New Republic: The Enemy of My Enemy

18 years after the Battle of Yavin...
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Re: New Republic: The Enemy of My Enemy

Post by Cyprien Taillefer »

"That's a lot of ships," quipped Toklar, glancing at a holo-projection of the ongoing battle.

Cyprien felt his stomach grow quesy at the sight of so many piratical ships, and promptly swallowed a nausea pill which he kept in his pocket. How the hell is Toklar so calm? I thought he was the green one here, but perhaps his inexperience blinds him to the knowledge that we could soon be charred bodies roasted by turbolaser fire, or floating out there lifeless in the vacuum of space...there's no way we stand up to this pirate armada, bu at least the near tactical situation is good...He glanced at the many sensor blips that surrounded the trio of disguised Republic vessels, many of the piratical fighters were getting picked off easily: Capital ship gunfire broke their formations and coordination; Republic starfighters fell upon the disorganized pirates like packs of wolfs. And seemingly everywhere, pairs of Arrow-class blastboats soared around the dogfight, spewing out volleys of concussion missiles as the dragons of old breathed fire. We can survive at this rate, but not win...Cyprien beckoned Toklar over with the wave of a hand; the Mon Calamari giddily ambled over to the captain's chair.

"What's your assessment of our tactical situation?" said Cyprien dryly.

The alien hesitated, "We're outgunned, so we're running away?"

"Yes and no," half-agreed the man, "we were originally moving to divide the enemy's force so that we may more easily pick them off with less losses to our own side. That is the essential nature of tactics: focusing our strength against an enemy's weakness, while preventing the enemy from doing the same. So what is the enemy's weakness right now, certainly not numbers, is it?"

"Speed," suggested Toklar, "None of those ships would seem very fast, except maybe the fighters."

"Exactly so," agreed Cyprien, "that Kaloth-class Battlecruiser is their fastest ship, and its well below the speed of our slowest ship. At one point, the Razorwind probably filled that niche in their unit, but it's now gone. So we're going to compound that problem for them later, but first, we're going to find some better space to fight them on. See that asteroid belt over there? Find a good course that we'll get us a good kilometers into the belt, but no deeper than that. That is all, Toklar."

"On it sir."

"Sir?" said Yalltir, "Lieutenant Greggs is asking for some assistance for the Jubilee, their aft shield generators are getting pounded by that Kaloth..."

"Helm, decrease speed by 2 MGLTs, and Yalltir, instruct the Jubilee go directly ahead of us for the time being. We can shield them a bit while they try and restore their shields, that's assuming we'll be out of their firing range soon."

Cyprien glanced down at the sensor screen. We'll be in their firing range for only a few more minutes. It's really too bad we don't have many weapons that can hit them from the aft...Gregg's Luck Jubilee briefly jetted ahead of the Wallace's Revenge, taking sanctuary from the battlecruiser's fire behind the bulk of the frigate and its hefty shield system. Toklar soon had the group moving towards the asteroid field as the New Republic starfighters beat back the last of the first wave of fighters the group had encountered in the system. And soon we'll be in that belt, and there we'll give them hell.
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Re: New Republic: The Enemy of My Enemy

Post by Cyprien Taillefer »

Cyprien watched as the Moonstriker deftly slipped between the tumbling rocks of the Weyne Asteroid Belt. The little gunship ferociously lashed out at its surroundings with its blue particle beams and red lasers, beginning to blaze a temporary trail for the rest of the task force to follow. Several hundred meters behind it, the Luck Jubilee cautiously followed the Moonstriker. It too fired its own weapons, shattering those asteroids which seemed to veer too closely to itself. Cyprien ignored those ships, instead focusing on the following pirate gang. Even thousands of kilometers away, the Bandit's Blade was an imposing ship in its weakened state. Apparently the Renegades thought the same, leaving only a single Hammerhead to accompany it without any sort of starfighter screen. Those Tie Interceptors and Uglies which launched out of the piratical warships formed the tip of the spear aimed straight at Task Force Audacious. Behind the swarm of starfighters, the Kaloth-class Battlecruiser led a motley column of ships that included a modified bulk freighter, a bulk cruiser, and a hammerhead frigate. Cyprien spared a glance at his chrono and looked over at Flight Controller Eris.

"How long before our fighters are fully recovered?"

"The last of Stormfire squadron is landing right now, and we have a two of the Arrows maneuvering to take shelter in the cargo containers. About two minutes more before we're all set..."

Cyprien slowly nodded. No point in pushing our pilots into exhaustion. They need a break from flying, even if it isn't the most peaceful. Besides, sending weary pilots into an asteroid belt is certainly a sure way to lose ships. The native of Jalarren looked at Twensies, and offered a nod. The former Imperial nodded in turn and began barking a set of orders to his gunnery crews. The forward batteries of the frigate flared to life, widening the initial path blazed by the Moonstriker and preserved by the Luck Jubilee, to allow the full girth of the frigate to pass through unscathed. The few rear-facing batteries of the Wallace's Revenge continued to fire ineffectually at the oncoming rush of piratical starfighters. At such great ranges, few of the shots hit between the fighter's small size and ever-changing positions, yet the fire seemed to effectively keep the fighters from moving in a straight, quick path right to the task force. The frigate's two tractor beam projectors snagged a pair of smaller asteroids, and hurled the already tumbling rocks into paths which Eris predicted would be used by the piractical fighters to approach the task force. As the enemy fighters slithered around the Audacious' turbolaser fire, one of the squadrons nearly collided with the oncoming asteroid, and Cyprien was lightened to see a small flash of light where a hapless ugly clipped the space-going rock.

"All fighters recovered," announced Eris, "and the Arrows are secure."

Cyprien glanced at the holo of the battlefield, "We're not going to be far enough to do it quite yet."

"Shall I switch to defensive fire, sir?" questioned Twensies.

Cyprien hesitated, "Only for our laser cannons and ion cannons, keep the turbolasers concentrated on boring through our path."

