Until I come up with a better, less stupid title, the title will remain the title. This is the second part of a five-part series. Please note that this story, as well as Part 1, were also published to an on-line story library under the titles 'Awakening of the Complacent' parts I and II. Thank you for your understanding regarding this matter.
Comments are WELCOME and APPRECIATED
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_ Final victory, shall be ours,
reigning triumphant, and basking
in splendor and glory, so truthfully,
the fate of the Confederation.
Though the battle, pitched with fury,
we may suffer past our fortitude,
still we will endure and we will triumph
for the good of all mankind._
The Enaratolian Defense Force troops marching along the pedestrian avenue filled the chilly air with the raspy sound of their voices, as Samuel Priodon watched glumly. Although the lyrics to the military tune were sung in the Enaratolian dialect of Chinese peculiar to the southern Enaratolian worlds, Samuel had heard the translated version enough times to follow along mentally. For a brief moment, the singing of the soldiers was drowned out as a gunship rose into the air, banked, and suddenly blasted off due east, engines burning brightly.
Three weeks had passed since Samuel had arrived at Homeland base, and he was becoming restless. There was still sadness mingled with the dying threads of fiery anger at the IZA task force which had killed so many of his compatriots, but that was slowly being supplanted by an impatient desire to return to space and to once again experience front-line service. Samuel was one of the few who dared to enjoy the adrenaline rush one felt when engaging an enemy capital ship at close range, although that was not without its disadvantages: each rare defeat opened a new wound and brought back even more terrifying memories of past losses.
Thick clouds, black with the burden of rain, sailed overhead, and Samuel was only snapped out of his reverie when he felt someone tapping his shoulder. Behind him was an younger man, unfamiliar to Samuel- barely out of adolescence. He sure seems like one , Samuel thought to himself, as the nervous officer coughed and began introducing himself to the commodore.
Er ehem hello, sir. My names Ivan, and Ive er heard a lot about you and your combat prowess. I myself am a newly promoted commodore, and I have eh a proposal to ask of you. Ivan looked nervously down.
Well, what is it? Samuel was not indeed interested, but he reasoned that if he at least heard the young man out and politely declined, that he could at least retain a semblance of seeming polite. After all, decorum was something that he intended to uphold.
In addition to the carrier Isogradit , I also have the two missile frigates Danuoi and Tepenstu under my command. At hearing this, Samuel snapped to attention. If he was indeed newly promoted, he must have been exceptionally talented in order to gain control of such a powerful task force , he thought to himself. Ivan continued. Recently, an Enaratolian scouting vessel discovered a Neo-Socialist Enlightenment vessel floating derelict, but otherwise in very good condition, on the outskirts of the uninhabited Javind system. Its quite a few jumps to the galactic north of here; I daresay itd take a good one and a half months to get up there and back as quickly as possible.
What kind of vessel? Samuels curiosity was piqued. He wasnt expecting an answer- most naval captains knew little to nothing about Enlightenment-era vessels, except that they belonged either in Enaratolian military-research yards or in many little pieces scattered and drifting across former planes of battle.
Neo-Socialist Enlightenment navy; Enlightenment yards Tanbain-II class advanced assault battleship. Ivans reply was unequivocal and confident.
Samuel frowned. Are you sure? Enlightenment warships were few and far between: immediately after the War of Revolution, the vast majority simply disappeared. The Navy of Sol had requisitioned most of the remaining military vessels, and the final set of fifty or so had been acquired by independent shipyards and the many corporations operating out of the Nonaligned Sector just slightly north of former Enlightenment space. Not that it mattered anymore; the Nonaligned Sector, along with Enlightenment space, effectively the entirety of humankind residing beyond the protected borders of the Confederation, and the enslaved peoples beyond the reach of human expedition were now firmly under IZA Extremist control.
Im absolutely positive. I was always fascinated by the Enlightenment while growing up. I really dont know exactly what it was about the NSE that made it so interesting to me the heroic Resistance that eventually played a few dirty tricks of its own in order to secure victory? Perhaps the Socialist Vanguard Navy, the single most powerful human fleet ever to traverse the stars? But I digress I know its hard to believe, but you need to understand that the Navy of Sol never possessed half as many of these warships as the official tallies might have led you to believe. He looked away pensively.
Continue.
Youve heard of the SVN Incidents- basically, for a while Enlightenment vessels in the Navy of Sol began destroying themselves: for a while, there were reports three or four times a week of vessel reactor failure, refrigeration systems shutting off and reactors overloading upon their own volition. Nothing the Republic of Sol could do would rectify the situation, and finally they simply decided to mothball the NSE vessels they had inherited. Most of them had their reactors cut out and destroyed
True. Weve all studied the SVN Incidents. But what does that have to do with this? The roar of a squadron of gunships screaming into the sky interrupted the conversation.
