Prologue: Getting Ready

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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Prologue: Getting Ready

Post by Kai »

The large Grey Terran ship Known as the Battle Hymn floated in Orbit over Altres, It's only safe haven, a galaxy away from the war it was supposed to be in. The Admiral Ceres paced the bridge, awaiting his captains to line up for the briefing of thier first mission. Captain Kieran "Kai" Nakamura was the first on the bridge, giving a quick salute to Ceres.
"Captain Nakamura reporting for duty" He called out, a tone of excitement in his voice.
The admiral Nodded At this eager captain, as the other captains filed in, reporting much the same as Kai had. "Listen up men!" Ceres shouted, "This is the best ship ever made, and we are gonna take it on it's first, and most dangerous mission." The captains' smiles grew at these words. "And that mission is as simple as it is dangerous. I can now tell you that our mission is to KICK SOME DRATHONIAN TAIL!" The entire bridge erupted into cheers at the shouted statement, they were all eager to do just that.

Gaining launch clearance, the ship darted into another trajectory. Though quite massive, The Battle Hymn was still very agile. As soon as it reached 1,000 miles from it's previous orbit, the Ship Kicked it's warp drive into gear, and shot off toward the distant milky way galaxy. Though the ship traveled 300,000 times the speed of light, it would take a while to get to it's destination.
(OOC: just post introductions for now, all characters are currently on the Battle Hymn)


Kurohime smiled as the ward drive kicked in. Her flame coloured hair was braided for convenience, but was already stained with oil and grease.
Her overalls were also dirty, this was the reason she rarely wore full uniform.
She went to the Comm system and messaged the Bridge,
"Engineering to Bridge, Warp Drive is fully functioning at maximum efficiency with containment fields at 100%. Life support is working at 10% capacity and at the current consumtion rate, fuel should last, a few million years. All external weapons are fully operational and there will be a test of the emergency alarms at Ten-hundred hours, so in about fifteen minutes. We'll give you another warning right before we begin the test.
One last thing, if you've got any mechanical problems, don't hesitate to get one of the engineering staff to fix it, it's what we do. Engineering out."
She turned off the comm, and went back to the table which she was working at.
She was currently working on changing the sight for a sniper rifle to fot her small pistol. She picked up a small file and continued to file away at the mount of the sight.


The bridge's internal Comms officer replied to Kurohime "Status Acknowledged, Engineering" then quickly sent a courier to Admiral Ceres. When the courior arrived he informed the admiral on the situation. "Good, she's doing exactly what we designed her to" the admiral happily replied. Maybe we'll win this war after all he thought.

***
Kai was down in the Armory by now, making sure all the weapons and body armor were in top condition. he was ready to board a Drathonian ship and show them what Terrans were made of.


Kurohime finished her work and fitted it to the pistol, it fitted perfectly, she tested the sight, it still worked, now all she had to do was make sure it aimed properly.
"I'll be down in the armoury, if you've got any problems you can't fix on your own, I've got my comm. And make sure the alarm test goes ahead as planned, and tell the crew it's just a drill." she put the tools she woul need to adjust the sight and left for the armoury.
When she got down there she saw the captain was there.
"Captain." she saluted awkwardly, still not used to the rank system.
"Just testing something that might improve our hand weapon capability."
She grabbed the safety gear for the target range and stepped into a booth.
She turned the sight on, aimed it at the target, and fired a single shot.
It was a little off.
"Ok, lets get to work." she muttered, taking her tools and adjusting the position on the pistol.
The next shot was closer to the mark, so she adjusted the sight again, this time the shot was dead on.
"Great, now I've got to get the replicators to make them." she muttered putting her things away.
She went to the weapons officer and asked, "How many of this make are on the ship?" showing him her pistol, with the safety lock back in place.
"Not many, they're only assigned to Bridge and Engineering crew as personal weapons, we've got 100 in here and another 50 in personal use."
"Ok, cause if I persuade the replicators to cooperate, you've got 150 of these heading your way." she showed him the sight
"What is that?" the officer asked,
"Modified sniper sight, it now fits on the pistol as an extra attachment, you won't need to fit them all on, just store them and fit them to the guns that people want them fitted to."
Suddenly a message came up on the ships comm.
"This alarm is a drill, do not panic."
Then
The lights changed colour, they were now red, and there was a loud siren accompanied by "Red Alert, Red Alert!"
a minute later it stopped and the lighting went back to normal.
Then the siren started, but no light change, "Alert, Alert!"
The whole system of alarms was tested with success.
Once her hearing had recovered, Kurohime commed engineering, "Good work guys, I'm heading back up." and she left the armoury, and went back to her 'home'.


