CHAPTER-2- In the quiet of the storm

UEG-NIGHTMARE CLASS-STEATH CORVETTE-STARLIGHT
5/15/3863-ALR
IN ORBIT ABOVE SHANXI

After being in system for three hours my emotions were starting to get the better of me. At first all I felt was rage at the sight of the burning garden world, at the sight of civilian ships burning in atmosphere as they tried to get away. The confusion at the sight of just who was doing this. A group of fifty ships, of unknown design with the largest being a one kilometer war ship. The captain relayed this information to the princesses and now we are weighting for our new orders.

The poilt of the Sky Crane called back to me, “Sir, you are needed on the COMS, relay number 001.”

“001?” I thought, as I changed my COM,”that’s only used by the high-ups”

I was shocked by just who had come up on my HUD.” Princess Luna,” I began, “It’s an honor to speck with you.” I nervously said in the most respectful way I could.

“I only whish this was on better terms.” she said.

“As do I ma'am.” I replied.

She smiled at me lightly, “You have new orders, you are to drop on the outskirts of the main settlement and gage their numbers and capabilities, while you are doing this the STARLIGHT will do the same with their fleet.”

“Understood”, I replied, “But if I may say ma'am, there 'fleet' is almost laughable, only one is barely a kilometer.”

She perked up, “Well that’s good but I will hold for the full report from the STARLIGHT before I do anything”

“Of course ma'am”

”good luck Steven.” she smiled and cut the COM.

“Ten minutes to BURN-IN sir!” yelled the pilot.

My helmet’s panels slid into place over my face. “Thank you” I spoke into my COM.

As I calmly weighted for the drop I said the mantra of the 8th:

In the quiet of the storm I come.

In that instant of charged atmosphere I come.

I feel like lightning and my burden is awesome.

I feel like lightning and down I must go.

“DROPING NOW” yelled the pilot.

My seat roiled back, my HUD gave me a now updated map of my drop zone and my orders from HIGHCOM: recon surrounding area, collect “data” on enemy forces, and gage the offensive and defensive capabilities, and assist main force.
My altimeter gave me my current point: 90,000FT, the onboard AI calculated drop shock and weather interference on drop conditions.

The hatch on the Sky Cane opened, I slid down, and count down came up on my HUD: 10 SEC TO DROP.

UEG-COLONY-Shanxi
5/15/3863-ALR
JUST OUTSIDE OF COLONY

If anybody would look up now they would see a vary pretty sight in the night sky, a long and bright fire trail, callused by the falling debris of the ships in orbit, or that is what the Turian commanders thought it was when one of the solders radioed it in. On the other hand, the remaining civilian populace currently in detainment saw something completely different, hope. Because this fire trail did not bring death and destruction (at least not to them), it brought salvation, it brought and end to their imprisonment, and it brought revenge for all who had died here.

As I watched the fire trail wrap around the protection of my energy shielding, watching the fires in the city get closer, I looked for my target.

There, my helmet zoomed in on the odd shape, it was bipedal in stance but everything else was completely alien to me.

10,000 feet to impact

This thing was defiantly an alien, its ‘legs’ were like the back legs of a pony, and it was clad in armor I had never seen before.

The thing that put me off the most was not the strange armor or its weird body structure. What concerned me was the gun it was holding. It may be an alien but the object in its claws was distinctly familiar, strange shape same purpose.

1,000 feet to impact

I decided to do this silently, as not to attract any is this things buddies. I flipped over so my feet were pointed downwards, and activated my main airbrakes, and then my hand went to my knife sheathed in my left pauldron.

100 feet to impact

The alien had thankfully not looked up yet, as it was now too late to correct my fall. Now I knew nothing about the aliens’ physiology, but two tons of armor and flesh going at little below the speed of sound, coupled with knife to the back of the I assumed was the neck, the alien was dead before it ever knew I was there.

