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Shadows of Archon II (part 11) - A Hero's Last Stand
Posted By: Wado<wyamauchi@msn.com>
Date: 11 September 2002, 7:20 am
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"My sleeper is dead," said Princess Kira as her penetrating silver eyes sprinkle deep blue tears, "and I never got to..." Her words fade away in the mists of a dream.
That was the end of the transmission between Cat and Princess Kira.
Cat looks at the others, tears in her eyes, and says, "It is no use, Princess Kira, like all of us, is deeply hurt by the loss of John. For now the Archonian fleet stays behind their beautiful walls. They will not aid us."
In the room around Cat assemble Master Covenstein, Valerie Sinclair, the Lady, Sub-commander Zax Rellius, Cortana, and Communications Officer Tak Musung. Each one a hero in their own rights; together they form a mighty force, but they are incomplete, the loss of John and Commander Thom, and even Gunter the Hunter has taken its toll. Without the leadership of John or Thom, the group is divided in what to do next.
The Lady steps up to the role, once again. "We must stick with what we know," said the Lady, "and saving John is still an unknown. We have a chance to save Thom and I have a plan."
"I am honor bound to save my Commander and friend," said Sub-commander Zax, "and I will follow any plan you have to save him."
"We all stick together, let's hear the plan," said Cat.
The others agreed and the Lady spells out the plan to rescue Commander Thom from the Covenant. Thom is being transported in the Covenant cruiser called the Divine Might, one of the new Proteus II class prototypes. It is currently in slip-space in route to Anterach 4, an Elite strong hold.
The Lady has secured the help of one Nomdian Barracuda class cruiser, the Willow. Like the Archonian cruisers, the Nomdian cruiser is small, less than 100 meters long with crew of 23.
The Nomdians do not want to risk war with the Covenant. Although far more technologically advanced to the Covenant, they are very much out-numbered. The commander of the Willow, the Adept, and his crew will be acting on their own -- The Nomdian High Council will claim no knowledge of the Willow's intentions or actions.
The plan is for the Willow to engage the Divine Might in slip-space. This is very difficult if not impossible to do. If the ships do not match jump frequencies then they will never even see each other. The other major obstacle is that gravitational fields are several magnitudes more powerful in slip-space and somewhat unpredictable. If courses are not plotted carefully, the Willow could end up getting yanked out of slip-space inside an asteroid or a planet.
The Willow will attempt to knock the Divine Might out of slip-space by damaging its engines. Once the Divine Might is out of slip-space, the Willow, Destiny's Blade and Seeker 157 will engage it, board it and rescue Commander Thom.
The whole plan is going to be very difficult and likely cost the lives of many Covenant, but everyone agreed it is the best course of action.
------------------------------------------------
A Hero's Last Stand
Aboard the Covenant cruiser Divine Might a different story emerges from the darkness of the mind. Commander Thom and Gunter face a group of eight Elites. They all don armor and wield shock staves.
Back to back Thom and Gunter stand. "Gunter they don't want us dead," said Thom, "but they do want to hurt us."
The crowd around roars, "Get the traitors, teach them a lesson."
Elite 1, called Scar, leads the attack flipping his staff from hand to hand, he spins it around and takes a big swing at Thom.
Thom leaps over the swing and parries two more thrusts from Elites 2 and 3. With a swift spin he sweeps all three attackers to the ground.
Zap, zap! Gunter is hit twice. "Ouch that isn't nice'" said Gunter. He drops his staff and grabs the heads of Elites 4 and 5, smashing them together. He tosses them down -- they don't get up.
"Get him." Three more Elites (6, 7, 8) jump on Gunter; they take him down.
Scar flips up and ducks under a thrust from Thom. He grabs Thom's staff and they both wrestle for control of the weapon. "You will pay traitor."
"Not by your hand ugly." Thom twists and flips Scar into two Elites and then moves to pull off the other Elites from Gunter.
A whistle from the comm. "Commander on deck, attention!" Through open blast doors enters Commander Nikon. The crowd moves aside to let him pass.
"What is the meaning of this Sub-commander Scar?" said Commander Nikon, "and what are these prisoners doing out of their cells and with armor on?"
"Sir, it was exercise time, err... the prisoners were exercising," replied Scar.
