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Prologue: Contact

The Caliphate of Procyon Procyon System, Procyon VII Light Cruiser CNV Valorous

October 10, 2547 CE

'Why do people find this so fascinating?' Thought the felinoid as he sat on his bunk, looking out the viewport toward the swirling upper layers of a gas giant. Three years and the same sights every day. Maybe one day something interesting will happen.'

First Lieutenant Azukhannja Tulrikvah, better known as just 'Azuk' among some of the crew, is a pilot operating from the CNV Valorous. For the past three years, he's served within the naval aviation division of the Procyon Defense Fleet. Having gotten a start flying the family's plane over their farm, Azuk learned to fly first with the older planes that exist on the homeworld. After acceptance into the Navy Academy, he made sure to pursue training and a focus in flying proper space fighters, specializing with the use of an interceptor; a large craft meant to carry heavy ordinance to intercept smaller warships.

The Tesgno, a Jungle Tesgno by heritage, stands rather tall at around 1.8 meters in height, or closer to 6'2" by the older measurements of known space. Like most jungle Tesgno, he has a rather lithe, athletic build meant for jumping, sprinting, and pouncing. His fur is a dark brown color, broken only by darker stripes meant to act as a natural camouflage if he were in a dark jungle. Other than his green eyes, nothing in particular stands out. Being a pilot doesn't make one a particularly large or wounded individual.

The clock by Azuk's bunk shined with red light from its numbers, showing the time as only 0010 Tesgno Standard Time. His patrol shift is in under an hour, and the alarm still had twenty minutes to go off. What woke Azuk was the rocking of the ship, in such a manner that its inertial dampeners didn't even catch it. That was unusual, but Azuk knew better than to ask questions of that. They weren't being fired on and there was no alert. There was no reason to worry.

Shaking his head, Azuk stood up from his bunk and picked up his flight suit. The olive drab suit was only somewhat loose fitting, and only the first layer. When he got to the hangar, he'd be getting his flight pressure suit on, which would protect against vacuum in the off chance he was forced to eject. It took less than a minute for Azuk to get the flight suit on and zipped up to the neck. Other than that, there was no other dressing truly necessary. The PDF was relaxed in their uniform policy, not necessarily requiring footwear due to the digigrade nature of the Tesgno. The Imperial Navy, however, wanted to be more like the Terrans, so it was mandatory there.

Stepping out of his cabin, a luxury given the small flight crew for the light cruiser, Azuk looked down both ends of the hall. A single marine stood by the door to the left that led into the rest of the ship, providing at least a small bit of security for the flight crew. On the right, toward the fore of the ship, the hall ran a short distance before widening into one of the maintenance halls used to transport craft from cargo to the hangar bay, and serving as extra cargo space if ever necessary. Behind a double airlock, the large doors that led into the hangar bay properly were cycled to the bay, with the internal airlock closed. That meant the other flight was on the way in, or would be ordered to return in the near future.

The upside of a separate flight section was being able to enjoy special accommodations. Azuk made a right turn down the hallway and turned left through a wide, open entry into the pilot's cafeteria. The downside of special accommodations was that the food they got tended to be a bit older and usually cold by the time it got to them. When returning from a ten-hour flight shift though, one couldn't truly complain about the quality. With three shifts a day, that left a twenty-hour break where pilots could still manage a hot meal in the actual cafeteria.

In the cafeteria, the food was of course cold, though Azuk gave it a simple look over. He wasn't truly hungry, and would just shove something into a pocket to eat while in space - something that he had at least one reprimand for already - but for now he'd survive with some Terran imported coffee. While the ever-growing number of human products annoyed him, he had to admit that their coffee excelled at getting someone awake and keeping them awake for a good while. It was no surprise that most pilots drank quite a lot of coffee on any given day.

"You're up early." A voice said as Azuk was pouring himself a small cup of coffee. He looked over a shoulder at the female pilot, Second Lieutenant Rizwana Rahimi. She's technically Azuk's wingman.

