. "unless you wanna take one of those, this is it" he continued gruffly, going back to work on one of the damaged ones.

***

The Main Terran fleet had been running ahead of schedule, and had now linked up with the Altresian fleet. Within moments they would be over Terra IV ready to help out the Battle Hymn.

Darian glanced at the battle screen. It was not good, Green Squad was trying a pincer without bothering to ask for help. Darian had met the Green Squad Captain before, and had not been overly impressed.

Idiot Darian thought to himself He must have forgotten to com the other squad leaders and ask for help. Now his squad is, for all intents and purposes, committing suicide. I guess this ship will have to do for now.

Darian hopped into the cockpit of the Scimitar, strapped in and called in for permission to launch.

This being the middle of a battle, command wanted as many fighters out as possible, and launch permission was granted almost instantaneously, Allowing the pilot to shoot out of the bay and into the fray as quickly as he wished. Damaged fighters from sever other squadrons were pouning in almost constantly, and the ground crew were working their butts off to get the things in working order as soon as possible. Soon the scimitar distribution got first come first serve, and any fighter that was ready was handed out immediately. Darian had gotten the last unscathed one.

***

BAck on the drathonian ship, an alarm went out, signifying that they had been boarded. Quickly the enemy resistance was becoming stronger and stronger, drathonians at the ready for the Terran intruders.

The fighters, as well, were getting better at fighting the Hymn's fighters, as scourges from thirty ships were fighting scimitars from just one. Only about 300 Scimitars were still operational on the battlefield, as opposed to nearly one thousand scourges.

As Green Squad neared the target, Steven heard the blood pounding in his ears from the adrenaline. He flipped a switch and the rock music came back on over the speakers.

"OK, Green 2, Green 3 launch missiles at the center of their formation. Green 1, you and I will shoot right for that hole. We're punching our way through!" Steven roared over the comm.

"You Blues had better hurry," he thought to himself while checking the location of Blue squad.

"FOR TERRAN PRIDE!" Steven shouted the battle cry accidentally on the public channel instead of over private chat.

The Greens all did their orders, and in seconds Green Squadron flew into the explosion that followed.

Darians ship screamed out of the docking bay and rocketed toward the regrouping blue squad.

"Blue Commander!" Darian called over com

"Dead" called blue 3, "there were too many of them and we couldn't get to him in time."

Darian knew what this meant. As the person with highest seniority in blue squad, he was now the acting commander.

"what are your orders sir?" called blue 4

At that moment a yell cut across the public channel "FOR TERRAN PRIDE!"
Darian glanced at his screen and saw that all but two of green squad had winked out of existence.

"We help Green" Darian called "Arrow formation, Blue 7 and 9 ready tow cables"

Green squad was as far into the fray as was humanly possible. They shot through the resonating explosion from the missiles.

"Sir, almost throu..." said Green 1 as his comm went blank.
"We've lost Green 1!" said Green 2 as Green squad past through the explosion. Just as they got through a piece of shrapnel stabbed right through Green 3 cockpit killing the pilot.
"Green 3 is gone Sir!" shouted Green 2 just as he took fire and was disabled.
"Green 2! Where the Hell'd that come from!" Steven shouted to himself as he looked up. It was what he had worried about; there was another wave behind the first one and they had open fire on them. Steven pulled up sharply trying to evade, but he took a glancing blow that caused the ship to jolt. Steven struck his head on the top of the cockpit. He pulled back as he continued to evade. Steven felt blood trickle down his face.

He was furious now. He was angry at the Drathonians, he was angry at his men, and more importantly, he was angry at himself. He was surrounded by dozens of enemy fighter now, the first wave had turned around towards him, and the second wave continued to fire. He knew he was going to die with the rest of Green Squadron, but he didn't care anymore; he was blood-drunk. He gave a deafening cry and turned the rock music up full blast; he turned the ship towards the enemy and opened fire.

As Steven charged defiantly towards the line of Drathonians, Blue squad sideswiped the Drathonian formation causing it to scatter. Blue 7 and 9 broke from the formation latched on to the surviving Green squad members and began to tow them back to the Hymn.

"Shield formation! Don't let the Drathonians get close!"

Blue squad formed a sphere around the two towing ships.

Steven's head was throbbing from the gash on his brow, but he didn't notice. He had taken many hits, but kept flying. He had shot down many enemy fighter by time Blue Squad reached him. He did not even notice them until he felt the jerk of the tow cable.

"Get off me!" he yelled into the comm at the Blue Squad. He gunned the engine trying to pull away. "I don't want your help!"

Darian saw Blue seven was struggling to keep the Green Commanders ship from breaking off. He turned on his com to Green frequency.

"Stand down! If you continue is such a fashion you will likely kill yourself and members of my squad, neither of which I would find acceptable. Now shut down, and turn off that infernal music!"

Seeing the Drathonians regroup, Darian switched to red frequency.

"This is Blue Leader, I need assistance getting to the hymn. could you cover our retreat?"
"Sure thing" called Red Leader.

Steven listened too the message from the new Blue Leader. "Then unhook me!" he shouted at the man, "I have to get back there!"

"I think it's a good idea to listen to the man Green Leader," said Green 2 in a weak voice.
Steven stop his yelling when he heard that. "Green 2 I thought you were taken down too!" Steven said.
"Nah, they only disabled me is all," Green 2 managed, "And besides what do you think the other Greens would think if they saw you acting like this?"

Steven stopped altogether when he heard that. He then switched off his engine and took off his helmet. He then turned off his comm. as well, and for the first time since he can remember he felt a tear go down his cheek.

The beginning of battle found Garrett prepared and ready to go. His tactical vest was equipped, and explosives were strapped securely. He had a small duffel of slightly larger equipment, should the need arise, and he hauled it the short way to the boarding pod launch site. He was with the second wave of boarders. Demolitions rarely went in the first wave, unless forced entry was an absolute requirement. After all, you didn't want your bomb buddies getting blown to pieces when your assault was just beginning did you? Of course not. If he went boom, then so did everyone else.

That made Garrett the most important unimportant person now boarding the Drathonian ship. If he died, chances stood that those within a fifty foot radius would too. That was a lot of space. "Better not play hero then," he thought aloud as his pod connected with the Drathonian command ship. Grabbing the duffel, he jumped out of the pod, and immediately dove for cover next to a marine private. "So, privvy, how's it coming?"

"Alright, sir!" shouted the private over the bursts of gunfire. "Glad to see the demolitions here, too, sir! Can't wait to hear the reports!"