"That's fine, just don't hurt anyone" Kai said, returning the salute. When the drill started, He looked up at the now red lights, the color reminding him of something in his past. he made a mental note that seeing this color in the ship meant something bad was happening, an easy enough connection for him to make. Satisfied with his squad's weapons and gear, Kai next wandered off to the fighter hangar to check on his baby, the lime green Scimitar starfighter he had lovingly named "Gloria". He would spend a while in the hangar before he left to find his squad.

Meigan walked along one of the ships many corridors. It was full of crew and staff walking along, and some in groups talking amongst themselves. Meigan's head was looking at her blaster as she polished off a bit of dirt from it. Suddenly the lights went red and a voice spoke "Red Alert, Red Aert". Meigan's head shot up so quickly it knocked her off balance and she fell to the ground. Her blaster fell from her hand and hit the ground, accidentily shooting off a small energy burst which narrowly missed a short woman's head and hit a wall, not doing any damage. A few people screamed at the sudden projectile as it zoomed by them, but the woman that was almost hit became pale and stared at Meigan.

"Uh, sorry?" Meigan said, she grabed her blaster and got up quickly. Then she started power walking away from the scene in a randomly picked direction, ignoring all the staring faces.

Kurohime had been heading for the engineering centre when she came across a strange scene.
People were talking to a crew member, consoling her.
"What happened here?" she asked,
She soon got the story, "Someone accidentally left their safety catch off, great, which way did they go?"
After being pointed in the right direction she said, "Get her to Sick Bay." then shot off, running to catch up.
She realised she had no chance of finding the person and shook her head.
"Just great, well nothing I can do except tell the right people." she moaned before sending a comm to the armoury,
"Ito here, we've got someone running round with a EV-47 Laser pistol with the safety catch off, there was a minor accident, you'll need to check security footage of Sector T, Junction 36 from the period of the alarm test to see who's pistol it was, then just give them a safety lecture, no one got hurt, just shocked."
"Ok, got that." was the reply.
"Right, Ito out."
She shook her head, and headed back towards engineering, when she finally got back, she was glad to see everything was still working.
"Ok, someone get me the replicator specs, I need to try and get them to make something."

Soon after this, Kai got a message on his Comm teling him that one of his squad members needed some talking to. Apparently a marine named Meigan had forgotten her safety switch on her pistols. Great, now I have to go find her he thought, not really wanting to, seeing as the ship was rather large. Exiting the fighter bay, he brought up a map of the ship on his comm and had it track down meigan for him. "Great, she's all the way on the other side of the ship" he grumbled, beginning to jog in that direction.

Meigan had no idea where she was now, it was a big ship and she hadn't had time to look over the map enough. Great, now I'm lost Meigan thought to herself. She leaned against a wall and tried to take in her soroundings and figure out where she was. It was no use, she was completely lost. Why make a ship so big? Who can remember thier way around here? Meigan sighed and attached her blaster back onto her thigh. She straightened up and started walking back in the direction she came from, hopefully no one would remember what happened. Like they would forget something like that...

Kai watched the green dot that indicated his position moving closer to the red dot indicatong one miss Eevane. He looked up at the white clad woman and called out "Private Eevane! would you kindly come over here and explain to me what happened during the alarm test?" The young captain hurried over to the girl as he said this, making sure she noticed him.

Meigan looked over at the man that called to her.
"Oh! Captian!" She said and gave a clumsy salute, or at least it was something between a salute and hitting herself.
"I, ummm, don't know?" She lied, and she knew right away that would not go over well so she started another sentance, "Well, you see, I..." But she trailed off and nothing that came out made any sense so she just stopped.
Yet she started up again hoping it would make more sense, "How was I supposed to know an alarm was gonna go off suddenly? It caught me by surprise, thats all."