Captain Taillefer looked at the holos of the oncoming pirate fighters just in time to see them swarm all over the frigate like a cloud of angry hornets. Laser fire spattered out of the Tie Interceptors and uglies alike in dozens of streams against the frigate. Yet Cyprien wasn't terribly concerned yet. Weapons that light, even in such numbers, aren't going to be able to do a whole lot unless they're concentrated on a single section of our shields, and that doesn't seem like its' going to be too forthcoming...Cyprien looked over towards Lieutenant Yalltir.

"Are they using a single frequency?"

She nodded, "I've been trying to crack it, but it's fairly well encrypted."

"No matter," said Cyprien, "That would be nice, but if they're only using one channel, we can still have some fun. Do you have the latest holo-news feed from GNN recorded?"

"I do," said the woman, "let me guess, you want me to broadcast it on that frequency?"

He nodded, "A little comm interference can't hurt our cause."

The blonde woman nodded and began her work. While such low-level interference from the frigate's comm would hardly effect a ship the size of a corvette, the comm systems on starfighters were much weaker strength than the frigates, and while they wouldn't be fully jammed, the interference made it less likely that they'd be easily be able to coordinate any sort of attack which could threaten the larger Republic warships. Cyprien watched as the frigate passed into a deeper section of the belt, surrounded on all sides by asteroids and stung at by the ineffectual strafing runs of the pirate fighters.

"How far away is that Kaloth from entering the asteroid belt?" said Cyprien, "in terms of time?"

Toklar glanced at his station, "About five minutes."

"Yalltir," ordered Cyprien, "give the call to Task Force Retribution in seven minutes, just after that Kaloth and bulk freighter have entered the belt."
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Re: New Republic: The Enemy of My Enemy

Post by Mir »

The Bulk Cruiser had opened up with its quad laser cannons bringing the total of one hundred and twenty laser cannons to bear on destroying asteroids that were impeding the path of the pirate forces. They had a larger ship to worry about than the Wallace pirates and they needed to be more careful. Tactical uses of tractor beam projectors dominated their journey through the asteroids as the two pronged attack pushed them deeper and deeper still into the asteroids. The few uglies that had launchers used them, but the effect was drastically reduced because of the lack of numbers of projectiles. Furthermore, the enemy gunners, once the uglies with launchers presented themselves, started to target them in order to eliminate them as dangers to the Wallace ships.

The GNN broadcast was over, and the pilots of the Razor Renegades were not grateful to have the update on what was happening at Mon Calamari. Instead they were rather irate that their ability to coordinate and plot had been reduced and though their lasers were ineffective, many of them had not received the orders to pull back. The Razor Renegades’ leaders understood that with the Wallace fighters recalled, there was little to no point to their fighters being out, especially when they couldn’t lend significant amounts to the damage that was to be dealt.

The two minutes of the Kaloth-class being in the asteroid belt passed quickly.

And then the transmission was sent out.

The Razor Renegades were fully entrenched in the asteroid field when the overt New Republic forces arrived in system. Task Force Retribution reverted in system, along with a potent surprise for their enemies. The Renegades were treated to the sight of a Bothan Assault Cruiser with the rest of the Task Force. The group started moving forward and launched fighters. In addition the Task Force’s normal fighter set up, the Bothan Assault Cruiser launched a full complement of fighters, two squadrons of E-Wings and two squadrons of B-Wings. All of the New Republic fighters set up position, and Taillefer’s ship was hailed. 



Kislum’s face appeared and he gave the other man a simple smile. “Where do you need us?” He asked.
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Re: New Republic: The Enemy of My Enemy

Post by Cyprien Taillefer »

"I think taking care of the Bandit's Blade would be a good start," replied Cyprien, gesturing at the partially operational Vainglorious-class Cruiser displayed on a holo-projector.

Cyprien turned back to the tactical situation at his own hand. Once Cyprien had deemed that the column of pirate ships were significantly deep inside the asteroid belt, he had ordered the Moonstriker to change course, cutting a quick path up to allow the task force to enter a more sparse region of the belt. Now, the Moonstriker and the Luck Jubilee had not only entered the little pocket of space, but had also turned around to present their bows to the tunnel. The Wallace's Revenge free from the tunnel and also entered the pocket of space.

"Helm, turn us ninety degrees to the right and hold our position right in front of the tunnel," ordered Cyprien, "and Eris, launch all fighters and blastboats. This is where we'll make our stand. Toklar, how long until that Kaloth has to reach the entrance?"

"Five minutes," replied the Mon Calamari.

Not a lot of time to get it all prepared and out, but enough that we should be able to do most of it. Might not get all of the fighters launched though, but neither will they...if they choose to do it even at all...Cyprien rapidly typed a series of commands into his console, giving him close-up holo-footage of the beetle-shaped frigate crawling up through the tunnel at him. The native of Jalarren lightly tapped his fingers together. That will do. He tapped a set of orders, designating the engine block of the Kaloth frigate as the primary target of both his ad hoc blastboats and the main gun batteries of his capital ships. As the Kaloth frigate neared the exit point of the tunnel, the Wallace's Revenge began to use its tractor beams to rapidly send a series of slow-moving asteroids at the frigate. Cyprien narrowed his eyes as the piratical frigate directed its own forward turbolasers to fire on the oncoming rocks. While the Kaloth was preoccupied with the rocks flying at it, the New Republic warships began fire. Cyprien formed his hands into a steeple and merely watched. Their shields seemed oriented to deflect a forward assault on their bow...which would be easier to hit with our guns, but in doing so, they've left their stern shields weaker...weak enough that...The blastboats unleashed a torrent of concussion missiles into the frigate's stern, finally bleeding out their supply of concussion missiles. While Cyprien knew that would make the blastboats more vulnerable for the duration of the combat, he deemed it worth it. Fire rippled up the stern, searing power conduits and igniting fuel lines before the combustions were stopped by a lack of gases to feed on. Yet still the metal around where the engines used to be glowed a dull red.

