Captain Gantir Alfamos
31st of Ûnatö, 2 BBT, Hour 10
Unexpected Engagement
Gantir was the captain of a Flagship- Specifically, a High Captain, who was trusted with such an important vessel. On his vessel was 27,196 loyal troops of the Trianarö Imperium Forces. He was a rare Kanareö officer operating in the Hemmerhaldian sector- he couldn’t breathe oxygen, or even gasses, so he wore a special suit for operation on the Flagship, where on his home planet he wouldn’t have had to wear such things. He had his suit specially made for military use, so that his soldiers could still see his face under the liquid- fish-like, the humans would have described it, but still stern, as he was a commander of a massive ship that had to be operated to the highest degree of efficiency lest they fail the new Imperö. The dawn of Penma meant that the Locale Defense Force had been mobilized in Hemmerhaldia, Kruxkil, and to a lesser extent Sykruko and Mannaö, to stop, arrest and if that didn’t work, engage and destroy, pirates who stole Civilian Arms Cleared ships (or illegally fitted non-clear ships) and used them to steal funds and resources from merchants and and resource transport vessels. Oftentimes captured resource transport vessels were even transformed into new Pirate Vessels as they came preloaded with powerful Cluster Plasma Cannons which they didn’t then need to gain illegally- they would have been expensive, compared to Superliminal missiles and regular Plasma Cannons, although they wouldn’t be military grade as their intent was to destroy obstacles the ship couldn’t maneuver away from in time, not to destroy ships.
And even though he was there to stop pirates, he couldn’t believe what he saw on the scanner.
30 Pirate vessels- 20 were admitted on the S-Chip System as confirmed Pirates, the other 10 just as stolen- were chasing 2 resource transport vessels. He had never heard of anything like this- 5-10 pirates at a time, maybe. 30 was ridiculous. The ships were engaged in a superluminal chase, heading straight in the Flagship’s direction. They got a transmission from one of the resource ships. “LDF Flagship Arklas, permission to dock? We are currently being chased by a band of armed pirates and fear destruction. The ship making this transmission is damaged and will run out of fuel before we make it away from the pirates. The other ship is similarly damaged.”
He quickly made a transmission back. “Please dock. Onboard engineers will attempt to assist yours in fixing the ships- assistant droids will come with them to speed up the process.”
The ships sped up, managing to barely outrun the pirate fleet- they must have put almost all remaining power to engines. In minutes they would maneuver up and dock, disappearing within the mass of metal that was the Arklas.
He gave orders to the other officers in the Command room. He ordered for shields to be put on 2 layers after the resource ships docked. As the pirate fleet came in range after the ships had docked, he made a transmission to all of their ships.
“Pirate-Designation Vessels, this is HC Alfamos of the Arklas. We implore you to surrender immediately- if you refuse, your sentence is death. There is no chance you will defeat this ship. We will not give you a second chance.”
There was more than 10 minutes before they got a response. It seemed like there was heavy deliberation among the pirates- but their answer shocked Gantir immensely.
“HC Alfamos, you will have to engage us in battle. We are unable to surrender.”
There were 30 ships, and from what the S-Chip system told them, they were rather well-armed for pirates, but even then, for them to challenge a Flagship was suicide. The punishment for Piracy wasn’t even death or life in prison like it was for different crimes- it was 15-30 years of prison and rehabilitation. Sure, these were powerful pirates, but flagships were known to come out unscathed when fighting entire fleets, and to say that an individual pirate ship had power of even half of a regular military ship would be an insult to any respectable Navy.
He breathed a heavy sigh from within his suit. “So be it.”
He made an announcement to the entire ship from the Command Room. “Attention, Crew of the Arklas. Go to your battle stations. We are to engage a band of 30 pirates. This is a battle code yellow, Ûferperion missiles are not to be used. Engineers, keep helping the docked trading vessels. I repeat. We are in a battle situation.”
The Flagship was now officially in battle.
If HC Alfamos was to gage the “classes” of the pirate ships, it would have been as followed-
There were 8 ships that were converted personal ships. They were extremely small, and their armament was light with only Superliminal Missiles and Plasma Cannons but they had powerful engines and great mobility. He would have called them Corvettes. Corvettes were useful in a normal battle scenario, as they forced the enemy to divert necessary energy to shields and were hard to stamp out, as well as being able to perform auxiliary work, but the sheer energy reserves of a Flagship rendered these irregular corvettes borderline useless. At most they would be able to annoy them, assuming they weren’t destroyed Immediately.