"You'll be hearing more than reports, privvy. Just follow the sounds of Drathonian death gurgles. That'll be my wake, son." The private chuckled and leaned out from cover to fire a few bursts, and then collapse after taking a shot to the face. What a horrible way to end such a beautiful friendship. Garrett sighed, and lit up a cigarette while he sat there, taking a peek around, and looking for his best options

Kurohime and the other Engineers had been working on setting up the shields to help the boarding party,
"Right, Abul, use that panel to figure out what kind of automated defence they should have, we can't risk doing anything major yet though, except fight, we don't want to draw attention to our group."
After a few minutes of fighting, the Drathonian Security squad had been wiped out, with no casualties.
"Good, now lets move on before more come, us engineers will use the data visors to follow the route, if you see anything with a tail heading towards us, just shoot it before it shoot us."
She heard alarms starting to go off, "Well, hopefully, they'll concentrate on the other, larger groups."
The shields had been taken down now,
"Right, lets move!" She said, motioning which direction to go.

At the next junction, they ran into a drathonian patrol, only they saw the lizards first, Kurohime pulled out her EV-47, and crouched behind a corner, she spotted a camera and fried it, while the marines took out the patrol.

Apart from that one incident, the group ran into very few Drathonians, something was wrong, there was not fighting on the level either.
Maybe the distraction plan worked? she thought, No, even if it had, they know they have a boarding party here, they'd have sent some more down, wouldn't they?
They were close to Engineering now, but she knew something was wrong, she could hear Drathonians up ahead, lots of them.
She quickly used her Data Visor to plan an different route.
"Wait," she whispered, this is too easy, she looked at the map then said
"In here, it's an emergency store room, used to store extra engineering parts, mainly pipes and wires, nothing worth guarding really.
Abul, get the door open, I'll need you to hack their cameras, I want to know excactly how many lizards are outside engineering, it sounds like a lot from here.
And we'll set up shields at the door, in case it's a trap and they want to box us in."

Meigan walked over to where all the rifles and such were, she took a bro rifle and straped it on. She then turned to the captain and asked, "We going soon?"

She didn't wait for an answer and started pacing around nervously. Was she nervous or excited, they felt the same to Meigan. Whatever she was feeling she was getting impatient.

"Yup" was Kai's simple replythen he punched the 'launch' button and the pod was fired at high speed across the battlefield at the enemy command ship. The pod bumped and jolted on the way, but there was no damage to it, and soon it smashed into the side of the Drake class. A bit of whirring and grinding noises told them the pod was having a bit of trouble breaking through, but before long there was a sharp CLANK as it locked in. a wooshing noise told them they had pressurised, and then the door opened. out in the hallway was nothing. they had landed on the same level as engineering had, and were just as confused by the lack of lizards. "Come on! let's go! Kai yelled at his squad, then led them through the maze of hallways, checking each door along the way. Nothing, till the last door in the hall and it was full of: the engineering group. "Oh, hello, good to see you guys here" he said. "need any backup?"

"We're mostly alive," Tom replied. "Better to go together than apart, though," he added, shrugging.

"But... Where is the opposition? We're on the floor where essentially the vitals of their ship are stored, and I can't think of any good reason to have so little resistance except... well, except an ambush."

Meigan had a bit of trouble keeping her balance as the pod shot towards the ship, but she was able to stay standing.

When they boarded Meigan was just as surprised as everyone else, why would they leave this section unatended, were they too busy with other things? No, the drathonians outnumbered them by a great deal, surely they would be able protect the whole ship at once.

But as the squad ran down the corridors, checking all the doors on the way, it became relevant that there were no enemies in sight. Meigan came to a stop with the rest of them as they opened the door and found the engineering group.

Suddenly, something odd happened: All of the Scourge fighters fell back leaving the remnants of the Hymn's fighter squadrons to gape at the scene of destruction between them and the enemies. Something was up, and whatever it was couldn't be good. The fighter controller called all of the pilots on the all hands channel "Retreat to the hymn for maintenence and repairs, I don't like what's going on out there" To further his point he turned on warning lights in all the cockpits of the fighters. Many of the wreckages suddenly had eerie glowing red lights in them, showing just how much damage had been done to the Terran's fighters. Those fighters that had been disabled now felt it safe to deploy chaff to mark their positions for recovery crews. Soon a huge recovery effort was underway for as much of the Terran gear as possible. it was a risky gamble, but one they had to make.

***
In the Drake class, however, the fighting was just as fierce as it had been, if not more so. In Garrett's section of the ship, the terrans and drathonians were at a standistill, a fierce firefight raging, many falling on both sides, but motly drathonians. a few squads on that level had been issued the new rifles and were showing just how superior they were, mowing down everything in their wake. Unfortunately, a squad of dragoons had pitted themselves against those squads, their tough hides making many of the blows simply glance off. Something needed to be done soon, as the second wave had only been mildly helpful.

As Blue Squad neared the Hymn Darian noticed that the Scourges were gone. Nothing but Terran ships and wreckage showed up on censors. A minute later, rescue beacons were filling the space around the hymn. Only then did Darian realize just how much damage had been done.

A voice cut through the local com chatter and said, ""Retreat to the hymn for maintenance and repairs. All ships still with little or no damage, your priority is now search and rescue."

Darian quickly called out orders to blue squad. "7 and 9, get Green Squad to the docking bay. 8 and 10 cover them. meet back up with us when you are done. Blue 4, 5, and 6 are on recovery duty. Blue 3 and I will be flying cover in case they show up again."

While being towed back to the Hymn, Steven just sat in the cockpit seat staring at the wreckage that was once the ship of the elite Green Squadron. He was thinking of all their missions: from when they all joined Green Squad, to last order he had giving them. Steven had been personal friends with the entire squad, and he would miss those men very dearly.

"At the very least there is still me and Green 2," he said to the darkness.

In the history of the Green Squadron's name, the entire squad had never been completely destroyed. It always carried on with old and new members alike. Ever since his Grandfather who was the very first Green Leader, and who held the title for well over forty years 'till his retirement. At which he gave the title to Steven's father. After his father's death a few years later Green Squad had seen many leaders. Then Steven took the title shortly after he joined the fleet.

Steven kept running over the history in his head and wondered if his father would be proud of him even after what he had done.

Then he sat forward and turned his comm. back on. "Hey new Blue Lead, what ever your name is. Could you do me a favor? If you could, could you retrieve the name plates from my men's ships?" he asked in a sullen tone.

Darian was circling the remnants of one of the Green squad ships when he got the call from Steven. Darian noted the empty, hollow sound of his voice.