"Well, Miss Eevane, they did warn everyone through the comms fist. but that's beside the point." He sighed, smacking his face with his hand What a clumsy girl "The point is, you need to remember to keep the safety catch on your blasters on unless we're in a combat situation" He held out his hand, palm up, as if expecting her to give him something "I'll take that untill you need it, just to be sure"

Kurohime had been working with the replicators for a while, but they could not quite get the specs she wanted to come out properly.
"Damn it!" she hissed in frustation, she picked up her hammer and gave the console she was working at a firm, but not overly hard, whack.
A few minutes later the replicated sight came out looking perfect.
"I'm heading back to the armoury, you know the drill, call me if you need me."
She went at a fast pace, not wanting to be away from the engineering section for more than she had to.

The tests did not take long, the sight was exactly the same as the one she had made.
"I got the replicators to work, I'm sure you have the space to store the sights, given the number of Ev-47 pistols on the ship."
She then ran back to Engineering, something was wrong, she could feel it.
"Ok, what's happened?" she shouted getting back inside.
"Warp drive output suddenly dropped, we've managed to stabilise the output again, but we still don't know the cause." was the reply.
"Right, get teams to check all the conduits, it seems that we've most likely sprung a leak somewhere.
Wear protective suits, you'll have to work within the conduit containment fields to fix it." she shouted out.
"Each team works its way along one conduit starting from the core, going out towards the engines." she went to a console, and entered the input code for the release of the engineering hazard suits.
"Keep to your regular teams, Davidson, your team takes Conduit A, Smith, Conduit B, I'll take C, and Singh, conduit D. Get your tools and suit up. The rest of you keep an eye on warp output, and try to keep it at this level, however, if it comes to a choice between the containment fields and the warp output, the containment fields are your top priority, Each group will keep you updated as they pass though each section of the conduit they've been assigned to."
She then began to pull the hazard suit on.
"And don't forget to have the decontamination system ready for us when we get back."
Once she was suited up, she sent her comm to the bridge.
"Sorry to inform you we have a possible leak on one of the warp conduits.
There are engineering teams currently working to find and repair the leak. The current warp speed will not be affected and the containment fields are working at 100%. Engineering will keep you updated on the teams' progress, Ito out."
"Ok, everyone, get into your teams and go fix this."
She opened the hatch which lead to Conduit C as the other teams went through different hatches.
"Ok, Jones, Abul, Marie, we'll move to the start of the conduit, then move along, we'll keep outside of the containment field for now, and only move in if we have to fix anything."
Something was bugging Kurohime though, this ship was supposed to be the best in the fleet, surely the warp conduits should not leak this early into a journey.

Meigan detached one of her blasters and inspected it.
"Thats nonesense, my saftey catch is always o--" She stopped when she looked at the saftey catch, which sure enough, was in the off position, "Oh..."
She handed over her first blaster and detached the other one, which she also inspected. The saftey catch on this one was in the on position though, "Can I keep this one? Seeing as its saftey catch is on?" Meigan pleaded, she had always had them with her at all times and leaving them with another didn't sit well with her.

Ugh... my gosh. Kai thought this marine was going to be a hassle. "I'll let you keep that one but i'm putting a remote safety on it, if you need it, message me and i'll turn it off for you" he placed the other gun in the empty holster on his side and walked off, mumbling that the new soldiers were nothing like the old ones. He headed to the armory so he could put the gun away when he got a call from the bridge about a problem with a conduit. Checking his map, he found the head of engineering, one miss Ito, heading his direction and jogged over to her position "What's the problem?" The young captain asked.