"Tractor beams, keep that Kaloth right there," ordered the native of Jalarren, "let's see how they handle a blockage like that."

With the stricken frigate stuck in place, the pirates were left with two options in Cyprien's mind. The first was to start and blast a new path to the pocket of space which the Wallace Star Company occupied. That would take a long time, particularly with the bulk cruisers' many, but underpowered laser cannons, to blaze through. The second option was more simple: move or destroy the Kaloth frigate. Yet as Taillefer mentally debated such options, the quartet of warships continued to attack each other, though the bolts from the disguised New Republic formation significantly outnumbered the pirate frigate, crippled by the loss of most of its stern and the ion cannon attacks off of the Wallace's Revenge and Arrow Squadron's blastboats. Cyprien glanced at a reading of the frigate. It might not even last long enough as a stopgap against this sort of onslaught, but if we keep on engaging only one of their ships at a time, we might be able to do this. Cyprien glanced at another subscreen on his projector, noting that his various fighter squadrons were forming up behind the warships in anticipation of the likely impending launch of piratical starifighters. At least there, they'll have a chance to not only be protected by our ship's bulk, but also be able to engage those uglies and interceptors after they've been scattered by the bigger guns of warships...
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Re: New Republic: The Enemy of My Enemy

Post by Mir »

Task Force Retribution arrayed itself and set to work, targeting the Bandit's Blade. Turbolasers lanced out from the Task Force towards the Razor Renegades forces. The New Republic fighters meanwhile screamed forward. The Pirate fighters were deep in the asteroid field and if they pulled themselves back, they would allow the Wallace Star Company the chance to launch fighters and catch them in a pincer move. The leaders of the Renegades were trying to work out how and why they were being double teamed by New Republic and Pirate forces. It would have made sense for the New Republic to attack both pirate groups, but they weren't. Especially odd, since the Wallace Star Company vessels were obviously marked as pirate vessels.

The decision that they needed to make in regards to the Kaloth-class Battlecruiser was made rather easily. The quad laser cannons of the Bulk Cruiser were brought to bear on the end of the ship, as if to light a fire under the ass of the commander to get them moving. The commander of the Kaloth had little choice but to try to move forward. His gunners were utilizing his forward tractor beam projectors to counter what the Wallace pirates were doing. It was a much, much larger than normal game of catch and nobody wanted to be the one who got the black eye. Finally, the Kaloth's gunners missed a small asteroid, at least one that they'd thought would be too small to cause enough damage.

But it was. The asteroid slammed through one of the pincers, knocking out a tractor beam projector. Because of that mistake, more of the asteroids were able to get through. The damage was done and the Kaloth was knocked out of the fight. It was only a matter of choice whether or not the Wallace Star Company was going to obliterate the vessel completely, or let it live.

The Bandit's Blade and the rest of the pirate forces started to divert some of their guns towards the oncoming New Republic vessels. They had no choice but to recall their fighters in order to fight the New Republic vessels. The leaders of the group knew that this was putting their Bulk Cruiser in big danger of attack.
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Re: New Republic: The Enemy of My Enemy

Post by Cyprien Taillefer »

"They're firing on their own ship," reported Lieutenant Fessk, his fur rippling, "I don't think that Kaloth is going to last the fight..."

Cyprien rapidly typed a few buttons on his console, bringing up a close view of the stricken vessel. Its almost cylindrical hull was an utter mess. The stern was burned away from the missile barrage and then the bulk cruiser's laser cannons. Dents from various asteroid impacts haphazardly covered the rest of the hull, making it somewhat diseased. Fewer of the ship's guns were now firing, and most of them were focused on destroying any of the incoming asteroids, some of which the Wallace's Revenge hurled at them, and others which were naturally headed their way. Cyprien leaned back in his command chair and let out an exasperated sigh. And this is where identities conflict...As a New Republic officer, Cyprien would generally have ordered a ceasefire on the vessel and ordered it to surrender, and failing that, order a boarding operation. That way, information on the pirate's activities could be collected, and the criminals could be tried by a civilian court. As a pirate, Cyprien would probably have simply destroyed the craft and its crew out of spite, or offered to make a deal to have the vessel and its crew defect to his own pirate group. Yet none of those options were truly available to him if he was to have the integrity of a New Republic officer, and yet still seem like a pirate.

"Concentrate all fire towards the bulk cruiser," decided Cyprien.

Red fire streamed away from the Kaloth to start to burning away at the bulk cruiser's bow shields. It's a tactically sound idea to take on the biggest threats and ignore things that aren't much of a threat, regardless if one's a pirate or a respectable officer. Cyprien studied the aging bulk cruiser. It's got a lot of quad laser cannons, too many for most of our dated fighters to take them on head on, yet by using starfighter-grade weaponry, that bulk cruiser won't be that effective against either our capital vessels or asteroids...

"Pull the Kaloth out of our way and into our clearing," ordered the starship's captain, "and give them directions that we'll leave them alone if they leave us alone, otherwise they're going to get it."

The Wallace's Revenge's tractor beams began to yank the crippled Kaloth out of the asteroid belt. Red turbolaser and blue ion cannon fire streamed around the pirate vessel to hit the Renegade's bulk cruiser from disparate angles. As the Kaloth cleared the asteroid belt, less of its hull blocked the bulk cruiser, and the streams of fire converged to hit specific shield sections of the bulk cruiser under Twensies' expert guidance.

"Captain Taillefer?" said a voice through his ear-piece.

"Yes Lieutenant Seic'lar?" replied Cyprien.

"I think that cruiser's too big a target for us to outright destroy with simple firepower alone..."

At six hundred meters, the pirate cruiser was over two times longer than the Wallace's Revenge, and massed it over several times over. While not exceptionally powerful for its size in terms of armament, its large shields would take a while for the relatively small guns of Task Force Audacious to take down. Over ten minutes maybe, and that's just on the bow shields alone, unless we employ the fighters, by attacking a bulk cruiser with them would result in some fairly high losses, and those quad lasers could probably destroy many of the missiles launched at it. And there's no way we can really stop a ship of that size from continuing forward at us with tractor beams, it's simply too big...