Ivan waited until the deafening roar had subsided to a low rumble before continuing. Well, it turns out that, because the Navy of Sol wasnt using these vessels in the fleets and formations that had been originally imprinted upon their electropsychic system computers, these NSE vessels knew that something was amiss. This is also significant, because this particular vessel is a Tanbain-II- the only type the Republic was able to successfully integrate into its fleet. All Tanbain-II vessels are late prototypes; the Enlightenment never got around to finishing them and as a result theyre much easier to work with, especially when it comes to bringing these ships up to specifications.
Sounds reasonable. What would the obligations be?
When the operation succeeds, youll be free to go, although you may not wish to do so right away. After I tow the Tanbain back for refitting, Ill take it as my personal vessel. You can take the Isogradit , Danuoi , and Tepenstu for your own task-force once the Tainbain comes out of dock: the Tanbain-II battleship will be enough of a reward for me.
Samuel simply stood there, mouth agape. Did Ivan know what he was doing? If Ivan kept his word, he would certainly become a much more empowered captain. He could certainly bequeath the Daqing frigate to his very capable officer Stephen, and become a carrier commander, applying his keen knowledge of tactics to naval warfare. There were at least a thousand upgrade permutations he could purchase with the credit-points he had been saving up: perhaps he could outfit the Isogradit with a high-capacity gunship bay and maneuverability upgrades and splurge on some titanium-fiber frontal plating and fly his fleet in true high-speed formation. Or maybe the Danuoi could benefit from anti-fighter weaponry while the other three vessels were equipped for standoff battle with additional missile launchers and enhanced sensor arrays.
Ivans hand was extended. Samuel took it and shook it heartily. Ill do it.
The next few days were a flurry of excitement and preparation. While the Daqing sat in a subterranean maintenance bay and its crew enjoyed shore leave, Homeland base erupted with new surface-to-orbit cannon emplacements and defensive shield projectors. The newest visitors were a strike-force of Navy of Sol vessels just back from an extremely daring raid deep into the heart of occupied human space: the upgraded Dreadnought and its five frigate escorts had eluded IZA defenses, the fleet crew had slipped into the regional command center, and now it seemed as if humanity was in possession of secrets that it was never meant to know. The IZA reprisal had been following the strike-force for quite a while; the IZA was still incapable of penetrating the sensor interference around the Homeland system and as a result the Navy of Sol fleet had decided to arrange a trap for the hapless pursuers instead of leading the fleet back to Earth.
Samuel was watching the shoreline yet again when the emergency sirens began to wail. He hastily dropped the umbrella he was carrying and silently slipped into one of the access hatches. Across the base the massive guns were slowly moving into position, their motors whining loudly. Buildings retreated into the ground, shutters of tempered plating moved into position covering vulnerable areas, and the air crackled with the energy of the base shield. All in all, nothing out of the ordinary, Samuel thought as the elevator he entered descended into the ground.
It turned out that the access elevator he had chosen led to a hangar, even now filled with pilots preparing their gunships for ascent and combat. Amidst the commotion, Samuel slipped into another elevator and headed straight down into a heavily-secured area. This was a base drone-control center. Samuel headed towards an unoccupied terminal and keyed in his access codes. The battle would be short and sweet for him:
Code 15-2123-2651-55169, encryption key A12:10:1712. Command granted for duration of Base Alert Status: Combat Readiness.
Some captains despised the grainy blue-and-white monochrome visual that accompanied the remote sensor readouts; Samuel simply ignored it, choosing instead to fly solely by instrument control. The holographic grid in front of him displayed a green icon floating in the middle of the tactical display space; around his icon swirled at least fifty red and blue shapes of varying sizes.
The battle raged in space; the planet Homeland hung among the stars like a celestial beacon. The ramming frigate Samuel was currently controlling from surface-side slowly turned around to face a much larger enemy assault heavy cruiser amidst the turmoil; computer actuators on-board the vessel slowly throttled the engines. The approach was slow at first, calculated not to arouse the suspicions of the gunners aboard the Iborroran target until the actual impact, when his frigate would be inaccessible from their fire. Eventually they would learn; Samuel would simply stay away from the ramming frigates once the IZA became used to them.