(ooc - we're in the warp conduits now, the entrances are all in engineering, but I'll work round it)
The teams had been not been in the conduits long, warp conduit leaks were easy to spot, so it was just a matter of walking along them until you found the leak.
It had been Davidson's group who had found the leak, but the damage was greater than had been previously anticipated, so the group needed special equipment and a few more hands to fix it properly.
With this news she replied on the comm,
"Ok, Davidson, if we go though the main corridors we should reach you in a couple of minutes,
everyone else, go back to engineering and get the replacement parts ready. My group will join Davidson and I'll relay any extra requirements once we've gotten a closer look. Come on, guys, lets go and quickly."
A minute later the team was moving through the corridors in full hazard gear.

Suddenly Kurohime saw the captain, and obviously he asked what was happening.
"Go ahead, I'll catch up." she said to her group, who continued
"Captian." she saluted, "A Warp conduit leak was detected and we've just pin-pointed the exact location, and are going to join the team already on site to assist in the repair. The containment fields are fine though, so there are no contamination worries." she explained, "Anyway, I need to hurry and make sure everything gets fixed properly." she saluted again before leaving.

She arrived at the conduit a minute after her team, and a few minutes before the replacement parts.
"Ok, Myself and Davidson will go inside the containment field and carry out the repairs. Abul, set up a portable containment field between where I'm standing now, and the nearest decontamination point."
She adjusted her suit to max protection levels and stepped past the invisible barrier that protected the crew from the chemicals that the warp conduits carried.
Once close up to the damaged section, she saw it would not require a huge repair job. she messaged engineering, "I need a 3 by 10 titanium alloy pipe, serial number for the replicators is FL-CK-M1-9, I also need you to shut pipe number 35 in conduit A down while I do the replacement, it looks like a simple blow-out, probably a hairline fracture formed when the pipe was moulded."

About half an hour later the repair was complete.
"Right, that should last the rest of the trip." Kurohime smiled, she messaged Engineering again, "Right, you can put the pipe back online and give me the readings from the warp output monitor."
"Ok, Pipe thirty five is back online, and warp output is back to one hundred percent." the reply came a minute later.
"Good, I think there's a crew meeting soon, I'll go to that for Engineering." she replied.
Once her comm was off, "Abul, is that portable field up?"
"Yes, all ready to go, just stay within the yellow lines on the floor."
"You first Davidson, you've been nearest the leak longest. And the rest of you, use the decontamination point once Davidson and myself are done, the fields should have held, but I'm not taking any risks."

The captain followed Kurohime to the damaged area and watched with interest as they replaced the broken part. Heh, looks like not everything on this ship is 'invincible' he thought, smirking a bit at how something so simple could cause such a problem. Once the work was done and he could continue down the hallway, Kai wandered into the Galley and got something to drink before heading to the meeting room for the official pre-battle briefing. All the captains had been informed that the ship would be warping directly into battle to break up the siege on one of the Republic's manufacturing bases, what they were to do during that battle, was what the meeting was about.

***
In the meeting room, Admiral Ceres was readying the place for the mission briefing. Every department would have a representative at the meeting, The engineering, marines, bridge crew, the Hangar crew, medical, and even the galley crew. He got out his Comm and quickly shot off last minute reminders to all those who were to participate. As a last thing before people started filing in, he began tidying his uniform.

On his way to the meeting room, Kai once again found the clumsy Meigan. "Hey, Private Eevane, come with me to the briefing, I need someone to take notes for me" With that he grabbed one of her shoulders and began pulling her along the corridor.

A beeping at Garrett's hip elicited a groan from the man. He finished mixing his latest batch of flash powder, a potassium perchlorate/aluminum flake mixture. He had considered some additives, but decided against it. With the mixture finished, he stepped away from the table and unsnapped the comm device from his waist band clip. It was a short message demanding he be present at some sort of briefing. He sighed and began a long jog to the elevator shafts. From there, he'd go up a few levels, down a few halls, and enter the briefing room. He came across very few people along the way, but that was as it should be. Few people walked the halls in his little corner of the ship, that corner being the location where the demos did all their dangerous and lethal work.

At the end of the journey was a door, which opened upon the presentation of Garrett's physical self. It slid open with a soft hiss, and he entered, eyed a few of the occupants, and then located himself in a chair far from Admiral Ceres. He was practically a no one in comparison to that man and so did his best to keep his distance. Admiral Ceres was certainly not the type of man Garrett could get along with anyways. This call for a briefing was proof enough.