"I think the prisoners have had enough exercise for today," said Nikon. "Return them to their cells and get them out of that armor."
Over the comm, "Commander to bridge. Red alert."
Thom and Gunter are taken away. Nikon and Scar head to the bridge. Lights flicker in the ship halls.
Once on the bridge, Nikon and Scar take their stations. "What is it Com?" asks Nikon.
"Sir, Divine Might has raised shields and armed weapons. He detects an enemy cloaked ship. No lock yet." Replied Com.
"In the middle of slip space, that's crazy," said Scar.
"Crazy for us but not for someone desperate enough Sub-commander," said Nikon, "and I can't afford to takes risks so near to gravity wells. Order our escorts to engage the cloaked vessel. We stay the course."
Six Covenant corvettes span out in a search pattern to find the cloaked vessel. One of them ventures too close to a gravity well and is torn out of slip space. Now there are five.
Corvette 1 slips back and forth erratically saying over the comm, "Aaargh! Get them out! There's monsters crawling under my skin." Corvette 1 is ripped to shreds blasting out of slip space too close to a gravity well.
Before Commander Nikon can give an order, corvettes 2 through 5 meet with a similar fate - They're all dead.
"Nomdians!" yelled Nikon. "Sci, who has neural scramblers installed?"
"Sir we all do," replied Sci, "but it wasn't standard issue for the corvette crews."
"Damn Nomdian mind games..." said Nikon just as the ship shakes and sparks fly from panels.
The Nomdian cruiser, Willow, opens fire with quad disrupter cannons. The disrupter bolts hit the Divine Might damaging its shields severely and causing electrical overloads throughout the ship.
For the moment, the Willow is detected and the Divine Might returns fire with pulse plasma cannons. The nimble Willow evades the fire.
"Commander, return fire ineffective, we can't get a good lock on target," said Sci.
Nikon surveys the damage and combat reports and says, "Sci, hold fire on all aft weapons, have them ready for a mass volley fire, on my command only."
Whizzzzip! The Willow fires a second salvo, ripping the shields down from the mighty Covenant cruiser. The disrupters are effective against shields and electronics, but much less effective at structural damage.
However with the shields down on the Divine Might, the Willow closes to effective range of its primary weapons. Out from the ship fires pulses of energy from the tremor devices. The energy strikes the engine area of the Divine Might. It pulls and repulses, shakes and vibrates, ripping the very atomic structure of the material.
One of the three main engines is ripped clean off of the Divine Might.
"Fire aft now," ordered Nikon.
The massive volley of plasma fire strikes the Willow, blowing down shields and punching holes through its hull. The fire continues without avail and the Willow is blasted into no more than a slab of materials burning out of slip space.
The Divine Might also drops out of slip space suddenly with the loss of one of its engines. Its shields down and half of its electronics overloaded and shut down, it does not even notice the cloaked ships coming out of a stargate near by.
Seeker 157 with Covenstein's help jams the communications and scanners of the Divine might. Seeker being a scout ship, its scanners and electronic warfare abilities match and exceed the mighty Covenant cruiser.
Destiny's Blade with its Archonian weapons and shield array circles around the Divine Might. With pin-point accuracy it first takes out the bridge, then auxiliary controls, and then the main bay doors of the cruiser.
Seeker 157 lands in the main bays of the cruiser, out from rear doors fly Alpha, Beta, Delta, and Gamma squads led by Sub-commander Zax. They make their way to the brig area where Cortana, who has tapped into the ships systems, has identified as the location where Thom and Gunter are being held.
Meanwhile, behind blast doors, Sub-commander Scar, badly burned himself, looks through a small window at the charred remains of Commander Nikon in what's left of the burned out bridge. Scar barely made it out before the whole bridge decompressed.
"Sir I have reports we are being boarded," said Com, who also made it out of the bridge in time.
"Gather everyone who can fight, let's kill those bastards," replies Scar. They race down to the main bay area. Soon they are an army of a thousand Covenant.
They blast through doors that have been sealed from the other side to find corridors of dead Covenant. Down the corridors they go, blasting through many more locked doors, until they reach the main bay.
The main bay is empty. "Sir whoever they were, we're too late, they're gone," said Com.
Scar looks at the stars through the open bay doors. He lifts his fists up and curses.
-- Next, Twisted Fate --
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