Ivan Kal - Out of the Ashes

Sergeant Nathan Bell sat in the driver’s seat of the League Ravager Mk3 class tank. Behind him, on their own posts were his best friends, Donald Hall and Chloe Grant. Nathan’s tank was a part of the four tank squad, moving into position to attack a Ra’a’zani base. They couldn’t have approached the base before, fearing that the Ra’a’zani sensors would detect them before they managed to disable them. But now the Ra’a’zani defenses were down, his people had retreated, and his job was to level it to the ground. Their squad got in position on the hill overlooking the Ra’a’zani base. Their large 160mm caliber guns swiveled and locked on their target. A moment later their bombardment began. The large explosive rounds rained fire on the defenseless Ra’a’zani base. Within minutes the base crumbled in fire and smoke.

After the dust settled, two ten man teams moved in on foot, making sure that there were no survivors.

The first thing Aileen saw when she opened her eyes was the orange sky. For a moment she thought that it was dawn and moved to get up, she had things to do. But then she remembered. She realized that she was in a vehicle of some kind, bundled up in the back seat with someone sitting next to her. Through the vehicle’s window she saw that it wasn’t dawn, the orange color was from the flames rising up in the distance. Slowly Aileen rose up, the person sitting next to her noticed and turned to her.

“Are you alright child? You hit your head pretty hard.” The Father asked.

“What have you done?” Aileen asked weakly. “They’ll kill us all for this.”

“No child. The time when Ra’a’zani ruled over the Earth has come to an end. By this time tomorrow we will be free.”

Aileen shook her head. “You can’t fight them. They have ships, they’ll start bombing us any moment now.” She said defeated.

“We have ships as well. There is so much that you don’t know about your own kind. This is exactly why they managed to conquer us. If more of us remembered the past, the things would have been different.” The Father said sadly, shaking his head. “You don’t need to worry about their ship, it is being taken care of.”

Aileen refused to believe it. She knew what Ra’a’zani were capable of. They would never allow this to go unpunished. She kept her mouth shut, looking out the window at the cloud of orange smoke out in the distance. The Ra’a’zani base had been her home, and now it was gone. She didn’t know how to feel about that.

A few minutes later they came to a stop. The Father motioned for her to get out, and he exited the vehicle on his side. Aileen followed on her side. The man in the armored suit exited and shook the Father’s hand.

“I’ll be seeing you around Father.”

“God is with you son.” The Father said. Aileen thought about his words, and then something clicked in her mind. The Father was a priest. She had heard about them long ago, people that believed in a God, and dedicated their lives to him.

The man in the armored suit, laughed, said his goodbyes and went back to his vehicle, driving away in the direction they came from. The Father motioned for Aileen to follow, and not knowing what else to do, she did. They went around a corner of a building and were met with droves of people. Aileen realized that this was where the people from the streets went to. She looked around as they passed. Some people thanked the Father, others looked happy, talking about being free. But most were silent, looking like they didn’t care.

“Here child.” The Father said as they reached a building. “Go inside, you will find cots. Rest for a bit. I’ll come check up on you later.” With that he left her, while he went back among the crowd. Not knowing what else to do, Aileen did as she was told.

Olympus Explorer Ship Start Gazer moved above the docking area of one of the Ra’a’zani mining facilities. The Ra’a’zani had pulled back there, to hide from the human forces that had attacked them from within. Now Star Gazer rolled, bringing its four small double railgun turrets to bear on target. Jacob’s men on this site had already closed all airlocks. And isolated the area humans were in from the ones where Ra’a’zani were. The Star Gazer opened fire. The small 90mm rounds ripping through the docks hull depressurizing it and killing every Ra’a’zani inside.

Vit’r’an saw the human formation start to break apart, their ships slowing down and shifting. They weren’t turning away from the Blood Claw, they were arranging to meet his ship. Vit’r’an applauded the humans for their bravery, he knew some Ra’a’zani that would have turned and ran if they were faced with the same. He watched as the top of the human formation moved even further away from the three bigger ships in the middle, and spread out. The lower part of their formation doing the same. He knew what they were trying to do, as his ship passed the middle of their formation, the bottom would move behind them while the top tried to trap him from the above. He recognized the skill of the human commander. But sadly it would do her no good. Their ships couldn’t stand up to his. The human ships were in range of his weapons for a while now. But still he waited, just a bit more and he would open fire. The humans held their fire as well. That worried him, they should be firing their weapons at him, trying to get through. But they didn’t. That told him that they planned something as well.

Then Vit’r’an decided that they were close enough.

“Lock the Larsha’ka on the human ships one through three!” Vit’r’an ordered. Now you will see how truly outmatched you are.

On the holo the Ra’a’zani ship drew closer and closer. Johanna kept her weapons fire silent, their lasers were ineffective and the Ra’a’zani had a way of detonating their missiles. She placed all her hopes on one last move. Then the Monarch’s scans detected a massive buildup of energy from the Ra’a’zani ship. Then the Ra’a’zani ship opened fire.

The Ra’a’zani warship held three Larsha’ka cannons. The cannons turned and locked on the human three heavy cruisers. Then the faint green light started emanating from the inside of the turret barrels. The light grew in intensity for a few seconds, and then all three turrets released their Larsha’ka energy. Three bolts of bright green-white energy exited the turrets, moving much faster than the human missiles. But still slower than the speed of light. The human ships point defense was unable to lock on the bolts, and unopposed they reached the human ships. The first human ship received the energy bolt on its forward section, the bolt “ate” through their hull, mangling and twisting the hull before it expanded all of its energy. The second human ship got hit directly in the middle of its top section. The energy ate through the hull and reached the ship’s weapon power grid. Once the Ra’a’zani weapons fire came in contact with the grid it released the remainder of its energy overloading the power grid. The resulting backlash caused a series of secondary explosions that blew the ship apart. The last human ship was lucky, it managed to roll and showed its bottom side, where its hull was the thickest. The energy bolt struck the hull but didn’t penetrate the hull, leaving only a huge scorch/burn like mark on the heavy cruisers hull.

Stunned Johanna watched as Ra’a’zani fire mangled her ships. The heavy cruiser Unity had blown up, the heavy cruiser Sword had sustained heavy damage, its forward section weapons were offline and the Ship Master Talis reported that they were experiencing constant power fluctuations in their power grid. The heavy cruiser Tempest on the other hand got off lightly, they got hit on the part of the ship where their hull was thickest, and sustained only light damage. But another hit like that and they could be in trouble. Johanna knew that the only ships in her fleet that could stand up to that weapon were her battleships and the Monarch. She changed her plan, sending her middle line in, while pulling the others back. A few more minutes and she would unleash the full might of the Monarch’s turrets and railguns on the Ra’a’zani ship.