Admiral Ceres stood up on the stage, watching as people entered the room. Only a few more need to come he thought, clearing his throat a few times in preparation for the briefing. Behind him was a large screen, which was to show details of the coming battle, but right now all it showed was a slideshow of The Battle hymn in various stages of testing and development.

Meigan was swept away by the captain before she could reply, "But--" was all that came out before she had no choice but to go. "So, uhh, what kind of notes do you need?" Meigan said shakily, "What is this briefing going to be about anyway?"

Kurohime ran down the corridor to the meeting, she'd managed to find a clean uniform, which meant she was no longer covered in oil.
She was carrying three data pads and the links needed to get them to relay data onto a projector screen.
One contained her report on the damaged conduit pipe section, and the other two contained all the specs of every part of the ship, with all weapon and defense specs with the easiest access.
She ran into the room and deposited her things at her place on the table.
"Sorry, if I'm late, I just had to make sure everyone who had taken part in the warp conduit repair was decontaminated. I have the full ships specs here, and the initial report on the conduit leak here." she motioned to the data pads as she saluted the admiral and captain.

"Well, someone wlse in our squad has to know the plan if i die" Kai answered Meigan, half joking. By now the two had reached the meeting room and they went inside. Seeing that they were the last ones in, Kai closed the door and took a seat.

***

Seeing that everyone had arrived, Admiral Ceres stood up and began his briefing. "Now that we are safely in hyperspace, I'm free to tell you our mission and battle plan" He said to the crowd, most of whom were either listening intently or jotting down notes. "We will be going to Terra IV to break up the Drathonian Siege. We will be arriving two hours ahead of the main fleet, so that we have the element of suprise" he announced, smirking a bit. He continued the briefing, telling each group what they were to do during the battle. In summary, the plan called for the Hymn and all her fighters to destroy the Drathonian command ship's escort and cripple her. Once that was done, all the marine pilots were to return to the Hymn and get ready for a boarding, which the dedicated pilots would cover. Once the Drathonian command ship was taken over, they would use it to jam all Drathonian communications and sensors. Engineering was to keep they Hymn in top fighting shape during the battle, but a small group would be taken on board the enemy ship to make sure that the marines could use the equipment there. Medical and Hanger staffs were to be on full alert and ready for injured marines or damaged fighters. The galley crew had to make sure everyone had enough energy to keep going during the fight. Once the briefing was over, the admiral made a quick announcement before sitting down again "Engineering has a small presentation to show before you are all sent to battle stations"

When they entered the room Meigan took a seat beside the captian. She hastily took down some notes as the Admiral was speaking, which ended up being a bunch of scribbles with few words that made sense. "Going to Terra IV...Arriving in two hours ahead of main fleet...After command ship's is down then return and get ready for boarding..." Meigan said these to herself and made some mental notes of them for personal reminders. She then stopped taking notes and sat in waiting for engineering's presentation.

Kai tapped meigan on the shoulder "Hey, you ready?" He wispered, inquiring as to whether or not the girl was ready for the upcoming bettle.

Once she was sure everyone was ready, Kurohime stood up and quickly connected the data pads with the ships specs to the projector.
"Right, this is just a summary of the combat capabilities of the ship and the weapons that will be issued to all members of the boarding party.

To start off with The Battle Hymn is equipped with Meteor type FM Shields, the majority of Drathonian external weapons are unable to penetrate these defenses, according to intelligence, there are only five ships in the Drathonian fleet capable of carrying the weapons that can. Should the main shields fail, there are a series of smaller, weaker deflector shields which take over, both these shield systems can be run together, allowing for partial failures to the main system.

In terms of external weapons, The battle Hymn has twenty DP-873 photon torpedo launchers, with full outfits of ammo. The main external weapon is a Solaris Laser - capable of destroying most ships it come across, however for the laser to be fired, it needs to charge up, which it is currently doing, and the shields need to be dropped for the duration of the shot, meaning it's primary use is in combat with small numbers of ships where we have the element of surprise.