"Sure thing." Darian replied.

He was just landing in the docking bay when Steven heard Darian, "Thank you."

Then he looked over at Green 2's ship and saw it swarming with medical technicians. Then his own cockpit opened up, and Steven blinked at the bright lights of the docking bay. "Are you all right Sir?" he heard someone say. He looked over and saw a young looking girl with pitch black hair along with two other medical technicians standing on the wing looking at him.

He smiled a bit and laughed, but stop when his head started to throb again. "I must be quite the sight huh?" he joked to the technicians who were helping him out of the cockpit of the fighter. He looked at the girl again, "Did I actually die out there, because I think I just saw me an angel."

"Captain, we're looking to hack into the security camera's, we're using this storage room as a temporary base, mainly because we can set up a double layer shield at the door and the entrance to a conduit that happens to lead to engineering."
She paused, "Since we're no longer on the outside of the ship, we don't have to worry about being spaced, the plans say this room is used for storing basic parts engineering use, pipes and wires mainly, nothing volatile. Abul is currently working on the door, and heat sensors show that there's no lizards. Though there is a lot of noise coming from the direction of Engineering. I may have to change the route depending on what we're up against." At that moment, Abul managed to get the door open and both teams moved inside.
Apart from a few crates which were quickly searched, the room was empty.
The conduit hatch was clearly visable.
"Right, get double shield layers up at the two entrances, and shut the main door again, we want it to look like nothing has happened.
Abul, try to get into their system without being noticed." Kurohime said to her team
"The ships plans say that these rooms ventilation systems are connected to the main life support system only, we shouldn't have to worry about being gassed, our only real concern is being found and the shields going down." Marie said as she set up one of the shield layers by the door.
Once everything was set up, Abul was able to hack into the camera systems
"Got the ones we need, whoa! That's a lot of lizards, I guess they figured we weren't regular soldiers." he said
"Damn, right, we reroute, I've got the conduit systems here, this one is a transport conduit," Kurohime pointed to the hatch, "It's used to move the stuff stored here to engineering, The transport conduit system forms a circle round the whole of Engineering, with several entrances.
Abul, get me images from the camera's in engineering, I want to see what we'll be up against."
"It looks like a couple of guards and the rest look like engineers, not too many weapons and low power ones at that."
"That's good, out problem is the ones outside, they look like dragoons, even with your sqaud captain, I don't think we could take them before engineering was locked down, and that would take too long to get around. Our best alternative is to stop them getting into engineering, and go through the conduit, and go in using each entrance.
Abul, you think you could lock engineering without them noticing?"
"Just a sec, well it's already locked from the inside, and I know that type of door system, if you fry the main internal panel, the door won't open until that gets fixed, 'cause the main mechanism is just behind it. An EV-47 should do it, you just need to be a good sharpshooter, this conduit entrance will give you the best shot." he pointed to one on the plan of the conduits."
"Ok, if you have no objections captain, we'll use the conduits to get people at all the entrances, the best sharpshooter with an EV-47 will go to this conduit, once everyone is in position, that person will fry the door mechanism and then we make our entrance, due to the size of the explosion that would be caused if someone hits the wrong thing with any Blaster Rifle, we can only use EV-47s and the laser edged swords.
Once we've locked down engineering, we'll continue with the mission and give our guys a helping hand."
She and Abul packed up the data equipment and Kurohime put her laser sight on her EV-47.

The captain thought over this plan for a bit, and came to a conclusion "Either way, we need to get rid of those dragoons, I say, since we know of their ambush, we can negate their advantage, Plus these new baby's will help us out quite a bit." He said, patting the rifle " I'll take my squad around and create a distraction while you sneak into engineering and take it over." He smirked And headed towards the door "Kurohime, Contact me when you're ready, youll be able to hear our shots, and so will they, the drathinians inside will be more than distracted enough for you guys to get in. Alpha squad! Move out!" he called for his squad and headed a bit down the corridor.

Anita stared at the fight raging just outside the space ship, a frown on her face. "War disgusts me," she muttered as she observed the wreckage strewn about, floating through space. The sounds of bustle in the hangar snapped her back to reality. She was supposed to be pulling wounded pilots out of the hangar and examining them.

She walked briskly through the hangar scanning for wounded pilots, there were quite a few getting help already.

"Did I actually die out there, because I think I just saw me an angel."

Anita heard the voice of a pilot. She glanced up, noticing a pilot speaking to another female medical officer, quite similar looking to herself. She felt a twinge of annoyance run through her. She swung herself up onto the wing the other medic were standing on. She tapped the other female medic on the shoulder. "I'll take Romeo here, you guys get some of the new pilots coming in," said Anita.

The medic nodded and scampered off the wing. "Now I'll need you name for the records," Anita said briskly, "You'll need be taken down to examine that head wound of yours there."

Just before the captain left, "Don't forget to switch from the rifles when you go into engineering." Kurohime said.
Once they were gone she turned to the rest, "Right, scan the conduit for life and hazards, they could have laid traps."
After a minute: "Scans show the way is clear, I don't think they expected us to come this way."

"Ok, put your gas masks on and set the armour for dealing with chamical and bio hazards as well as gunfire, we're going to enter a highly dangerous area, I won't take any chances."
Soon the whole team was ready, and waiting by the conduit hatch.

"Ok, I'll communicate to the captain when everyone is in position by a different entrance. When you hear the fight start, move in, our aim is to make sure the door doesn't open, hopefully they'll initiate a full lock down and not go to help, now move out."
The team mived quickly through the conduit, Kurohime took the entrance nearest the door, paired with a Marine, the other Engineers were at different entrances.
"Ok, Everyone in position?"
Soon all confirmations were in
"Good, when we go in, Marines go in first, Engineers sharpshoot from the conduit entrance with the EV-47." she ordered
She then switched to a different encypted channel,
"Captian, we're ready and waiting on you, just don't die out there please."

Soon they could hear gunshots, and panic hit the Drathonian Engineers, they began to hit buttons and a massive bulkhead closed over the door.
Perfect! was all Kurohime could think
"Right," she commed her team, "Theres a lot of lizards down there which need teaching a lesson, lets do this!"
At once the hatches were opened, the Marines jumped out shooting or slashing with the laser-edged swords and the Engineers sniped at the drathonians not involved in close combat.
Due to the lack of guards inside the take over was swift and brutal.

