Ravens of Eternity

397 Harbingers of the Apocalypse, Pt Orsethii stood on the bridge of the lead Imperial cruiser and reviewed the holoreports around her with abject approval. Her numbers looked very good, despite the casualties her fleet had suffered.

More than that, the tactical intelligence reported high chances of winning, which climbed higher with every moment that passed.

It was clear that Orsethii’s strike fleet was the superior one, despite having a seemingly lesser fleet. After all, she didn’t have a battleship on her side.

Most of what she had were summaries or predictions, which she found lacking. She then glanced around in search of more complete sets of data, but couldn’t find what she was looking for.

“I need the raw casualty reports,” she commanded. “Immediately.”

“Yes, dreadmother,” replied a technician from below her. “The team’s actively compiling and filtering incoming data as we speak. I’m sending our preliminary to you... now.”

One of Orsethii’s holoreports flickered as new data flowed into it. She happily sorted through the information until she found numerous spreadsheets with raw numbers in every cell.

“It appears that roughly 14% of our fighters have been neutralized by the enemy,” continued the technician. “We have also lost contact with 6% of our destroyers, and 8% of our cruisers.”

“And the Hegemony fleet?” Orsethii demanded. “I know their losses are higher, but I need exact numbers.”

.....

“We have completely neutralized all but one of their cruisers,” answered an analyst. “We have also eliminated more than a third of their destroyers, and close to a quarter of their frigates.”

“And the battleship?”

“Its energy signals are waning and its weapon systems are losing strength. My team has calculated that the battleship’s current effectiveness is close to 54.6%. And we predict it will take another forty-two seconds before it is completely neutralized.”

“Good. I want a loss ratio comparison and opening strike cost analysis as fast as possible and apply it to the strategy. Constant iteration and refinement is our path to glory and riches.”

“Yes, dreadmother.”

Orsethii took a half step back and watched as the numbers around her shifted even more, as her fleet dismantled the enemy at an exponential rate.

The Hegemony battleship eventually sputtered out as its insides were completely liquefied. Large chunks of everything inside were completely dismantled and made toxic. That allowed the rest of Orsethii’s fleet to concentrate their full attention on every other enemy ship still on the field, which they quickly dismantled with ease.

Their weapons fire pelted their opponents with incredible efficiency, to the point where it felt almost like child’s play.

A comms alert flashed in front of Orsethii, even as her widening grin reached its peak. When she accepted it, she was in a particularly amazing mood. In fact, she practically bowed as Senator Konleth’s holoprojection shimmered into being right in front of her.

“Greetings, senator,” she said. “How can this humble drogar be of service?”

“Greetings, reborn,” Konleth replied.

He took a look around and saw that they were in the middle of a sortie. But he quickly brushed it all aside.

“Apologies for intruding,” he continued. “But I have something that simply can’t wait. I’ve come to bring you what some might call a truly great opportunity.”

Despite already feeling a natural high from her still-occurring victory, Orsethii perked up even more. She always welcomed promotions, especially from those who sponsored her directly.

“I’m giving you the go-ahead to eliminate Ra’ventrii,” Konleth concluded. “However! Before you gather up everything you’ve got and launch an assauult, we have a few things to take care of, first. If we don’t they’ll be in your way.”

Orsethii’s eyes went wide. She had spent the last few years dreaming of her revenge against Freya, of chasing after her into the galaxy, and eliminating her. But she was stopped before she could fulfill any of them, to her absolute frustration.

Konleth had practically demanded she stop every single time – he always maintained that it was never the right time.

Up until just now. But even then, he was saying that barriers still existed.

“Fine,” said Orsethii. “Whatever it’ll take. Just point me at whatever’s in the way, and I’ll get rid of it.”

“Oh, is that a promise, now?” Konleth said with a slight chuckle. “What if I told you that what we need to get rid of is the Emperor, hm?”

Orsethii tsk’d loudly, and her tail whipped in annoyance.

“Quit fooling around and just tell me!” she said.

“I just did,” Konleth replied.

All of the sound suddenly left the bridge. Everyone paused their breath at what the senator had said. Most pushed it right out of their minds and focused on the work in front of them. The crew simply didn’t want to be a part of any seditious conspiracy.

Mostly.

“Truthfully, the Emperor is pushing for an end to the war,” continued Konleth. “And we can’t let that happen, can we?”

The both of them shook their heads in agreement. Keeping the war going was the absolute best thing for either of them.

For Konleth, it was because of the vast amounts of money that machinefather Gravoss had awarded him. For Orsethii, it was the vast amounts of violence she could perpetuate against the rest of the galaxy.

And also the money.

“What exactly do you want me to do about that?” Orsethii replied. “Challenge him to a duel for the crown?”

“As a reborn, you’d make short work of the old reptile,” Konleth retorted. “But no. Placing you as empress would be a very silly move. No, I want you to get close to him. Then when we give you the signal, you eliminate him.”