There is also a full outfit of smaller photon torpedo launchers and phasers, however those are primarily for the purpose of dealing with smaller ships, leaving the big stuff to deal with the main threats.
The ship's tractor beam is capable of pulling another ship up to half her size, but that will only be a factor if we need to perform rescues.

Right, personal weapons - Each crew member who will be on the boarding party will be kitted out in full tactical armour minimum. Enforcers will have the upgraded version, which includes bio-mechanical upgrades, allowing for greater speed and strength.

Each boarding party member will have at elast 3 weapons, the EV-47, a light laser pistol, not capable of much damage, but it now comes with an optional sniper-scope, vastly increacing it's accuracy, allowing for the lower damage output to be used most effectivly. Then there is the Dragoon NJ-32 Blaster Rifle, standard issue to all Enforcers anyway, high damage output, reasonable accuracy, but not exactly what you'd call a stealth weapon.
Now most of you will not have seen this before," she picked up one of the other things she had been carrying to the meeting.

"A laser-edged sword, these come in varying sizes and designs, and I know all members of the military know how to use some kind of blade, and the replicators caa easily reproduce all standard designs.
A laser-edged sword is a recent development in melee combat technology, the laser edge cuts through most armour, though it would take a couple of attempts to cut through full tactical armour. These blades are for use in close combat situations and in situations where firing a gun could have serious consequences, the best example is anywhere near an ammo stash, or in Engineering."

As she had been speaking, the data pads had been transmitting the image and technical data for each weapon or defence she had been talking about.

"The team from engineering will also be taking portable shields with them, these are designed to fit over doors and windows to act as a defense if we end up getting trapped in a room and have to break out.
There is a possibility of them being used over entire corridor sections too, but that use has yet to be tested.

And a final note for those on the ship, the replicators are capable of creating all standard weapons on issue to the military and any kind of ammo issued to the military, that includes DP-873 Photon torpedoes, though only the replicators at the launcher maintainance points are large enough to replicate those.
Right, any questions?"

Meigan looked over at the capian and whispered back, "As ready as I'll ever be, I guess." Then she added, "As long as I have my blasters with me I'll be fine!" As she said it she put one hand on her blaster with the remote saftey on it and put her other hand where her other blaster would have been had the captian let her keep it.

When the engineering presentation begun, Meigan listened intently and when the person asked if there were any questions she imediatly put up her hand and asked, "If we are one of the boarding party are we REQUIRED to have a Dragoon NJ-32 Blaster Rifle with us, or is it optional?"

This time, Kai got to answer the question, being in charge of the weapons and armor for his squad, he knew all about them "No, you don't have to have a NJ-32. we have a few of the newer designs which are too complicated for the replicators to reproduce at the moment, the S-Gur aka "sugar" and BR-O "Bro" rifles. Luckily for you, miss Eevane, our squad is one of the lucky ones that gets to play with them. I think you'll want the BR for the boarding though, it's better for those situations" he smiled a bit and looked up to the stage, where Admiral Ceres was once again standing.

***

The Admiral cleared his throat then asked "Any more questions before we release you?" he looked out over the audience, searching for any raised hands or soldiers standing up.

"I've not got any questions Sir." Kurohime replied, "Just a quick note that I've already got the names of people who are familiar with Drathonian Technology in my head, though most of us are familiar with different areas, so we'll have to figure out which squad is doing what so the members from engineering can be assigned to the teams where they'll be most use."

"I do have a question," Tom said, standing up briefly. His expression was unreadable; he'd arrived late, as he'd been busy cleaning his personal Dragoon. He'd missed some of the stuff he didn't need to know, but he had the jist of it; he wasn't an idiot.

"Why aren't we on their ship already?"

"Don't you worry, son" the admiral chortled "We'll be there soon enough. All right Ladies and gents, let's get moving!" he called out, pulling up his comm and tapping in to the ship's PA system "ALL HANDS MAN YOUR BATTLE STATIONS!" Almost instantly, the rumble of thousands of soldiers getting ready and running to their stations could be heard throughout the ship. nearly everyone in the meeting room joined in with the rumbling, most of the captains calling their squads and giving them orders on the battle.