"Ok," Kurohime said stepping out of the conduit,
"While our first aim is to disrupt inter-ship communications, our guys need help. Marines are to put the conduit hatches back and stand guard, we don't want them pulling what we pulled.
Abul, hack their systems, so far they've kept automated security off, make it so it hits Drathonians, not our lot, then turn it on and max accuracy. Singh, Jones, you should be able to activate all the bulkheads from that panel there, use the security cameras and ships plans to seal of any lizard patrols and the armoury, but if theres terrans in the area leave it. Davidson, mess up their comm systems, make it impossible to communicate with each other, Maire and I will work on cutting power to all the external weapons, but we'll keep the shields up for now, once we've got the ship totally under our control, then we'll work on the main mission."
"Done!" Abul said, "Wasn't too hard."
"Good, now help myself and Marie."
"Hey Kurohime," Jones asked, "What about the lizards we've sealed off that are on the outer part of the ship?" Kurohime knew what Jones wanted to do.
"They've spaced Terran crews before, while I won't be able to take the decision on the rest, make sure no terrans are in those areas, then make those lizards take a walk."
"Got it."
"Ok, power to external weapons is being cut. That should help the guys in the big battle." Abul said
"I put a little tune on their comm systems, nails down chalk board, continuous headache for the lizards." Davidson grinned.

"Good," Kurohime suddenly heard an increace in gunfire from outside,
"Get me those camera shots!" when she saw them she smiled, "Looks like the automated security trick worked, and that should be happening all over the ship. Ok, Davidson, give me a hand with the inter-ship communications, I want to borrow that tune, the rest of you, keep things status quo, only once you're certain the captain has won, and use the cameras for that, can you open up the doors. Singh and Jones, keep checking for lizards you can seal off, if our guys need to go through let them, just send them a message about the lizards on the other side."

Then she and Davidson went to the communications panel in Engineering, she took one look at the console and swore violently
"Seems the only way we can access what we need to access is from the bridge, when the captain is done, we'll go with his team, your job is to make it as easy as possible for us to get there."

Steven watched the other girl climb onto the fighter's wing, and as she dismissed the others. "Now I'll need your name for the records," she said to him.

"OK, my name is Pvt. Steven Kerning, Green Squadron Leader," he said to the woman. "And I'm fine I just need a bandage, but if you don't mind me asking, what the status of my buddy over there," he asked as he pointed to Green 2, who was now being carried out on a stretcher.

Tom grunted at the female engineer's command, moving over to the conduit, having a look inside, then pulling shut the door. He then set to work doing what he could about the mild degree of gore spattered on his uniform, the sword dangling loosely in his right hand.

"We're gonna be here a while, aren't we?" he asked, examining his sleeve.

As soon as he got the signal from Kurohime, Kai signaled for his squad to round the corner, Which they did, immediately opening fire on the drathonian scum. knowing it was dragoons, kai set his S-Gur to Sniper mode and hung back a bit, making every shot count. "One shot, One Kill" Kai said happily, Blowing the head off of the nearest Dragoon, watching it fall limp to the floor, The power of this new rifle was amazing, completely eradicating the advantage profferred by the dragoon's scales. After Loosing one clip from his rifle, and all his squadmates loosing their own, Half the dragoons were gone, to one injury in Kai's elite squad, but the dragoons had called for reinforcements, which came in the form of a squad of drathonian shooters from behind. getting the jump on kai, who had been behind, One got off a shot hitting him in the leg and taking out one more of his squad mates. the now divided attentions of the group reduced their effectiveness, and with Kai on the ground injured they were having more trouble with the dragoons until the automated weapons system started up and began firing on the drathonians, killing the confused lizards rather effectively. "It's clear out here" kai called to the engineering group "You guys have a combat medic?, mine went down and a few of us are injured"
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Kai
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Re: Chapter One: Sweet Revenge

Post by Kai »

On the bridge of the Battle Hymn, Ceres noticed the Drake had stopped firing, and was now spraying Drathonian corpses into the void. The transmissions they got from the marines on it, however, told the Hymn the fight wasn't over yet. Sensors now showed a force of Raptor class vessels were making their way towards the Hymn, Firing as they came, so heavily that even the Drathonians deemed it too dangerous to send fighters out. The combined strength of one of their volleys were enough to punch a hole in the shields, sending off warnings all over the bridge. "Take evasive action! we can't hold this much longer!" The admiral shouted. Once they had changed trajectory, the ship pointed at them "Let's give them another shot from the Solaris" He ordered, and a weapons officer Responded "Aye sir, we'll give 'em hell" Pushing the allmighty fire button, Unleashing the fury of revenge once again, blowing one of the raptors to pieces. By now the 20 or so Mars destroyers had made their way to the Hymn and were beginning to broadside any ship in their path. Dangerous, but effective. The Atmosphere of Terra IV was quickly becoming a ship graveyard, strewn with not only fighters, but giant crumpled space hulks as well. The sooner the fleet got there, the sooner the resources would be used for Terran glory.

"Open the doors!" Kurohime said,
The marine sqaud ran in, pulling wounded, "Right, all people with medical training get these soliders patched up as best you can." she shouted
Once all the sqaud was inside, the door was shut and sealed again.
"We have a problem captain, they've removed access to external communications from engineering, we'll need to take over the bridge."

"Wait Kurohime, I just got past their system security, we've cut the bridge off!" Davidson said, "The protocal on this class of ship is that if the Bridge is cut off from the communications system, Engineering gets control of everything, including external ship communications.
"On second thoughts, we just need a minute here." she said to the captain before running to the console
"Good work Davidson." she said typing in code after code.
Soon she could hear orders being shouted in Drathonian,

"Up yours Lizard scum!" she hissed as she inputted the final code, sending an aweful sound onto all the comms in the Drathonian fleet, overriding any messages on all drathonian channels, public or private.
"That should slow them down a bit." she smiled
"We've got the shields on this ship still up, just in case they figure out what happened, and at this point in time I have to advise staying here, mainly because if we lose Engineering, they can reverse what we've done, but only from here, so we need all the support we can get." she stopped for a second
"And now the bridge is cut off, and sealed off with the bulkheads, we have total control of the ship from here, though I wouldn't recommend joining the battle from here, we'd be blown to bits in no time. However to stop ourselves getting bored, we have injured to attend to, even if it is tying bandages."

"Cool" Kai said, grimacing in pain at his ruined leg. He could tell one thing for sure: it would need replacing. He looked down for the first time to see how bad it was and nearly vomited. His entire thigh had been blown off, and the bone had splintered out. What remained of it was a bloody mess. "Could someone get me a tourniquet before I bleed to death?" The captain asked, one of the marines with medical training came over And helped Kai put the tourniquet on, and the bleeding stopped. Regaining his composure a bit, kai got an idea. "Why don't we gather as many wounded as we can on this level and send them back for treatment? I'll need some help moving and I'm just a liability to you guys anyway" he said, giving a weak smile.