I picked my self of the now dead alien was able to get a closer look at the thing. The part the caught my attention was its oddly designed head. It had some type of scales or plates on its head and a fringe of the same martial coming back and off of its head. It also had a pair of mandibles on the sides of its mouth which was full of sharp teeth. I preformed a fast scan and tasked my AI to find anything and everything about this thing that she could, and send the information to HIGHCOM at Canterlot.

In accordance with my orders I set of to find good rust to recon, and if nee be snipe from. My foot kicked something though and I looked down to see the aliens’ strange rifle and decided to take it with me.

THREE HOURS LATER

As of now I am about four miles outside the city on the edge of an outcropping looking toords the city, well within the range of my ISD-V4 Vanguard sniper rifle. I had finished my recon of the surrounding area and was now watching the battle now taking place in the space above Shanxi, the princesses had sent in a fairly large battle group consisting of: two Dreadnoughts, five NIGHTMARE-CLASS-Destroyers, and ten NIGHTMARE-CLASS-Frigates.

I pulled up the data the STARLIGHT had gathered on the now conformed hostile alien fleet, fifty ships with the largest being a little below a kilometer in size, the STARLIGHT’s AI had flagged this ship as the flagship of the fleet, based on the size and odd power signatures coming from the vessel which gave the AI in her words “the AI equivalent of vertigo”. The mass of the ship aperies to fluctuate whenever the ship moves.

The fleet was due to arrive in moments so I told my AI to upload my recon data, and the information gathered from the dead alien to the TAC-NET so the ground ponders would have up to date information. She was also working on a large packet of information that the alien had stored in its armor but it was proving vary hard to crack and a large part of the data had all ready been lost much to her dismay, the first time she had tried to hack into the files it had begun to delete it’s self as some kind of automated destruct system, fortunately she was able to stop it before all of it was lost. Despite her failure I did not blame her.

” there was no way you could have known it would have done that”

“I KNOW DAMNIT….sigh… its just I should have caught it faster.”

“Hell I am glad it did “

“What? Really?”

“Yes I am willing to bet that thing was standard issue, we can find another; you on the other hand would be much harder to replace.” I said

“Aw, thank you Steven”, Cynder said.” I was able to save something big, it is there ‘gelactic standard’ it is a standard langrage of their govermints, I have prepared a translator package for your COMS, and I have uploaded a copy to all ship board AI’s, TAC-COM, and HIGHCOM systems.”

“Thanks Cynder this will help the fleet in orbit, and the land forces, you did well.” I complemented.

“It was my pleaser Sergeant.” she said. “The fleet has jumped in-system patching you in now.”

A small window appeared on my HUD of the commander of the fleet,” This is General Twilight Sparkle of the 85th patrol fleet to the alien forces over the colony of Shanxi, you will cease all hostile actions ageist the UEG immediately or your forces will be destroyed and no mercy will be given to your forces or govermints, you have five minutes to comply or we will open fire on your vessels.” , General Sparkles ultimatum was pretty lenient considering what these things have done but considering the might of the UEG these alien might get more then they barged for.

Almost immediately after that what I assumed was the alien fleet commander appeared on my HUD as well, at first I thought the translator was malfunctioning, but that was put down as Cynder yelled into my COM, “HOW DARE THAT THING LAUGH AT THE GENERAL!”

“You think the mighty Citadel Council will bend to the whim of four legged animals, ha ha ha, you are sadly mistaken, your worlds will be ours in due time.” The alien ‘smiled’ as he was about to cut the link but the General said some thing that put a look of horror on its face,” ALL SHIPBOARD AI’s ROCK THERE SYSTEMS, I WANT THEM DEAD IN THE WATER!”

Their SHIP-NET defensives were powerful but no ship could defend against seventeen DISCORD-class AI’s all attacking at once their flagship went from armed and dangerous to an airless ghost ship as the AI’s hit the ship, first the engines went offline, then their gravity, lights, power, as this was happening the General said one last thing, “ we warned you, now you die, Spike?” a holo of a green drake appeared next to her, ”Yes, ma'am ?,”,”Vent the atmosphere….slowly, let them think of what they have done.”,” Of course ma'am.”.