***

Kai was no exception, sending off a transcript of the meeting to everyone in his squad while simultaneously running to the Hangar bays. As soon as he arrived, he jumped into his trademark Lime green Scimitar Starfighter and began start-up sequences. This being done, he called "locked and loaded" to the ground crew. looking at his HUD, he saw there was but a mere two minutes before they dropped out of hyperspace and into the Hymn's first battle.

"Good," Tom muttered to himself, leaping up to head for the armory to lay claim to a Bro rifle before it was too late.

He got there well within time, joined a short line and was handed the rifle and, at his request, a full eight spare energy packs. He didn't want to run out of ammunition in the middle of a firefight; he couldn't afford that.

Tom would have taken a fighter, but it wasn't his strong point, even though he was competent. He'd just be wasting his life and the resources of the Battle Hymn. Instead, he prepared himself to board the opposing craft they would be encountering within a matter of moments. Adrenaline was already seeping into his bloodstream in tiny bursts, and its familiar energy boost came with it. He checked the rifle for any dirt or damage, loaded his first energy pack, and crouched down next to the rest of his squad, ready to start pounding the Drathonians...

Meigan rushed as fast as she could without falling to the hanger bay, where she saw her scimitar ship and remembered, I forgot to finish the paint job! Her scimitar was originaly a very flourecent pink colour, but she hated pink on any kind of vehicle so she had started painting it white, but she never finished and had totally forgot about it. Half pink and half white, but in great condition as she had never used it yet. Meigan got into it and started all the neccesary equipment.

"Right, we'll have to sort out who goes with which squad once we're on the ship." Kurohime said, before leaving.
She turned on her Comm and messaged Engineering.
"Right, Davidson, Abul, Smith, Marie, Singh and Jones, get yourselves to the armoury and get kitted up. I'll meet you there, we're going to be part of a large boarding party, standard weapons and armour, plus your tools and portable shields. And someone bring a biohazard kit."

Kurohime turned off the communication then broke into a run.
Once at the armoury she saw the engineers already kitting up.
"Ok, everyone is here, I'm not sure when we're joining in, but we're supposed to go on one of the tougher boarding pods, our job is to make sure everything on that ship that we need to work, works." she briefed the engineers as she kitted up.
She recieved an automated message on her Comm,
"Ok guys, hanger 15, this floor thankfully."
she paused, then messaged engineering, "Ok, this is gonna be our first real battle, your priorites are in equal order, weapons, life support and all internal and external shields. Get the appropriate alarm on now."

Once she had issued her instructions she heard the Blue Alarms go off,
"Blue Alert, combat imminent, all personel to battle stations, this is not a drill, battle is imminent."
"Right lets go!" she shouted and ran to Hanger 15

When they got to hanger 15, she saw the captain's fighter take off.
She also spotted a single boarding craft with a large number of marines getting on.
"Ah, the engineers, sorry, but we'll need you on board early to make sure we can get a hold without their technology getting us." one of the marines said,
"Ok, I dunno where you guys are going but I'll give a quick run-down of who specialises in what as we board: Davidson, Internal Communications; Abul, internal and external weapon and defence systems; Smith, propulsion systems and navigation; Marie, life support; Singh and Jones, general knowledge and drathonian tools, and I specialise in Ship-to Ship Communications." She pointed to each member of her team as they boarded before boarding herself.

She had been the last person in before the pilot, who she ended up sitting next to in the cockpit.
She recognised him as the one who had asked "Why aren't we on their ship already?" at the meeting, she noted his name and said
"Well Peterson, if something on this ship breaks down, you won't have to worry about it not getting fixed."

In the bridge, the countdown read 0:01:00 remaining till they dropped out of hyperspace. A technician placed locks on all the shuttles and boarding pods, they didn't want those to be destroyed before they were needed. yet another technician was beginning the arming sequences on all the starfighter weapons, and secondary guns and turrets began to charge. The Hymn was humming, all it's generators at maximum to power the initial onslaught. In orbit over Terra IV the Drathonians had just pased their orbital bombardment, they were to recieve supplies soon. Or so they thought.