"What are you thinking of?"

"Boarding it," replied the Bothan, "it's a classic pirate tactic, and why not, since we're suppose to be pirates."

"Let me hear what you've got..."

As the two discussed the plans, the bulk cruiser's bow broke free from the tunnel only to run into the corral of Republic vessels. With it's stern still stuck in the tunnel, the bulk cruiser was in a precarious situation, not quite being fully out of the asteroid field. Meanwhile, the vessels of Task Force Retribution and the Renegades continued their fight.
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Re: New Republic: The Enemy of My Enemy

Post by Mir »

It was a fight that the Renegades were not doing well in. They were fighting a losing battle against the New Republic force and the presence of the Bothan Assault Cruiser was what had caused the battle to be definitely in the favor of the New Republic. Lances of energy flew between the two groups, but it was seemed as though the Razor Renegades couldn’t match the overall output of the New Republic forces. The Republic forces were concentrating all of their firepower on the Hammerhead-class Frigate that was with the Bandit’s Blade. The Bothan Assault Cruiser and the Mon Calamari cruiser that was a part of Task Force Retribution had kept up the pressure on the Frigate, who’s shields were getting dangerously close to buckling.


The rest of the Task Force had found their targets and had joined in one the shoot. Kislum had felt that taking out one ship at a time would be the wise thing to do, instead of splitting their focus across both ships. Also, he was always more than willing to accept a surrender and that needed to come from the Razor Renegades’ lead ship. The last thing he wanted was for one of these pirates to surrender and then in the process of moping up the rest of their former allies, the New Republic forces leaving themselves open to a sneak attack.

His fighters were the ones engaging the Bandit’s Blade head on. Austin’s forces had changed their target because he’d decided that slowly eliminating all of one’s help and leaving one by oneself was the best way to demoralize his foe. Cyprien’s task force was doing very well over in the asteroid field from all of his sensor scans that weren’t somewhat marred by asteroids. All of his fighters had gotten off a full volley of projectiles aimed at the Bandit’s Blade. The Vainglorious was an interesting design, and it had a good number of anti starfighter and anti projectile weaponry. Sixty point defense laser cannons up against close to two hundred projectiles though was something that was hard to overcome. Enough of the warheads made it through to do sufficient damage and the explosions that rippled over the surface of the larger ship told Austin that they were getting their point across.

The New Republic forces had more firepower than the Razor Renegades did.

That was when he gave the order for the MC-40a and the Bothan Assault Cruiser to turn their attention to the Bandit’s Blade. The Hammerhead-class Frigate was almost out of the fight and they were preparing to turn it into a hulk and ensure it was disabled before any surrenders were accepted. That was something that the two Warrior gunships and the Retribution could handle.

Meanwhile, the Bulk Cruiser’s captain’s eyes widened as he watched assault transports launched to come at his vessel. What was the sense in that? They were in a small enclosed area and there were only targets in front of his ship, targets that were now easy to attack since his ship had been designed and given weaponry precisely for smaller vessels. He gave the order for all of his quad laser cannons to fire on the assault transports. He knew that he was probably out of this fight, but he was going to take a number of these Wallace Star Company bastards with him.
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Re: New Republic: The Enemy of My Enemy

Post by Cyprien Taillefer »

JUst as suddenly as the mixed squadron of Endor Armed Transports and Arrow Blastboats reached the edge of the bulk cruiser, they abruptly pulled back, but not before unleashing a torrent of missile fire. Most of the cruiser's guns turned to wipe out the oncoming horde of missiles. Cyprien watched the feints initiated by the mixed group of assault transports half-interested. As those transports kept the bulk cruiser occupied, both the Moonstriker and the Luck Jubilee quietly aligned themselves, before jetting abruptly at the bulk cruiser. Neither of the corvettes fired, but rather refocused their weapon's energy towards boosting their shield and engine outputs. The Wallace's Revenge doubled down her weapons, letting loose supercharged volleys directed on the opposite halves of the bulk cruiser's stern, those areas directly opposite of where the two corvettes were nearing. Both corvettes redirected their energy yet again, combining their fire with that of the frigate to knock down specific areas of the shields.

"We're not boarding them with the transports?" questioned Toklar.

Cyprien shook his head, "Getting every trooper into a transport takes not only time, but also puts them in a ship pretty vulnerable to a bulk cruiser, so I thought we'd do the opposite. Consider this, a typical bulk cruiser has 200 passengers, and combined, our corvettes can put a hundred troopers onboard, so it's a fairly even fight, not because the numbers are even close, but because the bulk of their troops are going to be initially spread about their ship."

The Mon Calamari frowned, "But they can't hold the ship, much less control it."

"No," agreed the native of Jalarren, "they can't, nor will they try."

Cyprien zoomed in on an image of the Moonstriker, which was nearly close enough for a wookie to touch both starships. At that close of a range, neither vessel was really capable of bringing that much weaponry to bear on the other, so besides a few steady streams of laser fire, the space around both ships was relatively pristine. Suddenly, what appeared to be a cloud of dust jumped from the Moonstriker to areas on the piratical cruiser where the doubled down weapons of the Republic fleet had knocked down small areas of the starship's shields. Marines in armored vac-suits. A series of minute explosions rippled around the hull as their proton charges breached the hull in tiny holes, just allowing the marines to slip into the hull of the ship. Cyprien noted several objects, and possibly, a humaniod of some type fly out into space as the vacuum of space initially cleared the rooms for the marauding marines. Shortly thereafter, the marines jumped into the vacuum-filled holes to infest the outer hull rooms like a horde of cockroaches. Cyprien turned to Toklar.

"What does the Empire typically do when they're going to lose a shipyard or something important to an enemy?"

"They destroy it," said the Mon Calamari.

"This isn't going to be much different," said Cyprien, "the marines aren't boarding the craft to capture it. They're simply planting charges inside the rooms they first enter. Why fight against a shield when you can use it to contain and magnify a blast?"