Anita scribbled down Steven's name onto her sheet. "I'll be the judge of whether you just need a bandage or not," she glanced over at the injured pilot he pointed too, "Several of his controls were damaged and shrapnel got flung at him. His face is scratched up but the only thing I would worry about is the fact that he has several pieces of shrapnel embedded in his biceps. Back to you, how exactly did you get you injury? Where you bludgeoned at all or is it a laceration?" She spoke quickly, professionally, and to the point.

"I'm not sure. What does smashing my head into a windshield count as?" Steven said casually. "I'm sorry, it's a blunt injury," he said getting back to being serious.
He looked back at Green 2 as he disappeared through the doors.
"You medical guys better take good care of him, got it?"

"I assure you our medical staff is more than prepared to take out a couple pieces of metal and repair some muscles. He'll be up, on your squad, and killing again in no time. I just need to check to see if you have a concussion. Just answer a couple questions for me. What is the name of the type of ship you pilot? What is the name of the ship you're currently on? What year is it?" Anita spewed out a constant stream of pointless questions. She paused after each question for a couple seconds and then moved on to the next one whether Steven answered or not.

Suddenly, in the middle of a question, she said "Catch," and quickly tossed a ball she had been sneaking out of her pocket while distracting Steven with her questions.

Steven sat and listened to the woman list off questions one by one.
"What is the name of the type of ship you pilot?"
"Easy, Scimitar class starfighter."

"What is the name of the ship you're currently on?"
"I call her Emberen."

"What year is it?"
"I know this one give me a sec..."

She countinued on with the questions as Steven was trying to sort them out to answer.
"Hey slow down," he asked her.

"Catch!"
"Catch wha.." he got off as a ball came towards his face. He caught it just barely.
"We done yet?!" he asked quickly.

"We can't really do much until we've dealt with most of the lizards." Kurohime said, checking the cameras.
"However there are some levels we have total control of, we can send a couple of marines to those groups to gather the wounded, our scans of the conduit systems indicate the lizards aren't there, so we can use those to avoid fights on levels we don't fully control."
She looked around and decided who to send,
"Tom, and you (ooc: Megan if possible)," she got another Marine's attention.
"Go with Marie to these groups and help get the injured back here, Marie, take the bio-hazard pack, it has equipment suited for transporting wounded, and take some of the portable shields just in case."
"Sure thing Kurohime." Marie replied

Meigan saw the captain's large wound and quickly turned away. She was not that good with blood, just thinking about it made her uneasy. So she turned her attention to the situation at hand. She then noticed an engineering person asking her to go retrieve the injured.
"Does t-that mean there is going to be..." Meigan paused for a few seconds, "blood?"

"Yes Meigan, theres gonna be blood. But I need you to not be a panty-waste and go out and help those people" Kai said. his face still clenched in pain a bit, most of his body drenched in sweat. He adjusted himself into a more comfortable position against the wall. "we want as many marines as possible alive at the end of this battle, you hear me soldier? Now go! that's an order"

Tom was already out the door, carefully moving to the wounded and hefting them gently to a fireman carrys, allowing those who were capable of standing to use him as a balance. A strange little troop of three or four injured men plus Tom, holding his rifle, came back to the door towards the medics.

Meigan stared at the captain for a few seconds before registering what was just said to her and passing it off as him being in a grumpy mood from his wound.
"Fine," Meigan replied simply and started walking down a hallway, searching for wounded marines. She hadn't waited for the other two to go, and hoped they had just followed her. Meigan jumped over a couple dead drathonians on the way, nearly slipping on a few blood puddles.
Disgusting Meigan thought Why did they have to die right in the middle of my path? Why couldn't they have died somewhere off to the side?

As the battle continued to rage on, Garrett kept to the back-end of the Terran squads, a safe and prosperous distance from the Drathonian sights. However, things quickly started turning sour when the Dragoons showed up, brazenly boasting their armor by striding down the halls unflinching. It was truly a demoralizing sight, and Terrans were beginning to retreat. Garrett smirked and stamped out his cigarette. Kneeling, he pulled two adhesive explosives from his duffel, then lay down on top of it, feigning death. The Dragoons passed without a second glance. With their backs to him, Garrett rose and tossed the duffel bag down the hall, passed them. Then he sprinted.

As the bag soared past the Dragoons, they turned their heads to find the source, and found Garrett hardly a yard away, explosive in his right hand and pistol in his left. He fired thrice at the face of one Dragoon. Surprised, he flinched. It was all Garrett needed to distract the beast. Using all his moment, he leaped and landed on the Dragoon, bringing him to the ground. He forcefully inserted the explosive into the Dragoon's mouth, activated it, and withdrew his hand before the Drathonian beast could devour it. The second was now readying his weapon for an assault. Garrett dove out of the way just in time, and clicked a small trigger.

An explosion tore through the hallway, and one Dragoon's head exploded, brain matter, bone debris, and various other bits of gore spattered the walls, floor, and ceiling. Even the second Dragoon was covered in the nasty remains of his comrade. He was also stunned from the explosion. Garrett crept up close, slapped the explosive onto the Dragoon's head, and ran. Once he felt safe, he pressed the trigger. The following silence was all Garrett needed to know that both targets were dead. He grinned at his Terran comrades as he ran down the hall past them, scooping up his duffel on the way. With the Dragoons removed, the advancement resumed, but Garrett did not join them. Instead, he took another route, slowly creeping through the halls, searching for anything that would be worth blowing up.

Kurohime pulled out her own CBH med kit and began to treat the wounded.
"Abul, see if you can get us a route to the nearest hanger which isn't controled by lizards, once the outside battle is over, we'll get the wounded there, so we can get them off this hunk of junk asap."
"Right, It'll take a couple of minutes, depending where the hangers are in relation to us." was the reply.
"Good," she went over to the captain and took over the treatment, using the heavy duty dressings in her kit.
"I'm assuming you heard what I'm getting Abul to do, once this fight is over, I'll request a medical transport is sent to the hanger we decide to use, then once the wounded are off, the rest of us can get off using regular transports. Before that, I'm gonna set an auto-self destruct sequence which will be triggered by a signal at a specific frequency, once we're at a safe distace, I'll tigger the sequence from a comm unit on the Battle Hymn." she said.
"Anyway, now that wound has been properly dressed, well, as properly as someone who isn't a doctor can dress a wound, all you need to do is not move much and to make sure you don't black out, a painkiller shot."
She pulled the syringe out of it's packet.
"And I am trained to do this, don't worry."
Before the captain could object she injected him in the upper leg, then finished cleaning up the smaller wounds on his body.
Soon more wounded were arriving, some with minor wounds, others on the brink of death.

