Rogue 9 wrote:NRS Black Prince
Black Prince was Fifth Fleet's Dauntless class battleship and she was slightly out of her element; made for heavy assault, she was not built for pursuit of fleeing destroyers. Still, her oversized engined allowed for considerable thrust as she surged in pursuit of a fleeing interdictor, her escorting destroyers fanning out ahead to attempt to box it in.
Commodore Greyson stood up from his command chair. "Prime Archer missile tubes. Fire missiles 1 through 100 at the target on my mark." He paused for a moment. "Mark."
The missiles leapt free of their tubes and surged forward, accelerating to nearly half the speed of light. They rippled against the interdictor's shields in rapid staccato. The last few ruptured against the hull plating.
"Comms, give the mark to the frigates."
"Aye, Commodore." The communications officer quickly relayed the order to the half dozen Bandit class frigates in the escort force.
NRS Sherwood
"Mark."
"Captain..."
"I heard it, Comms. Helm, bring us about to bearing 330 mark 20 and accelerate to flank speed. Torpedo room, Conn. Confirm Mark 610s in tubes one through three."
"Conn, Torpedo, confirm Mark 610 torps," came the response over the intercom.
"Torpedo, Conn, aye. Stand by to fire tubes one through three on my mark."
"As ordered, Conn."
Scattered shots from the interdictor, until now concentrating all guns on the heavy destroyers moving to flank, began to reach out for the frigates as they rapidly closed the distance, massive engine blocks flaring blue as they strained. Too little, too late.
"Mark. Fire one. Fire two. Fire three. Reload with heavy torpedoes."
"Tubes one through three fired, reloading with boomers, aye."
The three torpedoes streaked forward, rapidly closing the relatively miniscule difference between the frigate and her prey. The rest of the gunners on the interdictor opened up too late as the ship's captain realized his peril. Multiple torpedoes prematurely blew as they were met with point defense fire on the way in, and frigates began taking withering hits that they could not withstand for more than half a minute at most.
Fortunately, they didn't have to. Four torpedoes survived and hit the interdictor. Rather than exploding against the hull, arcs of energy and ion bursts went from the torpedoes to the ship's hull. The interdictor quickly went dark, and continued hurtling through space unpowered and unguided, her weapons falling silent as they lost power.
Captain Horton grinned. "Comms, Conn. My regards to Commodore Greyson. The target has been neutralized and may be captured at leisure."
"Conn, Comms, aye."
NRS Long Island, RSC Assault Ship
"Conn, Comms, new orders," called out the comms officer. "We are to cancel our capture run and move to assist the Hub corvette Peacekeeper, currently disabled, out of control, and losing life support, without delay. The corvette is currently bearing 112 mark 10."
Muttering under his breath, Captain Brrashik nodded his furred head in acknowledgement. "Helm, Conn. Set new course 112 mark 10 and move to intercept the Hub corvette. CAG, reoutfit a flight of Pelicans for board and rescue and prepare for launch."
"Aye, Captain."
The kilometer-long assault ship fired it's engines and heeled over to the new course, rapidly accelerating towards the stricken vessel.
"Comms, Conn. Attempt to establish contact with the Peacekeeper, ask for a damage assessment and docking instructions.
NRS Fortitudo, RSC Assault Ship
"Acknowledged, Commodore.
Fortitudo out." Captain Grrasskir let a predatory grin spread over his furred face, or as well as it could with his mouth oriented downwards as it was. "Helm, Conn. Acquire and pursue Sierra-7, she's been disabled and we're to make the capture."
"Aye, Captain," acknowledged the helmsman as he smoothly slid the annunciator up to flank speed. "Pursuing."
"Stand by for boarding action, all Marines to boarding action stations."
Forward hangar bay
Marines and fully suited ODSTs scrambled into Pelican drop ships. When they were aboard, the large doors to the rear drop bay sealed shut; they would egress through the forward boarding airlock into the enemy ship.
Command Master Chief Kyle-012 rammed a magazine home into his battle rifle and looked up. The first successful SPARTAN supersoldier, he was literally raised to be a combat special forces infantryman. Today, he would lead a squad in his first combat mission against live hostiles. He strode over towards the lead Pelican, filled exclusively with ODSTs, his armored boots clanking on the deck plating as his power armor responded to his every movement. He nimbly hopped up into the drop ship and sat down in one of the jump seats. Lowering his helmeted head to his rifle, he jacked a round into the chamber and then looked around at his men, who were checking their equipment and donning their own helmets. The door to the drop bay closed and they were sealed inside the ship.
"You all right," he asked gruffly without turning his attention from his rifle.