There were 12 ships that were converted medium-sized mining and transportation vehicles. These were more dangerous as they were fitted with significantly more weaponry, and these types of ships generally came armed with cluster plasma cannons to destroy other debris. While these cluster plasma cannons weren’t military grade and didn’t come preinstalled with military targeting software (Military cluster plasma cannons concentrated fire, while civilian ones spread fire to affect a wider area) pirates were known to change these systems to ones more similar to that of the military. He would have called these frigates.
The next group was 9 in number: the same as the last but bigger and more armed. He would have called these heavy frigates, and if he were being extremely generous, destroyers.
The last ship was obviously the leader- and apparently a steal. It was a converted civilian cruise ship, armed to the teeth with custom weapons, and even sporting Beam plasma cannons. He wouldn’t have had to be generous to call that ship a battleship.
He also felt extremely good about their odds.
He gave them one last chance. “Take all energy from your weapons and shields and kill your engines. This is your last chance, otherwise you will all die here for resisting the Imperö’s will.”
In response, one of the “Frigates” shot a superliminal missile at the Flagship. It did basically no damage, but sent a clear message.
One of his Attack officers gave an order on the Control Console- These orders were as instantaneous as clicking two buttons and the soldiers had to do nothing but maintain the weapons.
ATTACK ENEMY PC-2 WITH HYPERLUMINAL MISSILE.
Before they even started moving, a Hyperluminal missile struck one of the “Corvettes,” whose weak shields weren’t even fully up, destroying it instantly. It was funny, in a morbid way- The pirates shoot, nothing happens. The Arklas shoots, and a ship is destroyed.
Realizing that in fact, sitting still did not increase their chances of winning, all the ships started moving. Another two Hyperluminal missiles were shot, one hitting another “Corvette” and destroying it, the other grazing and ripping a hole into one of the “Destroyers” and seriously damaging it- if the last one had done any more damage, that pirate crew would have been at the mercy of the void.
AUTOMATIC REQUEST: DEPLOY SWARMERS?
On a code orange or red, swarmers would have been automatically deployed. While Swarmers would make this operation way easier, it would have honestly been a waste of resources.
HC:DENIED.
AFFIRMATIVE.
The enemy began peppering the shields with shots. While they most likely couldn’t do real damage, they couldn’t be taken lightly lest the Flagship be damaged by its own hubris.
Another order was given.
ATTACK ENEMIES PHM-3 AND PMM-1 WITH CLUSTER PLASMA CANNON.
One of of the “Frigates” and one of the “Destroyers” happened to be in range of plasma cannons and an officer had taken advantage of this. The “Destroyer” was the one that was already damaged- The impact made it spin out of control and explode. The “Frigate’s” shields managed to absorb the 3 blows that were dealt to it, but it must have taken a significant portion of energy to do so.
At this point, the Pirates seemed to be realizing how uneven a fight this truly was. The attacks became harder- They must have been realizing that their shields were doing very little. Still, the professional military-grade ones absorbed the entirety of the damage.
5 more “Corvettes” were hit and destroyed, 4 by Hyperluminal missiles and 1 by 2 regular plasma shots.
another 4 “Frigates” were destroyed by a total of 8 Hyperluminal missiles.
A “Destroyer” was destroyed when it took on the full brunt of a cluster plasma cannon barrage.
The Pirates were still fighting. The Flagship was going easy on them, truly, as the prospect of taking a few alive was still not off the table, if not just to investigate. But any reasonable individual would have at least tried to escape by now. HC Gantir was stumped. Then, he had an idea. He gave a direct order.
HC:ATTACK PCC-O WITH 5 HYPERLUMINAL MISSILES, 3 CLUSTER PLASMA CANNON SHOTS, 2 SUPERLUMINAL MISSILES, 1 PLASMA CANNON.
It was definitely overkill, but he had to be sure. PCC-O was the designation of the “Battleship.”
The Superluminal Missiles were shot first, hitting their mark. The combined hits from all plasma cannons as well destroyed the shield of this “Battleship” instantly. The five Hyperluminal missiles hit the ship with a force that could have destroyed a moon- the ship exploded almost instantly. He then sent a communication to the Pirates.
“This is HC Alfamos of the Arklas. Your destruction is imminent. If you do not cut your engines, shields, and weapons, what happened to your lead ship will happen to you. I’ve given you every chance I can afford for you to live.”
And one-by-one, the ships did as he asked over the space of about 4 minutes. He called a Sapper police team- one that could sap the ships’ energy, preventing them from attacking on their way- to escort them for investigations. He was rather proud of the Arklas’ performance- that entire engagement took place over the span of about 8 minutes itself. And while he wouldn’t know what exactly brought on these suicidal pirates, that was someone else’s job.