Several minutes later,the marines, less a few unfortunate troopers, were jumping out of the bulk cruiser back to the corvettes. As the last of the troopers were being recovered by the corvettes, the first of the charges began to go off, and the stern of the pirate cruiser erupted into flames, but unusually, the bulk of the pirate ship's shields were still up, forcing the flame back into scour the bulk cruiser. Quad lasers, sensors, and comm systems, unprotected by the shields, were promptly incinerated on the pirate ship. Cyprien leaned back in his command chair.

"I doubt it'll be much of a threat now," decided Cyprien, "begin the retreat."

The two corvettes jetted away away from the stricken craft, letting the Wallace's Revenge and its contigent of assault transports attack the blackened hull of the ship with a combination of turbolaser fire and concussion missiles. The last fires of fight went out from the pirate cruiser under those salvos, and albeit not completely destroyed, Cyprien decided that the cruiser was neither a threat to anyone, nor would it be going anytime soon. Cyprien spared a glance at the Kaloth-class battle cruiser. They're at our mercy, and it's half-tempting to leave no survivors...but that wouldn't fun for our intelligence services nor our courts...

"What about Task Force Retribution?" questioned Toklar, "we're leaving them to finish this fight?"

"They have things covered," decided Cyprien, "we've done our part, and they seem to be doing fairly well. But more importantly, we can't make it look like we're working with them, in case there are any other observers or survivors that somehow escape our notice. If we leave now, it'll certainly look like we're not working together, because we won't be helping each other out."

The trio of starships from Task Force Audacious began to blaze a new trail out of the asteroid belt, and mere minutes later, jumped out of the battle into the safety of hyperspace.
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Mir
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Re: New Republic: The Enemy of My Enemy

Post by Mir »

OOC: Figured I’d just do a quick summary since most of this is done. Thanks for the help and it was nice writing with you.


IC:

Kislum gave a single head nod as a salute, though Taillefer would not be able to see. The Wallace Star Company/Task Force Audacious had done their job in this battle and he was appreciative of everything that they’d done. The battle continued onwards after they had left though. The turbolasers continued to fly between the various ships and his fighters moved to engage the Bandit’s Blade once it’s shields began to drop and hits began to score through on the hull itself. Austin knew that the enemy vessels wouldn’t be able to stay in the fight for much longer. 


Already, the Hammerhead-class Frigate that had been with the Bandit’s Blade had offered a total surrender, as had the Kaloth-class Cruiser in the asteroid field. He was waiting for the rest of the ships to fall in line, and he knew that the last one to surrender would be the Bandit’s Blade, if it did. From what he knew about the Razor Renegades, they had never lost a battle. Which meant that he honestly didn’t know whether or not they were going to surrender.

When he finally did ask for their surrender, he got no response. He’d told his communications ensign to put the request out one more time and when he got nothing the second time around, he had no choice.

The New Republic forces destroyed the Bandit’s Blade and then accepted the surrender of the rest of the ships in the system, as by then, all of the rest of the ships were ready and willing to offer unconditional surrenders. The Task Force sent NR Marines over to establish control of the ships before slaving them to the Retribution. Then they were off, headed out of the system. The damage that they had done to the Razor Renegades, Austin wasn’t sure but he knew that they had done something. He doubted that they had seen the end of the Razor Renegades, but he knew that they would rethink what they did before they tried to strike against innocent people again.
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Re: New Republic: The Enemy of My Enemy

Post by Mir »

The past few days had been nothing but reports and informing his superiors of what had happened. They had been interested to know how well Taillefer had acquitted himself, and Kislum had given him nothing but glowing recommendations. From there, he had broken down everything that had happened during the battle and his superiors had been quite pleased with all that had taken place. Now he had given his group a needed break from everything, as all of the ships were currently undergoing repairs and were in drydock. A number of routine upgrades or so he had been told. Either way, they were on Sluis Van and he was going to take advantage of it. Nothing like keeping the morale up.

Sitting in a bar, Austin was relaxing when he felt someone tap him on the shoulder. He turned to see a woman standing there, dressed in “normal” smuggler attire. Rather attractive too. A little confused as to what was going on, he was about to shrug and ask her what she wanted when she spoke to him. “Hello, Captain.” She said. “My name is Kileen Hark. I’m with an important group of people that wish to speak to you about something that you can do for us.” She said.

“Lady, I may be dressed like a regular guy but I am-”

“You are a captain in the Combined Defense Forces of the New Republic. I know. The same way that I know attempting to bribe a CDF-NR officer to commit a crime is a very punishable offense. It helps that we’re on the same team and that this is something official.” She said with a small smile. “Perhaps we could talk somewhere more...secluded?” She asked.

He nodded. Well if it was official business, then he’d hear her out. His mind had already latched on to who she was with. NRI. No CDF-NR official mission would have come down like this. That was just impossible. As they walked to a booth that would afford them the privacy that they were looking for, he was reminded of his old school days with the Rebellion. This was how a lot of missions had started back then. It gave off a familiar feel, and nostalgia swam in him as he slid into the booth. 



“Alright Hark, what can I do for NRI?” He asked and she smiled in response.

“You are a smart one.” She said. “This is a sanctioned NRI/CDF-NR operation.” As she spoke, she slid him a datacard. He plugged it into a reader built into the table and started to look over the documents. “NRI is concerned about pirate activities in the Outer Rim and I know what you’re thinking. That isn’t something that we’re normally interested in. But there is something going on with this particular group. We don’t have a name, nor do we really have a modus operandi. All we know is that they’re targeting aliens.”

“Aliens?” He asked.

“Alien communities.” She said. “They go after humans, yes, but their real bread and butter is alien communities. And there’s a reason. We’ve been getting reports of there being kidnappings as well.”

“Slaves?” He asked. “Has anything popped up on any intelligence networks?” He asked and she shook her head. “That’s why you guys are interested.”