"We're good, Chief," responded a petty officer, similarly checking his equipment.
"Right, strap in."
Bridge
"Looks like she was moving at a pretty good clip when they zapper her, sir."
"Angle to intercept. Any active enemy vessels nearby?"
"None, sir. They're either running or scrap right now."
"Very good. How long until optimum time for launch?"
"32 seconds, sir," came the answer from the holographic projection stand near the captain's chair as York, the ship's AI, manifested himself. A countdown appeared simultaneously on a secondary screen at the front of the bridge. The aerospace controller watched it intently, finger on the comms button to the hangar.
"Open hangar bay doors." A pause. Zero. "Boarders away!"
Pelican Charlie-35
Kyle listened to the rumble of the hangar bay doors opening, the containment field holding the atmosphere in. Wouldn't be long now, he thought.
Then he felt the Pelican lift under him abruptly before accelerating forward. The roar of it's engines suddenly dampened as it passed through the field at out into space. Though none of the special forces squad could see them, more drop ships followed. "Hang on, Marines," said the pilot over the intercom. Nobody bothered to correct his mistake, for a second afterward, the ship suddenly decelerated and then a low clang rang through the hull. "Damn, York was right on the money."
"Surprises you?" The copilot chuckled as the emergency airlock they'd hit started to come open underneath the hull cutter ring. "Go, go, go!"
The ODSTs and lone SPARTAN quickly moved forward to the airlock. Petty Officer Michaels nodded to the CMC and twisted the safety ring off of a large canister. The lock came open and the SPARTAN quickly and smoothly moved forward. He seized the ring lock on the inner door and twisted. It spun open, a feat impossible for an unaugmented human to accomplish so quickly, and swung inwards. He jumped back, activating his energy shield as he did so, and the gas canister flew out past him, hitting the floor and releasing clouds of smokey knockout gas, able to put most carbon-based life forms out cold in moments and keep them that way for two hours or more. The fully suited commandoes came out of the airlock in pairs, covering each way down the blackened corridor of the powerless ship, helmet nightvision systems activated.
"Clear left."
"Clear right!"
Kyle turned around and strode to the airlock, swinging the door shut and clamping down the lock. "Charlie-35, clear."
"Roger." There was a slight shudder as the drop ship broke it's seal on the ruined outer door and soared off. Seconds later, another thud sounded as a second drop ship clamped onto the airlock. Without cutting to do, the airlock swung open and a squad of Marines piled through, compact breathing masks in place to protect against the gas.
"Right, move it out. Bridge is this way," ordered a petty officer. "Reynolds, Jordan, take rear. Chief, you got point?"
Kyle-012 nodded and strode forward, rifle up. Where were the pirates? Power was out all over the ship, but surely they would have sent people to secure the airlocks before now. He activated his helmet radio. "Command Master Chief to
Fortitudo, are we sure the crew didn't abandon ship?"
"Negative, Chief. No escape pod launches detected, nothing left the hangar bay."
"Roger. No contact with the enemy so far. Proceeding to the..."
*Tink, tink*
He didn't even think. As the grenade bounced around the corner, he bent his knees, leaned back, and launched himself backwards down the corridor. He was still in midair when the grenade went off with a loud thud at where his feet used to be, and fragments sparked off his shields as he landed on his back and slid a short distance, shields sparking like mad against the deck, before coming to a stop with his head jutting around the corner right in front of Spacer Mattingly's boots. He rolled up and hopped to his feet in a second and pulled out one of his own grenades as he did so. Pulling the pin, he waited a moment before throwing it down the corridor and bouncing it precisely off the bulkhead to bank into the corridor where the first frag had come from. It went off immediately, to the accompaniment of a pair of screams from the corridor.
"If they didn't know we were here before, they do now. Move." He trotted down to the hall with the ODSTs and Marines behind him, putting his back to the wall at the corner and ducking around it, rifle trained down the corridor.
Two mangled and burned bodies lay on the deck. Ignoring the mess, he signaled that the hall was clear and went around the corner. A head flashed around the right hand corner of the next junction at waist height, and started to pull back. Anyone else taking point would have let loose a burst too late.
The Chief did not. His rifle snapped around and the trigger depressed, almost as of it's own accord. The three 9.5mm rounds entered the unfortunate pirate's forehead. His forehead rapidly ceased to exist, along with the rest of his brainpan. Panicked yells from around the corner greeted the ears of the Marines.
"Fire in the hole!" A grenade whistled past Kyle-012's helmeted head and bounced around the corner as two ODSTs dashed to the junction. One dove and rolled across while the other hit the corner and snapped his rifle around it. He waved up a second later.