From the STARLIGHTs’ shipboard cameras I watched as their air true to General Sparkles’ word slowly vented from the flag ship and the shipboard AI’s began jamming there ship-to-ship COMS and the fleet moved into attack.

The enemy fleet began to slowly move into a lose grid of attack patterns, and opened up on General Sparkles’ dreadnought, of the forty-nine rounds that were fired ten were targeted to her ship, eight hit her ship it a 46% drop in shields, she fired back along with the rest of the 85th, seventeen KRG rounds screamed toads the alien fleet and thanks to the AI’s every round impacted a separate ship, seventeen small suns appeared in the sky and five more were caught in the blast, aliens 0 UEG 22.

DAMN this will be a short fight. That first salvo decimated the alien fleet, but something unexpected happened, the enemy fleet fired a second time. Damn maybe not, we have them beet on firepower but they kick the shit out of us on fire rate. Cynder told me while there guns were weaker they could fire every two point five seconds compared to our 30 second reload time.

The cause of there faster shot times? Three of the NIGHTMARE class Frigates, and one Destroyer. But the main guns is not all the fleet has the also make use of DEWs these plasma canons launch ‘pockets’ of plasma at the enemy in magnetically controlled balls.

The fleet fired the second salvo at the enemy and another thirteen ships were wiped from the playing field only this time none were caught in the blasts, they learn fast I will give them that.

By this time there fleet had had just about be killed off by the 85th and were heading out system towards a massive tuning fork shaped object my HUD named a SHOCKPOINT GATE. I asked Cynder,”What the fuck is a shock point gate?”

“It is what the scientist were studying here they discovered it about a month ago and activated it a week ago.” Cynder awnsered,”it would appear that these Turians as they call them self’s came from the gate.”

“Just what does it do?”

“It allows for near instantaneous travel across hundreds of light years, similar to our jump drives, it would appear that the Turian based all there technology on these mass relays as they call them, I have completed the translation of what’s left of the ‘codex’ sending copies to fleet AI’s and HIGHCOM now.”

General Sparkle appeared on my HUD once more, “I am sorry about the four ships ma’am did some of the crew get out of the ships?”, I asked.

“Yes, many life pods were launched from the ships we are in the process of recovering them now, and the enemy fleet is in full retreat with eleven ships remaining.”, she said with a smile, ” What I am concerned with is the situation on the ground, it looks pretty bad here in orbit, just how bad is?”

“ I am sorry to say mam not good, the civilian populace has suffered major casualties, the majority of the superstructures here have been knocked down, and the remaining populace has be moved into segregated camps,…..and…..”

A worried look and a bad feeling crossed the Generals face and mind, not much can rattle a member of the 8th, “It’s, ok Sergeant you can tell me, take your time.” She said with a forced smile.

“They have been killing any unicorns they find ma'am…” a pained expression crossed my face, “regardless of age.”

The General closed her eyes in sadness as did most of the bridge crew,” They will be avenged Sergeant.” She activated her ship-to-ship COM and told the other captains to destroy any life pods that they come across.

“The fleet is moving into geosynchronous orbit above the main settlement, when we have regrouped I will deploy the main ground force.” said the General.

“Of course ma’am the Turian ground forces have moved into defensive positions, and Cynder has taken the liberty of painting what looks like high value targets and ranking command officers, my presence to my knowledge has not been compromised ma’am.”

“Vary good sergeant, new orders will be relayed to your TAC-NET in a moment, as of now continue to monitor the situation on the ground, may the sisters protect you.” said Twilight

As her face disappeared from my HUD I switched my gaze down the scope of my vanguard. I activated the scopes magnification and the destroyed cityscape jumped into view.

The Turians had indeed noticed the absence of their fleets’ communiqués as we had jammed their ship-com systems so their ground forces likely know nothing of their loss in orbit. They have started to reinforce the defenses already in place in and around the city, multiple fire lines and cross fire locations, and snipers.

This will be a hard won fight.

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Nightwatcher here do you readers want a codex like chapter ?

Next Chapter: Some one to watch over us Estimated time remaining: 22 Minutes