“What are they doing with all those people they kidnap?” She asked. “That’s what NRI and CDF-NR want you to find out. We've hired some outside help to provide transportation and ex-filtration. She will work with you to get to the bottom of this."
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Re: New Republic: The Enemy of My Enemy

Post by Mir »

“I don’t understand. How are they able to get away with this? These people are kidnapping; wholesale kidnapping. The citizens of these worlds aren’t saying a thing about it?” Austin asked.

“If it ain't happening to you why talk about it,” the smuggler sitting across from him asked. "Either don't ask, don't tell or get a blaster to the face. Most people choose not to tell."

“True.” Austin said, walking around the ready room of the Retribution. There was a lot about this that bothered him, bothered him a lot. He didn't like kidnappings and he didn't like slavers. Austin didn't know of many people who did, generally they were slavers themselves. “Only taking aliens, what’s with that?” He asked.

“Some kind of alien monster mash? I don't know. We can ask them when we find them.”

“Two months of this, and we’ve barely been able to get a whiff of them. We only got the lead that we do have because someone decided to report it, and it matched the criteria that we’re looking for.” Austin said. “They’re smart though. Hitting worlds that are New Republic, but the majority of their targets are non-affiliated single system governments? That’s really smart.”

The smuggler shrugged. “Want to stay under the radar? Steal from the people no one cares about.”
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Re: New Republic: The Enemy of My Enemy

Post by Pryde »

"Anyway," the smuggler continued, "can we get on with this? Republic ships make me queasy."

Austin stared at her, "Why did they hire you for this mission again?"

"They pay me for my silence," she said, "And I'm really good at keeping secrets."

She kicked her legs off the table and stood up, checking her datapad momentarily before glancing back at Austin. "Nimbus is downloading the mission details now." As well as a few other things, she thought. "We can take off any time you're ready. Until then if you need me you can find me on the Aurora."

"Wait," Austin said suddenly, "What did you say your name was?"

"Kara Thrace," the woman answered, then she turned and left the room heading towards the hangar.
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Re: New Republic: The Enemy of My Enemy

Post by Mir »

It didn’t make sense to Austin. He was a military man, a man who had lived his life fighting Imperials for over a decade. While he understood utilizing private citizens for their knowledge, experience, and most importantly, their ability to move around in ways that military could not, he didn’t always approve of the methods that Kara Thrace was using. He could remember the days of the Rebellion, when they had all been private citizens who were striking against the Empire, and danger had been around the corner, considering they did not have a government, a true government to back them up. Those days were past them now, and he wasn’t sure that hiring her had been NRI’s best option.

Especially when NRI had agents that they could have sent.

However, while he could argue that he didn’t like the woman’s tactics, he couldn’t argue with the results. Though she was a bit unpredictable, at least to him, Kara got the job done, and at the end of the day, that was all that he could ask for. She had given Task Force Retribution information on these raiders movements that conventional means would have taken months to get. Considering the fact that they were targeting aliens and causing quite a bit of strife and friction between human and alien communities, this was important.

Now they were traveling through hyperspace, hopefully towards what was going to be the last place that the pirates and kidnappers had struck. Kara had given them the information in a dead drop location, on a navigation sensor/buoy of the New Republic Astrogaphy Corps. A novel place to put it, he had to give her that.

Hopefully they’d get some more answers when they dropped out of hyperspace.
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Re: New Republic: The Enemy of My Enemy

Post by Mir »

Austin’s mouth thinned as he received the damage reports. This was ridiculous. Kara had promised that the coordinates she was giving them contained the location of the raiders last known location. Here they would be able to get detailed information from the people and get their statements while all the information was fresh in their mind. That was what he had been anticipating and that was what he had ben planning for. But that was not what happened. Not at all.

No, what was happening was that Task Force Retribution was in a fight. Not a fight that they were totally mismatched in, but one that they were not expected.

Three HKD Missile Frigates and a pair of Munifex-class Light Cruiser hung in space before the Task Force, and turbolasers were flying between the two forces. The problem that Austin faced was the Missile frigates. He was being forced to use his two Warrior gunships to shoot down oncoming waves of missiles, which meant that they were taken out of the fight when it came to offensive capabilities.

He was relying on his B-Wings to bring the fight to the enemy forces, and he needed Blaster squadron to be the ship killers that they were. The A-wing squadron, Jawa Squadron was making short work of the enemy’s two squadrons of Uglies and for that he was grateful.

Just as he decided that he was definitely going to have to have words with Kara Thrace, one of his junior officers told him that a hyperspace reversion was imminent. He looked in the direction of the reversion and when the sensors brought up the ships coming out of hyperspace, his jaw dropped.

This had just gone from shite to something else. Something…far…far else.
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Re: New Republic: The Enemy of My Enemy

Post by Pryde »

Kara stumbled a bit as the ship rocked under another direct hit. The Republic fleet had been engaged in a battle pretty much from the moment they arrived in system and now considering the amount of panic she saw in the crew's faces it seemed like things had gone from bad to worse. That was only a guess, of course, but one backed up by some pretty strong evidence. The two armed guards escorting her to the bridge were a pretty clear indication that her plan had gone somewhat awry. Once on the bridge she could see why, the task force was engaged with a group of slaver vessels and what appeared to be a rumored, non-existent ship.

"You know, Austin, if you wanted to talk to me you could pick up a phone," she said as soon as she was brought before him, "Or, you could come down to my ship. I'm sure I could--accommodate you."

"What are you trying to pull, Thrace?" He demanded of her.

"What are you talking about?"

He pointed towards the view port where the massive Locust-class Heavy Carrier could clearly be seen. "Did you lure us here for a trap?"

"Lure you," Kara asked indignantly, "Are you insane?"

He pulled his blaster out of its holster and leveled it at her. "Answer the question!"

Kara instinctively held up her hands. "Look, Austin, I don't know what's going on, okay? My information was good. Your spook boss lady even checked it out. You really think I conjured all that up just to lure you out here? For what?"