The young captain nodded and said 'Yeah" to just about everything the engineer did. He was a bit out of it at the time being , and didn't really care. He sighed in relief when she injected him with the pain killer, and his head cleared a bit "Alpha squad, I need you guys to help escort the people from engineering who need to get anywhere. make sure they stay alive, we need them or else we'll lose the battle" he said. Soon the painkilling effect of the drug made it to the man's head and his eyes glazed over a bit as he fell into drug induced daydreams.

***

The Combined Terran And Altresian fleets barreled towards Terra IV, soon to arrive. They were all getting ready to launch into a battle, one they expected to be doing a lot worse than it actually was. In a miute, they dropped out of hyperspace into a lull in the battle, Shocked, thinking that it was over early. "Admiral Ceres of Battle Hymn, this is Admiral Kiyoshi of the RBD kosomos, What is your status?" Asked the fleet's former flagship.
"admiral kiyoshi, This Is the Battle Hymn, Be ready for anything, we have sustained 57% shield damage and a few systems overloaded, as well as the loss of an as of yet unknown portion of our fighters. we request that you Immediately engage the nearest Drathonian ship, except the damaged drake class directly in front of us, as it's fullof marines"
As the Admiral updated the fleet, The drathonians caught wind of the now much larger force, and began immediately attacking the ships which had begun flanking them. A large battle had now re-begun, and intensified as Several thousand scimitar starfighters launched from their respective ships. the drathonians were completely trapped and cornered, but they would not give up the fight yet, they Knew something the terran fleet didn't.

Once the captain was fixed up Kurohime went to a console and looked at the Drathonian commucation logs.
"All things considered, the fact we've not recieved a communication saying the battle is over is worrying. The scanners show the main fleet has just arrived but the Drathonians are still fighting like they think they can win, something isn't right." she muttered under her breath. She continued to scan the logs, then she saw what was really going on.
"Oh no . . . whatever it is, if the descriptor is right, we've got a problem." her face was white, as the situation dawned on her.
"Captain, we have a serious problem, I've checked their communication logs and found that something code named Demonix is due to arrive here within the next ten minutes. At this point in time I can't determine what this Demonix is."
She paused, "I'll set up a secure channel to Admiral Kiyoshi and Admiral Ceres, we need to warn the main fleet asap!"
Before anyone could respond, she set up the Channel to the Hymn and Kosmos.
"This is Engineer Kurohime Ito reporting from the boarded Drake. We have uncovered information on something code named Demonix. Whatever it is, it is due to arrive within the next ten minutes. The descriptor by the entry says: 'It's something that'll ensure the terrans surrender the minute it arrives.' So whatever it is, it's big, we're working on finding out what it is, but no gaurentees on getting that info before it arrives." she said as calmly as possible, but she figured the fear was showing in her eyes.

Darian and his squad were still busily recovering fighters when the Fleet arrived. Upon seeing the fleet, Darian let out a sigh of relief. All that was left to do was clean out the remain of the Drathonian Fleet. However, this was not going to be an easy task. The drathonains seemed to know that they had lost the advantage and were fighting back furiously. Scourges were pouring out of the Drathonian ships.

"Drop whatever you are doing and form up!" Darian called to blue squad, "Things are heating up. We need to join up with the Fleet's squads."

Steven was beginning to get really annoyed with all of the medical nonsense.
"Can't you just give me a bandage for the cut already, I need to get back out there to help the others!" Steven growled as he watched what was happening outside. He was becoming more and more anxious to get back in a ship and help the other squads with the new wave of enemies.

The fray carried on smoothly after Garrett took down the two Dragoons. A short fifteen minutes later, though, a squad of elite boarders pulled him aside, requesting his special talents to gain access to engineering compartments. They had been cut off on the way, and now required his explosives to move forward.

"Then it's time work, eh?" He smirked, and followed these men deeper into the ship. After gunning down a few more Drathonians, it was clear. The soldiers stood guard while he prepped and armed a heavy-duty C4 package. "Move!" He ducked around the hallway and pressed the trigger. The explosion was almost deafening, but anyone that had been on the other side of the door was most certainly dead. "Go, go, go!" The marines rushed through the smoke and floating debris. Almost immediately thereafter, Garrett heard gunfire, and a pair of human screams. Fortunately, he heard a far greater number of Drathonian gurgles, and felt at ease as he came around the corner, duffel slung over his shoulder. "Where now?" he asked. The leader pointed to a blast door. "The last one, and we're in."

Garrett nodded, and went to work. It was blown open in due time, and the marines filed in quickly. There was no gunfire this time, so Garrett followed quickly, and came upon a makeshift medical site. After glancing around quickly, he came across a far higher ranking officer than himself, and knelt beside the man, but he was out. He looked to the medic next. "What's going on?"

Kurohime jumped when she heard the explosion.
When she saw it was a demolitions team, she was furious
"You idiots! Didn't any of you think to check your Data Visors to see where you were on the ship, if we'd not had the portable shields up the warp containment field would have gone down, and we'd all be dead. As it is, we did have those shields up, so that did not happen, and the debris didn't get inside, so the injured don't have more injuries to cope with." she shook her head,
"Any combat medics amongst you get to work helping out, the rest can help guard the surrounding corridors since we don't have a door any more." she said cooly.
She went back to the console she was using,
"Ok Demonix, where are you?" she muttered, the stress was getting to her, she had to focus, but having the best protection the room had blown to bits was too much.
"Damn it, they don't have a single reference apart from approximate arrival time." she moaned, falling to her knees in dispair.

With the Combined might of the Hymn, Kosmos, and terran fleets, The 30 or so remaining Drathonian ships were easily obliterated. They fought back hard though, and managed to destroy or damage some 50 Terran ships as they went down. On the Night side of Terra IV, the people on the ground got a dazzling light show. Streaks of bright light glowed in the sky, followed by explosions of massive proportions. All in all, it was a beautiful sight to the beleagered terrans on the planet.