The Chief jogged up to the corner and looked around it. There was a blood trail starting fairly far down, but other than that it was clear.
"Ran away, sir."
"Huh," snorted a Marine corporal. "Chickens."
"They're pirates, Greeley," rumbled the Marine sergeant, walking up to the front. "They used to dealin' with scared merchant spacers. They're rats. Just you remember that rats bite when you grab 'em, though."
"Yes, sir."
"Now, they run down that way." The sergeant cast a veteran's eye on the tall, armored figure that he was now standing next to. "This is your first time in field combat, innit, Chief?"
"Yeah, Gunny."
"You doin' good, but tactics ain't all quick reflexes an' good aim. You need to start switchin' off point; I don't care how good one guy is, going one point to the next without another point man covering and switching out for ya leaves you vulnerable. Especially now that we know we got hostiles down there."
"Right." He looked back. "Ramirez."
The ODST addressed nodded his helmeted head and padded around the corner, putting his back to the wall and turning quickly to aim his rifle down the new corridor. He pulled back just as quickly as a pair of shots, one from a blaster the other some form of slugthrower, rang out.
“It’s a dead end, sir!” Ramirez yanked a grenade from it’s holder on his armored chest and pulled the pin, chucking it around the corner. A dull thud, gout of shards and smoke, and a scream later, Kyle-012 jogged up to the corner and, stepping around Ramirez’ crouched form, swung out around the corner.
There were two mangled bodies there, one moving and moaning a little with shredded legs and the other quite dead. The Chief sprung around the corner and was atop the man in a heartbeat, flinging away the weapons on the ground and standing over him, rifle aimed at his forehead. “Corpsman!”
The Marine corpsman came running around the corner, along with the squad sergeant. “See to this man,” ordered the Chief. He then stepped away from the wounded man and lowered his rifle. He then turned to the end of the hall, ten feet from the corner.
“Airtight doors.”
“Yep. Must have been stuck shut when they lost power. They can’t move troops around. Then, neither can we.”
Kyle-012 stepped up to the door and grabbed at the rims. When he started to strain against them, though, they wouldn’t budge.
“We’ll have to blast our way through.”
“You got it, Chief. Perez, can you move this man?”
“Wouldn’t want to Sarge, but its better than blowing him up again,” responded the corpsman as the prisoner continued to moan. He reached into his pack and pulled out a ultralight collapsible stretcher. “Greeley, help me out here.”
Corporal Greeley jogged up and helped Perez gingerly load the stricken pirate onto the stretcher before they picked it up and carried it away.
“Hawthorne, your show!”
“Got it, Sarge.” The squad demolitions specialist came up and examined the airtight door in front of them. “Right,” he mumbled to himself, rooting around in his equipment pack. He pulled out two round charges and a generous portion of detonator cord. He applied the charges to the meeting of the two double doors, one high, one low, and ran the cord around the doorframe. He then set detonators. “You wanna get back around the corner, Chief,” he said as he began running out wire to the detonators back around the corner. Kyle-012 and Sergeant Thompson followed.
Lance Corporal Hawthorne pulled out a triggering device and attached the wires to it. The Marines and ODSTs got back further in the corridor as the Chief stood directly behind Hawthorne with Thompson behind him.
“Fire in the hole!” Hawthorne twisted on the trigger and a resounding blast sounded out, accompanied by a gout of flame and chunks of blast door.
Kyle-012 snapped up his rifle and jumped around the corner to land in a crouch, aiming down the hallway. It seems those in the next compartment had noticed the grenades; there were at least five pirates in varying states of having been shredded by flying door parts, three of them actually trying to aim. Kyle depressed the trigger on his battle rifle, putting three rounds cleanly into the closest moving pirate. Thompson rolled to the corner and, bringing his rifle around, put a burst into another as the Chief brought his rifle a little to the left and shot the third.
He then began trotting down the hallway, rifle at the ready. Out of the corner of his eye, he caught a movement.
One of the pirates, badly shredded and with a chunk of blast door actually through his left leg, had a blaster aimed directly at his chest. He began to twist out of the way, but he knew it was too late.
He did better than most would have. The shot caught him on the right side of his chest instead of center of mass, near the arm. He flinched away, reflexively expecting to feel the burn...
Instead, his shields sparked along their surface, a yellow static line shooting across his faceplate. Then a rifle rang out and his assailant dropped down and stayed there.
"Damn it Chief, don't do that!" Thompson was fairly red in the face as the Marines and ODSTs rounded the corner. "Bridge is one section more. C'mon."
Kyle-012 looked down at the body of the man who had just shot him. He shivered for a second inside his armor, then set off towards the front of the line.