Austin had to admit she was right. He couldn't see any way for her to profit from getting herself killed along with the fleet so he lowered his gun. "So what is it, then? Did you use us as bait?"

Kara immediately started laughing. "You have a high estimation of my skills, Commander, I'm just a freighter captain."

"Then why did the NRI hire you for this job?"

"Because of what I know," she told him, "and because my cooperation was going to keep me out of a Republic prison awhile longer. I assure you, Austin, I was not expecting this."

There was some truth to that. She had fully expected the slavers to attack if she dangled the Republic fleet out in front of them but she had not expected to see a vessel that was only rumored to exist, especially that one given the person it was linked to. "Are you done treating me like a prisoner now," she asked, gesturing towards the two guards behind her, "Cause I'd really like to get going. Keeping my record clean isn't worth getting killed over."
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Re: New Republic: The Enemy of My Enemy

Post by Mir »

Austin waved her away. He didn’t have time to deal with Kara at the moment. But then he looked back at her retreating form, as she made her way off the bridge. “Kara.” He said, and she turned back. “Your next piece of intelligence better be good. Or I’m getting in touch with NRI.” He said, and turned back around.

Assuming he made it out of this.

“Alright, what’s the status?” He asked.

“Sensors pick up multiple weapons emplacements on the unknown ship. It’s over eighteen hundred meters. Outside of that, we don’t have much. She’s not in range of our guns yet.”

Austin nodded. That meant that they were in range of the enemy ship’s weapons. They didn’t have the luxury of waiting to see what would happen once they were in range of each other. The ship was bigger than an Imperial-class Star Destroyer. Even if he assumed that it had the same amount of weapons as an ImpStar, he was woefully outgunned. He had to revert to his days when he had been a Rebel Allianc officer, not a New Republic officer.

Hit and run.

The ambushers had become the ambushed and he needed to do something about it.

“Pull up the schematics of a Class 1000 cruiser.” He said. “All weapons target their life support generators.”

One of his officers looked at him.

“It’s us or them. We don’t have the luxury to be nice right now, we have a time hack to meet. Sensors, I want a one-minute warning before we’re in range of that ship. Navigations, make sure you have a course plotted for the Task Force, and you need to be ready when Sensors gives us the warning.” He said.

A few minutes later, they were in hyperspace, having knocked out the life support systems of the two Class 1000 cruisers. If he remembered right, a Class 1000 had over five hundred people. When you had to worry about a thousand lives, you were busy and distracted. That would give him time to regroup.
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Re: New Republic: The Enemy of My Enemy

Post by Mir »

Austin’s fist bounced off the metal table in the ready room of the Retribution. He had come very, very close to losing not only his ship, but his entire task force. Whoever this Kara Thrace was, he was not impressed, nor was he pleased. If this was what NRI was going to send him, he was better off on his own. Dropping into a chair, one of his hands came up to his temples, and he closed his eyes. He knew what his mission was, he knew what his objectives were. The mission needed him to be at the top of his game.

He was fighting an unknown enemy that was attacking alien settlements and communities, kidnapping people. Quite possibly for slave labor, but he had no idea. Their intelligence was sketchy, and never in his life had Austin seen the ship that had shown up towards the end of that skirmish. After fighting for the Rebels and then the New Republic for years, Austin had thought that he had a pretty decent knowledge of most of the starship classes that were out there.

But that had been something else entirely.

How was he supposed to fight against something that big? Task Force Retribution lacked the firepower to effectively fight against the ships like that. If he was going to figure all this out, and get to the bottom of things, he was going to have to change his tactics.

Definitely go back to the ways of the Rebel Alliance. There was no way that CDF-NR Standard operating procedure for engagements was going to work in this situation. That meant that he had to brainstorm. It also meant that maybe he was going to have to trust Kara Thrace more than he wanted to at this junction in time.
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Re: New Republic: The Enemy of My Enemy

Post by Mir »

“So, we have no idea where they are, and we have even less of an idea of where they’re going to strike next.” Austin said.

His XO shook his head. “I think that sums it up quite nicely.” He said.

“The NRI assigned us Kara Thrace, and so far, she has not lived up to the hype.” Austin said, leaning against the wall of the ready room of the Retribution. He shook his head, as his mind replayed the events of what had happened during the battle. “But that doesn’t mean that they didn’t have the right idea. We need someone like her, someone who can get the information that we can’t with these uniforms on.” He said, grabbing at his CDF-NR uniform.

“What are you thinking of?” His XO asked.

“I’m not too sure yet.” Austin said, and walked around the room, looking out of the transparisteel viewports as he did.

The emptiness of space looked back at him, and the void seemingly had more substance than any solutions he had to his problem. As he walked, he thought about all the pirates that he had hunted throughout his time in the New Republic. It had been one of the constants of his naval career. Austin had transitioned from fighting the Empire to keeping the people safe, and he had become quite good at it. But most pirate groups had simple goals, which made them relatively easy to catch.

This group, this group was totally different. Their motives were different, which meant that obviously their tactics would be different as well. He wasn’t dealing with simple pirates who wanted to steal or rob from people, he was dealing with terrorists who were kidnapping and destroying families for some ultimate goal that seemed too far off to understand.

So how was he going to catch them?

At this point in time, Austin didn’t trust anyone except for his own people. NRI had given him the mission, but NRI had seriously dropped the ball when it came to giving his task force the information that they needed to accomplish the goal. He had a mind to speak to that Kileen Hark when next he saw her. Until that time, however, he was going to have to keep working. The solution to all of this wasn’t going to spring up from thin air.

“I think I’ve got an a possibility.” His XO said, looking up from the table and at Austin.

“I’m all ears, go for it.”
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Re: New Republic: The Enemy of My Enemy

Post by Mir »

“Do you think it will work?” His XO asked him.

Austin shook his head. “There’s no way to tell.” He said. “I mean, it could very well work, but the odds are a longshot.”

“The odds were a longshot when we used the Wallace Star Company as bait to get the Mobisi Raiders.” His XO said, and Austin nodded, running his hands over his face.