All was not won however, as Kurohime's comm signal got through the meaningless chatter barely intact. "Admiral, We're getting a signal, one of the engineers on the Drake we've boarded has found some info on something called 'Demonix' We've heard this before, but have yet to figure out what it is. The comm goes on to say it will arrive in a few minutes" The Comms officer looked up at the Admiral, a note of fear in her eyes. The admiral replied "Send a transmission to all Operating terran ships, Form a defensive perimeter In orbit over the base on Terra IV, we don't need a Terra V" With a stern tone, adding an emphasis to the last word. The Comms officer complied immediately and soon the fleet was moving into the requested formation. Kiyoshi of the Kosmos sent a return comm line, opening up on a viewscreen "Ceres my old friend, what has you so worried to make us do this?"
"Demonics" was the simple reply, elliciting a gasp from the other Admiral. these two men were some of the few who knew the true meaning of that word. All fighters were ordered to return as soon as the rescue was over, and the drake was ordered abandoned, it wouldn't be of much use during what was to come.

When the order to abandon came through, Kurohime shook her head, "I'd guess by that, someone knows what Demonix is." she stood up.
"Right, everyone capable of walking do so, we've only got a couple of minutes before who knows what arrives.
And anyone not capable of walking is to be helped. We're making our way to the hanger on this level, there should be a couple of transport ships waiting for us, though it may be a bit crowded." she what equipment she had out into her pack, then went over to the captain.
"Come on sir, we can't leave you behind." she said, pulling his arm around her shoulders, letting him lean on her when he stood up.
"Abul, Davidson, Marie, you lead the way, there should be no lizards en-route."
The rest of the wounded were carried or given support by the rest of the group as they left they saw the other marine groups arriving.
"Give us a hand, Abul, Davidson and Marie are in charge of directions." she said helping the captain along to the hanger.

"Great. Drag 'em all into engineering and now I gotta haul 'em all back out." Tom hefted a wounded man to his feet, letting the man drape his arm around his shoulder. He raised his rifle to his other shoulder, one-handing the light weapon as best as he could, which wasn't half shabby.

"Alright, let's get moving," he added, heading for the boarding craft on which he had come.

Garrett merely shrugged at Kurohime's annoyance. He got that kind of crap all the time. Be more careful, watch what you're doing, explosives can kill, friendly-fire, BLAH BLAH BLAH... He'd never killed another Terran, and he never would. He was a demolitions expert for crying out loud, and a Terran to boot. He knew how his side ran their operations, and he knew how to handle his devices. Garrett could only get slightly irritated at other soldiers' ignorance, though. After all, they didn't know the art of demolitions. They knew how to pull a trigger, patch a wound, or hack a mainframe.

As he stood, he grabbed the nearest limping soldier and provided the proper aid, then glanced to Kurohime. "I understand your worries, ma'am, I do, but I am a demolitions expert. I know what I'm doing. Now let's get these boys back, eh? Less squabbling, more hobbling!" And with that he marched off, his injured companion in tow as he lit up another cigarette. A lot of people complained when he did that too. You'll give away the position, bad for everyone's health, disgusting, WHATEVER. Hadn't anyone heard of oxygenated purification? The art of cleaning one's lungs had only been around for the last century or so, geez...

The mop up was almost complete when the word came for the beleaguered blue squadron to return to the hymn. Darian was at first relieved, A relief that was soon replaced with concern.
What did the coms officer mean when he said "we are pulling out". We just won. why are we retreating. With the hymn and the fleet, we should be able to repel any counter offensive they could pull for now. did the hymn take to much damage to risk in another fight?

Darian was still lost in his thoughts when he landed. He walked through the chaos that was the docking bay, nimbly weaving through the wreckage and med crews that filled the space despite his limp. Darian wanted nothing more than to get checked out by the first available medic, then to go to his bunk and sleep.

"Yes, I'm sorry for the delay. You don't appear to have a concussion so you are free to go after I bandage you up," Anita said briskly ignoring the annoyance in Steven's voice. She took a roll of bandages out of you medical case that she had with her. She had Steven bandaged up in a matter of seconds. "Happy?" she asked putting her hands on her hips.

When the group reached the hanger, they saw the two transports waiting for them.
"Ok, hurry up and get on one or the other, neither are medical so it doesn't matter which." she said loudly.
She helped the captiain into the nearest transport, and once he was sat down, she double checked his leg.
The bleeding had stopped, but she knew that it would require something more than a few bandages and painkillers to fix it.
"Ok, injured get priority for seats and bunks, if you have to stand so be it."
she used the comm to message all the group members.
"Davidson, Abul, you got the remote?"
"Here." Abul passed her the tiny device.
"Ok, tell me when we're a safe distance from this hunk of junk, when we are I'm gonna blow it up." she told the pilot.
"Yes, but what about the bodies of our guys?"
"There's nothing we can do, we don't have the room, and it'll stop the lizards doing anything to them." she replied.
"Ok, is everyone on board?"

"Finally! And, uh, thanks, i guess," Steven said as he got the OK from Anita. He quickly went to work prepping the fighter when over the comm he heard the order for all fighters back to the Hymn.
Steven let out a large groan and kicked the console. He missed his chance to go out again.
"Well I guess it gives me a chance to repair the ship," he said with a sigh as he climbed back out onto the wing. When he jump down from the wing he looked at the ship and for the first time saw how much damage it had taken.
He let out a long whistle as he looked over the damage. The ship had taken many hits across the entire haul, and there was shrapnel lodged in the ship. One piece of shrapnel was around four feet in length, and had punched a hole through the ship just behind the cockpit.
"Well. That was close," he laughed to himself. He looked over his shoulder to watch as the other fighters were returning. He saw the ships of Blue Squad come and land.
"Might as well ask what happened," he said and started to walk over to where Blue Squad landed.
"And don't touch my ship you vultures!" he shouted back as a group of mechanics moved in to work on Steven's ship. He went back to focusing on walking, and he started to realize just how much his head was throbbing now.

Kai woke up when he was placed into the shuttle, and, with his head down, the first thing he saw was his mutilated leg, but, due to the drugs, he was a bit disoriented. "Shit, who's got the screwed up leg?" he asked, pretty much out of it still. his head still swimming from the painkillers, he looked up at kurohime and said "this place stinks." It was a very simple comment. quite unbefitting of the captain. It was then that the full extent of his blood loss was realised, though not by him.

regardless, the shuttles flew on, about 50 of them making their way to the Battle Hymn. the tiny pinpricks of light made by the engines were nothing compared to the vastness of the fleet, sitting in a defensive sphere above the planet. Soon all the shuttles and fighters that could be were in the hangar bay of the Hymn, the stragglers having to go to other nearby ships which could accomodate them.


