Ivan Kal - Sanctuary

Nuva system

“Entering normal space in five, four, three, two, one.”

A moment later the violet and white surroundings of a translane disappeared, and the round view of Leviathans Command Center now showed star filled space.

“Thank god, we made it.” Ship Master Paul Isaacs.

“You don’t trust our scientists?” Adrian asked.

“No. I mean, yes, I trust them, but these sorts of things should be tested a lot more.” Paul answered.

“They sent a probe through.”

“An unmanned probe isn’t the same as a fleet of ships, filled with people. What if living things couldn’t survive passing through? They couldn’t have known.”

“Ah, but they did know. You forget that the Union used the translanes to travel, which means that living beings could pass through.”

Paul grunted unconvinced, and Adrian smirked.

“Contact the Traveler, let them know we have arrived. Set a course for Nuva.” Adrian said.

Sixteen days later

Retsar Isani stood in the operations center of the station, the eyes of everyone in the room were on the viewing screen on the far side of the room. The human ships had arrived. The ships looked impressive, rectangular in shape, their hulls brimming with weapons. But his attention was on the enormous ship. It was the largest ship Isani had ever seen, or heard of. It was massive, at least three times larger than his Valor. And its shape was slightly different than others, its front had a wing like appearance while the rest followed the rectangular shapes that all human ships had. Isani and his people had enough time to study their ships as they came closer. All ships had laser weaponry, and they noticed launch shafts on the ships that they believed could only be missile launchers, there were a few things that they couldn’t identify. Turrets that definitely were not laser nor particle weapons, and these appeared to be humans main weapons, they called them kinetic weapons. Isani assumed that there was something that he missed in translation as he had no idea what that could be, even though he understood the word. Then there were other things, these ships, although definitely made out some kind of metal like the Traveler, were obviously made for war. These ships were black, their hull coated with a material that dissipated light. Isani’s people guessed that it would also mitigate damage from laser fire, although they have no idea what it could be. And then there was the big ship, Leviathan. Isani has been in contact with the leader of human ships almost since they entered the system. They didn’t plan for the upcoming battle, they will do that in person. But they did share some info, the name of the ships, their class designation and such. The Leviathan was something they called a dreadnought class. The ship had a great amount of weapons, coupled with laser turrets with lenses that were at least twice as big as the biggest built by the Consortium. That told him that the power source on that ship must be much better than anything that Consortium had. After the ships settled into a safe orbit above Nuva, a shuttle left the big ship, on its way to the station. The human Fleet Commander Adrian Farkas was coming to speak and plan with Isani. As the shuttle neared Isani left to greet the humans. He arrived just as the shuttle docked with the stations ring. A few minutes later the pressure doors opened and three humans stepped on to the station. Isani immediately recognized Fleet Commander Farkas, he talked with him a few times via the FTL device the humans installed. Seeing him in person he was again struck with how young looking he was. In fact, every human he had seen was young. At first he assumed that the Traveler was a ship commanded by a younger crew, but as time passed, he became convinced that there was another reason. But Isani set that aside, there were more pressing things for him to worry about. Isani approached the humans and extended his hand. “I greet you Fleet Commander Farkas.” Isani greeted him in human language and custom, he had again gotten out of his way to learn a few more words of the human language, it was the least he could do. The Fleet Commander raised an eyebrow – Isani found the gesture strange, he was not yet used to seeing Nel like faces with hair on them, but he knew that the gesture could mean a surprise or amusement – then he grasped Isani’s hand. After, Fleet Commander bowed in Nel way,

“I am glad to be here Retsar Isani.” He said in Nel. Now it was Isani’s turn to be surprised, none of the other humans had spoken Nel.

“You speak passable Nel.” Isani said.

Fleet Commander Farkas smiled, “Only a few words.” He said in humans language, which were then reproduced via the translator. Isani noticed that Fleet Commander didn’t have the earpiece that the other humans claimed served as a translator, and yet he responded to Isani’s words almost immediately, just like how Ship Master Kisaragi did. He didn’t comment on it, there would be time later to solve that mystery.

Fleet Commander turned to his compatriots. First, he gestured to his left.

“This is Ship Master Paul Isaacs.” And then to the human with the dark, almost black skin on his right. “And this is Company Leader Dayo Okoro.” Both humans bowed their heads in Nel way, and Isani returned the greetings. When they finished their greetings Isani led them to a nearby meeting room that had already been set up to receive them. Isani had opted for conducting the meetings with the humans while seated. They entered the room and sat on the backless chairs that Nel used to accommodate their tails. Few assistants went through the room offering refreshments. A few minutes later the assistants retired.

“We owe your people a debt, and you will have the gratitude of Nuva forever.” Isani said.

“There is no need for that, we couldn’t have stood by and watched.” Fleet Commander said.

“Nevertheless, we are grateful. Now at least we have a chance of survival.” Isani said.

Fleet Commander bobbed his head, “I’m surprised that there was no change with the Sowir ships. I thought that they would at least slow down when they saw us. Did they try to communicate at least?”

“No, they stopped communicating when they started the war, there has been no talks since then. Sowir don’t retreat. They will keep coming even if they were completely outnumbered. If they fail, they will just send a bigger force next time.” Isani said.

“Did you try contacting them?” Ship Master Isaacs asked.

“There is no point, they will not respond.” Isani said.

“Perhaps we should try.” Fleet Commander said.

“I don’t know if it will matter, even if they respond they will still come.” Isani said.

“We had no official contact with them. If they turn back, don’t return and stop the expansion towards our space, we are ready to set aside the incident with the Voyager.” Fleet Commander said.

“There is no lasting agreement with the Sowir. They will break any agreement as soon as it suits them.” Isani said.

“I agree. But our leaders want us to at least try.” Fleet Commander said.

“It can’t make things worse for us.” Isani said.

“Good, then we will send them a message. In the meanwhile we should start planning for the engagement.” Fleet Commander said.

“According to their practices in the past, I believe it is safe to assume that they won’t bomb the planet. Nuva is an agricultural world, they will want to keep it preserved if possible. That means taking control of the orbit, and then slowly taking control of the surface.” Isani said.

“Yes, that is what we determined as well.” Fleet Commander said.

“But we still need to meet them close to the planet.” Isani said slowly, “We can’t risk that a ship will get past us. While they probably don’t have plans to bomb the planet, if they realize that we will defeat their fleet and a sole ship remains at the planet, I have no doubt that they will open fire on the surface and destroy everything in the planets orbit.” Isani said, this was all assuming that human ships were on par with the Sowir. The Sowir usually wanted to take control of any assets in the orbit of the planet they were conquering, but if they see that they will lose they will destroy.