“Alright, let’s say that I get close enough to Retholis that I can attack. And let’s say that I succeed in killing him. How do you expect me to get away from the Justicars, exactly? Because they’ll be all over me in seconds.

“I might be a reborn, but even I can’t handle a dozen of them in a row. That’s suicide.”

Konleth grinned widely at her question. Whatever answer he held was clearly incredibly amusing to him.

“You won’t have to worry about them at all,” he said. “They’ll be busy dealing with much larger problems, I promise.”

~

Federal Shipyards Assembly Planet 090, Archamondus System, Inner Sector, Sol Federation

Far on the other side of the galaxy, deep in Federation territory, High Admiral Kovakis slammed his fist down on his command chair’s side console. Every report on the attached MFDs showed how much damage his fleet was suffering.

At the same time, numerous screens surrounding the bridge revealed the live feed of the ongoing battle outside. All manner of chaos and destruction were displayed on them.

Federation cruisers and destroyers and frigates were ripped to shreds even as another one of their battleships crashed towards the ground below.

“Goddamned Hegemony pirates!” Kovakis screamed. “Turn the devastator’s broadsides towards their least damaged battleship, and perforate it!”

“Yessir!”

Just as the officer turned to issue the High Admiral’s orders, the sound of numerous shells hitting their ship echoed all throughout. Worse, the devastator itself was violently pushed sideways from the combined force of the successive blows.

It was strong enough to throw some of the crew off their feet. And then, only a moment later, the lights on the bridge turned a deep red, and a heavy klaxon rang in the air.

“Admiral!” shouted one of the technicians near Kovakis. “We’ve suffered hull breaches on our starboard side. Specifically at sectors twenty-seven and twenty-eight, across decks five, eleven, and thirteen!”

Kovakis’ eyes went wide the moment he realized that they had been boarded.

“Harden the devastator’s primary operational sectors!” he quickly commanded. “More importantly, triple the security team on the bridge immediately! And send in our fast response units to slow them down!”

Only a few passageways and decks away, the drill-like fronts on the corvette-sized boarding pods shot forward violently. They smashed into everything in front of them, and wrenched into whatever they struck, whether it was wall or floor or machine or person or some twisted mixture of all of them.

Numerous power armored assault troops leapt out of the boarding pods by the dozen, and swarmed whatever area they landed in. Each of them screamed war cries or curses or promises of death and destruction, even as they fired blindly into the area in front of them.

Every single one of the heavily armored troopers were painted red and black, and had the logo of a golden apple emblazoned on their chests. Many wielded underslung charged particle repeaters, and fired arcs of energy haphazardly into any Federation personnel in their path.

More than half of them ran in several directions, seemingly without rhyme or reason. They ran out in little groups and eliminated anyone they came across along the way.

Although it didn’t matter who their targets were, they focused most of their attention on the security personnel running at them, rather than the frightened technicians running away.

Others wielded heavy two-handed maces, which they used to demolish any Feds foolish enough to get close. And perhaps more importantly, they used the maces to beat down any security doors in their way. They simply smashed their hefty maces into the thick metal until it warped and bent and was torn out of the way.

In the end, the pirates wrecked everything in front of them, and that was enough for most of them.

While one half of the boarding party caused absolute havoc, the other half ran directly towards the numerous critical ship sections.

One of the teams ran up a long ramp to the deck above as fast as they could go. Unlike the others, this team was painted in only red, and wielded plasma filament halberds. Their thin dark red glowing edges crackled chaotically.

They ran through the passageways rather haphazardly, and sliced at anyone along the way. And because of their speed, they easily fell into an ambush laid by one of the ship response teams. They found themselves under fire the absolute moment they turned that corner.

The team was almost literally showered by a wall of bullets, though most of them bounced off their thick armor. Some left scratches in the paint, or left slight dents in the plating. A few dug into the gaps between the armor and bit into the person beneath.

But it didn’t stop their attack. It hardly even slowed them. Not even the ones who were hit seemed to care.

The moment that their suits were breached, the power armor themselves poured chemical concoctions into their wearers. Their pain receptors were numbed as medical nanites were sent to repair any wounds. And that allowed them to charge forth unabated.

But more than that, each of their suits injected their wearers with a burst of energy that propelled them forward even faster. Much like a boost awarded by Ascendant Form or True Harmony, but far less controlled, and much more chemical in nature.

Regardless of how crude the power was delivered, it was effective nonetheless. It gave the Discordians more than enough energy to close the distance between the two forces in the blink of an eye.

They swung down with their crackling halberds with extreme force, and with powerful swipes completely eviscerated the enemies in front of them. The Discordians’ attack was so fast and so brutal that every member of the response team was killed before they even understood what was happening.

Both halves of their bodies fell to the ground and bled all over the devastator’s passageway floors even as the Discordian assault troops kept on moving towards their target unabated.