Tom grinned. "That's rather comforting. It's nice to know somebody's covering your back." He patted the Br-O rifle on his lap. "I hope these things work, 'cause I'm carrying an awful load of ammo for them not to."

"Just be careful of it overheating, whilst the damage output is higher than that of a Dragoon, there is a greater chance of overheating." She answered, "But overheating only requires it to cool down, which is why you have more than one weapon issued for this."

She then turned to the rest of the people in the pod, "Our aim is to take over their engineering section, it's only from there we'll have easy access to all their systems, our first priority once there is to shut down their securtiy systems and disrupt internal communications, making it easier for the others to take the rest of the ship.

We'll have to seal ourselves in Engineering until we are certain the ship has been properly taken. When we reach engineering, you are to swap from whatever kind of blaster rifle you are using to either the EV-47 or the laser edged sword, we cannot afford to have a warp-core breach for obvious reasons."
She flipped the data projector eyepiece attached the the armour headset over her eyes.
"Everyone put your data links on, I'm sending the schematics of the ship type we will be boarding, we should be attaching to the ship at this point." she was operating her data pad to show the marines and engineers where they would be getting on the ship. The corridors in this area are narrow enough fro use to set up the portable shields, which happen to be one way, so we can shoot out, but they can't shoot in. While it is close to Engineering, other pods will be boarding at far more sensitive parts of the ship, hopefully allowing us to meet minimal resistance relative to the other boarding parites.
This is the route we are looking to take to Engineering. Depending on security, we might have the luck of running into one of the other boarding parites, which will help out a lot, but we can't plan on that happening.

This pod is equipped with an optical cloaking device. Whilst any sensor that does not rely on visuals can spot us, the aim is to make it harder for them to figure out what part of the ship the pod is attached to once we've boarded."

She suddenly heard the timer:
"10, 9, 8, 7 . . ."
"Good luck everyone, and don't forget, the only good drathonian is a dead drathonian."
"3, 2, 1 . . . Red Alert, Red Alert, all crew to battle stations, battle has commenced!"
Kurohime watched all the fighters take off, and felt the pod move.
This is it! she thought, nerves were starting to get to her, I just have to keep calm, it should be easy, drathonians aren't exactly what I'd call intelligent.


Steven was running over some specs. on his Scimitar when he heard he was gonna be taking part in an offensive maneuver.
“Finally! I’ve been wanting to try out some of the new modifications on this baby,” Steven said to his wingman who delivered the message to him. “So when do we leave,” he asked. The wingman then filled Steven in on the rest of mission. “So what do we do now Sir?” the wingman asked. “Well, you first walk over to your fighter, then you get it ready for combat, and when the order comes in you follow me into battle!” Steven said sounding a little annoyed.
Since his fighter was already primed, he sat in the cockpit and waited for the rest of his group to finish their own diagnostics.
The last man finished just before the order came in: They were to prepare for fighter vs. fighter action.
“My favorite kind of action,” Steven mused as he slid on his helmet and got the fighter ready for count down.

Kai keyed the Comms on his starfighter, to all the marines in fighters "Marines, make sure you focus on taking out the defensive guns on the drathonian ship so that our boarding parties don't get shot outa the sky, The flyboys'll take care of enemy fighters for us so we can focus on our mission" he then switched channels on his Comms to the pod engineering was in "All right, you guys are gonna take off a couple minutes after us then head straight in, My squad will return to the Hymn once we're done and get our own pod to support you guys" He cut the line then Lifted up, waiting for the signal to launch into the rapidly approaching fray.

Steven had finished launch preparation, and was waiting when the message came through. Steven grinned. He then switched his comm. to his squadron’s frequency.

“This is Green Leader, mandatory comm check, sound off boys,” Steven said to his squad.

“This is Green 1.”
“Green 2.”
“Green 3.”
“And Green 4 here bringing up the rear.”

“Good to hear boys. You heard the Cappy. Brace for launch, this will be one wild ride!” Steven said to the men.
He sat back, and waited for the que that would send him and the rest of his squadron over the edge.
Locked