Throughout the pressurized assault heavy cruiser a metallic thud resounded, as the ramming head of the much smaller remotely-controlled frigate made contact and mechanical adhesion with the huge vessel. As the wide-effect auxiliary engine grid came online and the massive vessel began moving away from the main conflict, quad lasers, adapted and improved from mining and recovery vessels, began cutting into the hull of the enemy vessel. Still, Samuel realized that precision maneuvering was impossible: the computers controlling the thrust from the primary, auxiliary and afterburner thrust systems were simply not powerful enough to compensate for the actions of the target vessels engines. There was a way around this limitation, though:
Another ramming frigate locked onto the same vessel in a specific location, its lasers reducing hull plating and the delicate engine-control machinery below it to slag. Merciless pounding by ship point-defense batteries soon ruptured the robotic frigates reactors and hull, but not before the job was completed. The engines of the large vessel were now inoperative. Samuels technique would probably only work a few more times; the IZA would certainly be rewriting their defensive doctrine to stress high-priority protection of sensitive subsystems, and that would mean withering fire diverted to any potential source of concentrated and localized energy threatening these subsystems. Still, it was useful while it lasted.
The massive cruiser now unwillingly turned back into the heat of the main battle, straight towards a flank of smaller frigate-class vessels left relatively unmolested by Enaratolian forces. The unwillingness of the Iborroran captains to abandon their strategically-advantageous position allowed Samuel to plow the cruiser, under heavy fire, straight through their lines: one vessel was caught dead center upon the cruisers pointed nose and exploded, while two more were grazed by the cruiser and left drifting for dead. A fourth was smashed against the side of the vessel as Samuel began towing the cruiser sideways in a tight arc, hoping to make a second run. His frigate, however, was now in the line of fire, and Samuel watched as the wireframe representation of his vessel began to flash red.
There was no point in hoping for the survival of the frigate. Instead, Samuel hastily pressed down two actuation switches located to the far left end of the control board. He held them down for five seconds, fervently hoping that the hull would hold out for that long.
In orbit, the badly wounded frigates reactors detonated. Three of the enemy frigates were taken out by the blast, and the heavy cruiser began to explode as its unstable reactors began overloading. This explosion was much more violent: everything within the vicinity was reduced to shards of metal, while three heavily-damaged Enaratolian carriers close-by were rendered disabled and drifting in space. The battle was over, though, and soon recovery ships would be sent up to bring disabled vessels and their crew to a maintenance station.
Samuel stood up as the station shut off and the screens went blank. He ran a hand through his hair, and for the first time in three hours realized that his forehead and hair were soaked with sweat. While the other personnel continued cheering, Samuel slipped away. The barracks would give him ample opportunity to refresh himself and check on the status of preparations for the upcoming mission.
As he moved through the darkened corridors, Samuel wondered exactly why he had been so engaged by the command console. In the command stations was a semblance of the electronic games he spent his childhood playing and mastering, a diversion from the news from the front and a reality of worlds covered with missile batteries, electrified wire, and filled with patrolling soldiers. Further east, away from the occupation, life was more serene and pleasant; the border worlds where he had grown up were as much a part of the war as the outposts, military bases, and fleets that fought against further IZA expansion.
Two more days had passed, and Samuel and Ivan were now prepared to leave Homeland base. Samuel climbed into the Daqing , which sat deep underground within a massive hangar, illuminated by floodlights, and made his way to the bridge. Strapping himself into an acceleration damper, he signaled to Base Control his preparation. The rest of the crew waited deeper within the ship, each ready for launch.
They did a good job with resupply , Samuel thought to himself. His victuals had been restocked, the plating had been replaced and even upgraded, the interior had been thoroughly cleaned and scrubbed, and the environmental systems had been purged and refreshed. His display console was also new; they had apparently upgraded his avionics to the newer Level 5.1 standard. He had been forced to wait long enough; it was the least they could have done for him.
The Daqing , guided remotely by Launch Control, glided across the hangar floor and eased itself into one of the enormous launch cradles sitting at the far end of the hangar upon elevated platforms. The vessel shuddered once, and then again, as the clamps gripped the vessel, and the entire assembly began rising.
In preparation for the impeding launch, metal panels descended over the clear command windows, and deep beneath the bridge Samuel felt the vessels reactor throttling up. A dull rumble rose through the vessel, growing in intensity until it became a roar, seemingly shaking the vessel, the cradle, and the whole base as well.
Reactor capacity at 110% rated. Launch in three two one docking cradle release.
The clamps released. For two brief seconds Samuel felt the Daqing sinking into the cradle, before the engines came on-line. Samuel was slammed into his seat as the missile frigate began climbing into the sky, followed by two more frigates and a carrier. The roar was deafening, the acceleration was becoming more and more stifling, and the vessel was moving faster and faster .
.until it suddenly stopped. The G-forces upon his chest died away and for a second he felt himself floating before the artificial gravity kicked in. The Daqing and its escorts were now in orbit.
Samuel keyed in a destination into the navigational computer. His fleet fired their engines, left planetary orbit, and glided away into the void.
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(This message has been edited by UE_Research & Development (edited 06-29-2004).)
(This message has been edited by UE_Research & Development (edited 07-07-2004).)
I bet they'd be hard to implement though. :rolleyes: