USS Ares
Earth’s Orbit
The level of morale amongst the crewmembers was at an all-time high for their battlecruiser was one of the four Beowulf class ships to receive the order to prep for deployment. The other three ships were the USS Beowulf, USS Enyo, and USS Phoenix.
They finally got what they were hoping for, a chance to prove their metal in a real space battle.
“As members of the bridge crew went about performing system checks, Admiral Ellis walked onto the bridge and took his seat.
“How are we looking?” he asked.
“So far, all systems are in the green,” his XO, Commander Oryan replied.
“I just completed checking the shields and weapons, everything’s good sir,” reported the weapons officer, Lieutenant Briscoe.
“Navigation and propulsion are a hundred percent,” said the ships navigator, Lieutenant Zielinski.
The pilots of Warlord Squadron gathered in the briefing room for a word from Captain Randolph.
“Well pilots, all of our time spent training and taking part in exercises has finally paid off for our wish has been granted at last. We’re not shipping out to provide escort service for some exploration ship this time, we’re going out on a deep space strike mission against multiple high value Borgan targets.”
Randolph’s announcement was greeted by a loud chorus of cheers, alrights and yeahs from the pilots. Randolph smiled at the joyful expressions from the men and women before him, he could sense it they were ready.
He raised his hand to signal them to quiet down so he could resume speaking.
“However we do not know what kind of targets we will specifically be going after apart from the fact that they mean a lot to the enemy, but we will be fighting alongside our Tulanian and Sathian allies. It goes without saying that enemy opposition will be fierce but we’re gonna show them that we’re fiercer because who are we?”
“We’re the Warlords sir,” came the thunderous response from the pilots.
“And who intimidates us?”
“No one sir.”
“That‘s right. It’s big game season and we’re going hunting.”
USS Beowulf
Admiral Andy Roberts sat calmly in his chair reading his orders which were displayed on a digital tablet.
“So it’s going to be a joint mission,” he commented.
“Who else are teaming up with besides the Japanese and the Russians sir?” weapons officer, Lieutenant Commander Womack asked.
“Our Tulanian and Sathian friends, we are to RV with them at their standby point to discuss our battle plan before we kick this thing off. I gotta tell ya, this is an amazing experience leading a multinational fleet to link up with an ally alien taskforce before dueling with the bad guys.”
In his early days, Roberts was a F/A-18E Super Hornet pilot and leader of the Royal Maces Fighter Squadron. He led his unit well on countless missions including those during the Earth Scorpion War and the first Borgan invasion.
Shortly after being promoted to Rear Admiral, he was on verge of retiring from the Navy when he was given the offer of commanding the Beowulf and after seeing it for the first time at Area 51 and being briefed on its purpose, he took the offer and in hindsight, he was glad he did.
“Beowulf this is the Enyo, We’ve completed our preflight checks along with the Ares and Phoenix and we’re moving to form up with you now,” Rear Admiral Sarah Sykes said over the radio.
“Copy Enyo,” Roberts replied.
“Beowulf this is the JSF Miyagi, my group is ready to go and we’re also moving to form up with yours,” Admiral Yoshifumi announced.
The Japanese ships contributing to this mission aside from the Miyagi were the JSF Gifu, JSF Shiga, and JSF Nara
“Roger, now all we have to do is wait on the Tulanian shuttle and the Russians,” Roberts said.
“Sir, I have the Tulanian shuttle on radar, it is almost done climbing through Earth’s atmosphere and the Ethon has launched two Space Hornets to escort it to us,” Commander Womack reported.
“XO you have the bridge, I’m heading down to hanger bay one to meet our guest and Womack, contact the C.O. of the Stalin and find out what’s taking his group so long,” Roberts said as he left for the hanger.
Tulanian shuttle
Upon exiting the atmosphere, Varosh’s shuttle was joined by the two Space Hornets.
“Chariot 1, this is Shockwave 6. Shockwave 4 and I will escort you to the Beowulf.”
“
Lead the way,” the shuttle pilot replied.
The flight to the Beowulf was a short one, lasting only fourteen seconds then the fighters broke away as the shuttle continued into the landing bay one.
Shortly after landing, the shuttle was teleported into the hanger where Varosh and his two person crew disembarked from their shuttle and were greeted by the Admiral Roberts and Captain Steinbeck.
“Gentlemen welcome aboard the USS Beowulf. I’m Rear Admiral Andy Roberts, the commander of this ship and this is Captain Steinbeck, leader of the Spacekings Fighter Squadron.”
“Thank you letting us come aboard; we are delighted to make your acquaintance,” Varosh said as he and his crew shook hands with Roberts and Steinbeck.
“Nice to meet you guys too,” Captain Steinbeck commented.
“Admiral Roberts this is Commander Womack, the Russian ships have linked up with us and Admiral Dmitri of the RFS Stalin is requesting to speak with you.”
“I’m on my way,” Roberts replied then invited Varosh and his shuttle crew to accompany him back to the bridge. Varosh accepted the invitation but the shuttle pilot and copilot opted to remain with their craft.
Roberts and Varosh took the elevator back up to level one and returned to the bridge where Roberts saw Admiral Dmitri was already waiting for him on one of the screens.
“What is it Admiral Dmitri?”
“First I wish to say sorry for being slow on getting ready but us, the Yelstin, and the Korolev are now good to go.”
“Excellent,” Roberts replied then sat back in his chair.
The American Beowulf and Japanese Prefecture class battlecruisers were large in their own right, but the Russian battlecruisers were huge. One Stalin class ship was twice as long as the height of the Taipei 101 building in Taipei, Taiwan, giving the ship a length of 3,338 meters.
The ships of the Stalin class had to be big to accommodate their huge arsenals that consisted of three-hundred vertical launch cells for missiles and warheads, forty kinetic rod launchers, 122 point defense rail guns for use against hostile fighters and other small targets and sixty-four triple barreled heavy rail guns for engaging enemy ships at close range along with twenty plasma and solar beam turrets.
In addition to all of that they were armed with a weapon that no other Earth ship possessed, interstellar ballistic missiles housed in a hundred missile silos.
For orbital strikes and airwing capacity, the ships packed twenty-eight bombardment cannons that could be extended from their concealed positions on the ships belly when needed and Red-fist cruise missiles housed in a weapons bay.
As for its airwing, they carried two squadrons of fifty SU-69 Stalker fighters and nineteen shuttles for transporting commandos housed in two hanger bays.
“All ships in the group have courses set for the RV point with the Tulanians and Sathians and are waiting for you signal sir,” Ensign Affleck reported.
“Beowulf to task fleet, prepare to enter hyperspace on my mark. Five, four, three, two, one, mark.”
The eleven ships broke orbit and entered hyperspace.
“Admiral Roberts, during my flight to your ship I contacted Queen Kiva about your worlds decision to join us and she is very thankful,”
“I’m glad to hear it. Has your taskforce been notified of our arrival?”
“At the end of our conservation, she said she would inform the fleet and it’s safe to say that they’ve been informed,” Varosh replied.
“Has your taskforce spotted any other ships in their area?”
“Negative Admiral. According to Queen Kiva, our fleets position is still secure, they would’ve changed positions if some unknown vessel came snooping around.”
“We have the element of surprise with us so far, hopefully it stays that way.”
“Then again we only need the Borgans to be in the dark about our plans until we actually commence them which will be when the shooting starts,” Roberts replied then asked Varosh if he could borrow his tablet to see the data that was on it.
“Certainly Admiral, but I need a place to set it on.”
Roberts directed him to the map table behind them and the tablet was set down and activated.
Roberts and some members of the bridge crew observed the images of the enemy held solar systems and bases with great interest. It took about four minutes for tablet to show them all and then it pulled up the image of the Tulanian and Sathian taskforce.
“I see that your fleet has some new ships, what can you tell me about them?” Roberts asked.
“We call them dreadnaughts. During the defense of Tulania, our frigates took heavy losses although not as heavy when the last Borgan attack forced us to abandon our planet. So due to their dismal combat performances, we began to develop a new class of warship to replace them and this is what we came up with. As you can see they are much larger than the frigates and even the larger than the destroyers, making them the largest combat ships we’ve ever constructed and thanks to information on Borgan technology your leaders gave us during the meeting that resulted in the birth of our alliance, every advancement in shields and weapon systems has been incorporated into them and the destroyers too.”
“Will probably get a more accurate measurement of them once we get to the rendezvous point,” the ships XO Commander Millen commented.
“Commander Womack, contact the C.Os of the other ships and tell them to beam over here with their weapon officers and squadron leaders, we’re going to have a meeting in the conference room about the targets we’ll be up against.”
“Yes sir. This is Commander Womack to all ship commanders, Admiral Roberts wants to beam over to his conference room immediately for a meeting regarding the enemy targets and the attendance of your weapon officers and squad leaders is required.”
“Will be over in a quick second,” Admiral Snipes replied from the Phoenix.
A few seconds later, everyone who was to attend the meeting beamed into the Beowulf’s conference room.
“They’re here sir,” Womack reported.
Roberts just got done telling Captain Steinbeck over his earpiece to head to the conference room for the meeting then told Womack to come with him since she was to attend as well and before they left, Roberts put one of the bridge officers in charge of the weapons console and Millen in charge of the bridge once again until they returned.
Chapter 7 coming soon