He could feel the stubble that was growing, a reminder that he needed to shave and that he needed a break. A vacation. A nap. Something. He was still getting damage reports from the battle where the ambushers had become the ambushed. Personnel counts were coming in too. So far not that many people were listed int he killed column, but the wounded column was a decent percentage of the overall man power of his task force.

His XO’s plan was worth considering, because it was the only plan they had that seemed remotely feasible.

But it went against almost everything that Austin stood for. He had spent years trying to fight pirates. He had even done it, partially, when he had been part of the Rebel Alliance, to help secure relationships with planets and systems that had been considering joining the Rebel Alliance. What his XO was proposing was not only dangerous and unlikely to get any concrete results, it was against the core of his being.

“Explain it to me one more time.” He said.

“Yes, sir. We can’t find the pirates because we don’t know who they’re targeting. We’re working with Kara Thrace, but we can’t trust the intelligence that she’s giving us. So what if we became our own intelligence?” His XO said. “We have command and control over the two ships that we captured from the Mobisi Raiders and the Razor Renegades. The Kaloth-class and the Hammerhead-class. We can skeleton crew them, establish new IFF transponders, and have them become a pirate group to join up and try to get more information about the people doing these raids.” He said. “I would say we use the Retribution as well but-“


“But you know how I feel about my ship.” Austin said and his XO nodded, with a small smile.

“It’s a good plan, sir. One that could work.”
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Re: New Republic: The Enemy of My Enemy

Post by Pryde »

"Or it could get you killed," a voice interrupted them as Kara Thrace entered the room. She was dressed in a Republic uniform and had an officer security badge hanging from her breast pocket.

"How did you--," Austin began but then he thought better of it. "Guards," he shouted and several armed men rushed into the room, "Take Ms. Thrace into custody and escort her to the brig."

Kara had a pained look on her face as the guards surrounded her, took her security badge and placed cuffs on her wrists. "And here I was just trying to help."

"By impersonating a Republic officer," Austin asked.

Kara glanced down at her uniform and smiled. "I thought it looked good on me, all respectable like."

Austin was fuming, this independent spacer infuriated the hell out of him. Why the NRI had even suggested using her was beyond him, clearly the woman was just a liability and could not be trusted. "Ms. Thrace, if you don't stop playing games I may just have my men 'accidentally' drop you into a depressurized airlock on their way to the brig."

"Fine," she said with a shrug, "you need me."

Austin simply crossed his arms over his chest. "Really? Why?"

"Because I highly doubt your executive officer here can speak pirate, or any of your men really. You need someone like me, someone who wasn't brainwashed into thinking rigidly."

Austin was incredulous, "You're joking."

Kara seemed surprised, "Am I? I hadn't noticed."

"Ms. Thrace, what exactly makes you think you could be of any use to us?"

"For starters," she said and then the entire room heard a click and a clatter as her cuffs opened and fell to the floor. "I'm really good at getting into places I shouldn't," she finished, holding up the key to the cuffs she snagged from the officer while he was frisking her, "And I could play a much more believable pirate than any of your men could."
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Re: New Republic: The Enemy of My Enemy

Post by Mir »

"Your ability to play a pirate so convincingly is what worries me." Austin replied, his eyes narrowing to slits.

Kara did her best impression of a blush. "Why, Captain, I don't know what you mean." She said demurely. The look on her face shifted once more. "You know you need me." She said. "If you would admit it, that'd be great for the both of us."

"The last time we relied on intelligence that your furnished, we walked into a trap against ships that I've never even seen before." Austin replied, folding his arms against his chest and planting his feet squarely. "There's no reason for me to admit we need you."

She snapped her fingers, shaking her head. "See, not good for the both of us. If it helps...I'd never seen the ships either." She added with a shrug.

His XO scoffed. "We're not rigid either." He said.

Kara's eyes widened before pointing at Austin. "Look at his back right now. Look at it."

"I fought the Empire using hit and run guerrila tactics that worked against the rigid military tactics of the Empire." Austin said, shaking his head. He couldn't believe what she was saying about him. "I doubt I'd be considered a rigid military officer."

Slowly, she started walking around the room, mainly because it looked like the guards were waiting for the slightest signal from Kislum to pounce on her again. "That's true. I've heard about the things that the Retribution did back in the day. But that was back in the day. You're in your late thirties now, thirty seven right? Having fought the Imperials for fifteen years, but the recent years, everyone on the ship has been wearing actual uniforms. The CDF-NR became the status quo. You are the textbook tactics that smugglers and pirates have learned how to fight against. You think because of your past, you're still one of the cool kids? You're the system, Austin, I hate to break it to you. You lost that touch of the debonair."

"So I'm not your type?" He asked with a smirk.

"I don't think I have a type. Gets in the way of being versatile." She replied.

"That hurts." He said, more at the realization of her point than anything else.

"We don't think the same anymore. You're more inclined to stay in one place and keep shooting round after round like you were using musket slugthrowers because you know you'll win any war of attrition and you've got the firepower to back it up."

"What..." He said, and trailed off, as he found the words a little difficult to say. Kara for her part did not make it easy on him, crooking her finger towards herself, as if slowly teasing the words out of him. "What would you suggest?" He asked.

"Two ships, a bunch of pirates ain't, that's for sure."
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Re: New Republic: The Enemy of My Enemy

Post by Pryde »

"Well, first we'll need more ships," she said, "and a crew."

At that Austin opened his mouth to say something but Kara cut him off. "Not that crew, that crew is too rigid and formal. I mean a pirate crew and I know just where we can get one. A small one, not so big that they'll outnumber us but big enough to be convincing. You give me a few of your men and, um--him," she said, gesturing at the XO, "and I'll get us some more ships and a crew."

She saw the look on Austin's face and feigned being hurt a little. "What? You want to come instead? Look, I know you're not going to let me do this without a babysitter so send whomever you want, but this is your best chance at being taken seriously as a pirate crew."
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