***

The terran fleet was mighty to behold, but their position was odd. they appeared to be defending a trash dump. what they were defending was themselves. after a few tense minutes of silence on the bridge, a bit of white noise was heard on every headset, in every communicator, and through every PA. it could only mean one thing. Demonix was approaching, whatever it was, and what it was, they would soon find out.

When the shuttle they were in landed in the Shuttle bay, Kurohime was glad to see there were loads of medics already there, but not to glad to see all the other injured.

"This could get interesting, will they be able to cope with the numbers?" she thought out loud, though quietly. She picked the captain up, he was in worse shape than ever, though that might have something to do with the morphine.
Once they were off the ship she handed responsibility over to the nearest medic.
"He's had 10ml of morphine, so if he says something odd, it's that and the blood loss." she explained to the medic.
"The dressings are from a BCH Med kit, I'll leave the rest to you." she added.

Once she was sure everyone on the shuttles in that particular hanger was off she rounded up her team.
"Lets get changed and back to engineering, from there we can work on a plan to get things in shape again. So lets be quick about it."
The group dashed off, and splilt up at various points heading to their quaters to get rid of the blood stained uniforms.

Kurohime unlocked the door to her quarters and raced to her wardrobe.
She passed a wall covered in photo's of friends she'd made back when she used to hitchhike across the galaxy, and friends from training, many of whom were with her in engineering now.

She pulled her uniform off, exposing pale skin to the cold of the room.
"So they had to turn the heating off except where they need to regulate temperature, wish they could have warned me." she muttered.
She pulled out her overalls and slipped into them, while they were not one hundred percent standard uniform, the engineers got away with it because of the things they had to do, and it helped to identify them from the redular crew.

Now she was changed, she grabbed her kit and ran all the way to engineering, which was on the same level as her quarters, just on the other side of the ship to her quaters.
Along the way she could see damage of varying levels, some areas sealed off by bulkheads.

The Alarms were currently on Blue Alert, since the battle was over, however tensions were high, what ever Demonix was it was about to arrive.
She took the shortcut through the observation deck, she needed to get to engineering fast.
Suddenly she stopped, she could see something through the viewers, her face went white,
"So that's why they call it Demonix." she whispered, her breathing becoming shallow.
She found she had to grip a pillar to steady herself, was she that scared?
She leant against the pillar to catch her breath, and realised the back of her overalls were soaked through, she ran her hands along the back and moaned
"Oh S***" when she saw the red stains.
"How come I didn't notice." she gasped as the wound began to sting badly.
"And how come no one noticed?"
She felt her vision blurring, she'd obviously lost a lot of blood, and the blood on her uniform on the lizard ship had been caused by the fighting, so she's already been covered in blood, and her uniform had already been torn a bit, and everyone being preoccupied with their tasks, no one else would have noticed.
So how come she had not.
"Damn Adrenaline." she whispered as she slumped to the floor unconcious.

Tom glanced out over the viewport. It didn't look like much to him, although he couldn't see it very well and he was no genius at identifying things. His guess was that it would be more subtle. Granted, most Drathonians weren't very subtle, but... they did have smarter higher-ups. He thought.

At that moment, Kurohime collapsed. Her back was covered with blood. Apparently during the firefight, Tom had missed it, and he cursed momentarily before picking her up from the floor. Shifting her to make sure she wasn't going to be bumping against the edge of his shoulder plate, he built up a little momentum and headed for the medical bay, uncaring as to who got in his way. Very few people did for fairly obvious reasons.

He slid to a stop outside of the medical bay and brought Kurohime in. He hadn't actually ever been wounded yet; this was only his third or fourth fight. Either way, he'd never been here, and he wasn't sure how it worked. He glanced around, seeing if there was someone who looked like they were in charge.

Darian was out of luck. While having a small cut on his arm stitched, he checked the info monitors. Apparently, despite the blue alert, all crew were to stay on alert.
So much for my nap he thought.

With the adrenaline leaving his body, Darian was becoming more and more tired. To clear his head, he took a walk. He didn't follow any particular path. First he went to the galley to grab a quick snack. A sandwich and two cups of coffee later, he moved on, feeling a little more awake. Seventeen minutes and a bathroom break later, he found himself in an observation room. As he walked across the room to look outside, and something outside the window caught his eye.

By the time Meigan was back on the Hymn with the rest of the squad, her outfit was completly crimson with blood except for a few patches of white here and there.
"Damn..." she said as she looked herself over, "Red looks good on me!"
Her energy blasters were also covered with a thin coat of the crimson liquid. Her bro rifle that she had picked before boarding had been nearly out of battery power, so she threw it away while she was on the drake, before returning to the Hymn.
Meigan looked around her at other marines and various other crew members who were badly wounded, it made her feel lucky to get out of the battle with just a few stains.

Kai, Being in such horrible shape, had been rushed to the med bay immediately. A few more minutes and the trickle of blood still making it out would have become fatal. Luckily he made it, withing ounces of his life, literally. In the med bay, the first thing they did was put him under. The next was to amputate the ruined leg, and fit the stump with a nueral linked cap, which had some sort of medicine on the inside. Once it was linked up, the leg was temporarily replaced by a Cybernetic (robotic) one. He then had a few pints of synthetic blood, along with nutrients, sugars, and all that good stuff pumped in, because they needed him awake and ready for action. After this was done, he was woken up. The drugs they gave him to wake him cleared his head immediately, and he blinked and asked "Why do I have a metal leg now?" obviously the heavy doses of sedative erased a bit of his memory. The docters replied "Well, your leg got messed up so we had to amputate it. We need as many soldiers as possible for the next battle, especially experinced ones like you, so you were fitted with a Cybernetic leg while a replacement organic one is grown." "OH." was the Blonde man's simple answer. The docters released him, and he walked around a bit on the new leg to test it out. it worked well, but the only feeling was in the bottom, telling him whether or not his foot was on the ground. it would take getting used to, and a few minutes for the rest of the nerve links to attach themselves, which due to the nature of nerves was a painful process, and left Kai groaning in bain every few seconds as another attached itself. Soon, Kai walked down to the hangar bay to check on his baby, and get used to walking on the leg. After Darian had parked said vehicle, the hangar crew had moved it back to it's proper sopt, to keep it out of the way. Kai arrived at the miraculously unscathed fighter, though he knew it should be so, having no knowledge of it having been lent out. He looked around the bay, wishing for sunglasses, the number of welding torches working on damaged Scimitars was astounding. Many of the Hulks were have parts switched to less damaged fighters, to keep them operational, and a few frankenfighters were taking shape here and there.

In his pain and now in the noise of metalwork, Kai had yet to notice the grating sound of the white noise caused by Demonix.
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