Rizwana Rahimi, or Rah as she prefers to go by, is about the average for a Desert Tesgno. Standing closer to 1.7 meters in height, or 5'8", she has sand colored fur. Unlike Azuk, she has no stripes or other patterns; it's just a solid tan coloration. Most pilots also ended up with a somewhat rugged look after a while, even the women, and that set Rahimi apart. Her fur was meticulously kept and groomed, and she had not a visible injury on her.

What little Azuk knew of her background, she actually came from one of the noble families from the desert. That would have secured her a higher commission in the Imperial Navy, but instead she was in the PDF. Azuk figured it came from the fact that the PDF remained within the Procyon system and protected actual Caliphate space. The Imperial Navy, meanwhile, acted outside of Procyon and usually while attached to Colonial Alliance naval formations.

"Did you feel the shuddering?" Azuk asked as he sat down at one of the tables. Rizwana sat down across from him. "That's what woke me up."

"Yeah, same with me. I guess you're ready to fly? We're almost to the port from what I can tell. Chances are we'll only be out there for a few hours, if that." She asked as she leaned back in the chair.

"Don't bet on that." Azuk said as he finally took a sip from the lukewarm coffee, grimacing from both the temperature and the low quality taste that came of Terran coffee. "With our luck, we'll be flying a full shift and already departing from the port by the time we head back in." He paused to take another sip from the coffee. "On the upside, we're heading back home after that."

Rah nodded slightly. "Well, we get paid to fly, and it's not like anything out there is actually a threat."

After taking another sip, Azuk just chuckled at the remark; a throaty laugh that was picked up from regular contact with humans. "One of these days, you'll say that, and we'll be facing an actual invasion. And do you know what I'll say when we are staring down the guns of a superior force?"

"I told you so?" Rah asked with a tilt of her head.

"Absolutely."

The intercom of the ship overhead crackled with the activation, then the voice of the Flight Controller said, "Hunter 2. Hunter 4. Report to the Hangar Bay. Your shift is active. Hunters 1 and 3 will be returning within fifteen minutes."

Azuk looked at what was left of his coffee and considered just finishing it. He decided against it with barely any debate. He quietly stood up and tossed the cup into the trash. "I guess that's us. Let's go then." Rah just gave a quick nod, and the two left the cafeteria, making the left turn to head for the hangar bay.

Approaching the airlock, the interior airlock cycled open to show the room where they'd get into the pressure suits and then cycle into the hangar. Azuk stopped at the cross hall, checking both directions and only seeing a single maintenance cart parked with the engineer nearby. Satisfied, he crossed the hall with Rah into the airlock. To either side, sealed lockers sat with code locked keypads on them. Each locker had the name of the pilot on a small plaque.

It took just a moment to tap his code into his locker, changing the red light to green, and opened the door. Tesgno pressure suits are simple in design and structure, separated into two pieces. The suits are a hazard orange color, with the Caliphate's flag on the right arm, and the emblem of the pilot's wing on the left. On the chest showed the name of the pilot. The whole suit is thin, with all necessary layers for survival compacted into a barely two centimeter thick suit. The back zipped up, and the flap that covered the zipper sealed it properly again.

Azuk climbed into the back of the suit, slipping into the boots of the suit easily enough, then wiggling into the gloves themselves. "Rah, zipper?" He said while making sure it was all properly set. One day he wished that they'd get a front zipping suit, just to make this whole process a bit easier. Without having to turn around, he felt the heavy zipper pull the back of the suit into place and tight against him. The sound of the flap sealing was enough to get him to turn around now. Of course it was Rah with her back, and zipper. Having always done it, he pulled the zipper up quickly and carefully, then pushed the flap over so it was properly sealed.

"Maybe we'll get front zipping suits one day." Rah said while walking back to her locker to pull out the helmet.

"Don't bet on it. They're probably too expensive." Azuk said as he turned and put his own helmet on. The metal ring of the helmet locked into the ring at the top of the suit. With a firm twist, it locked into the ring. The display on the helmet activated, showing the oxygen reserve level and the current atmospheric pressure and composition. He'd have to refill it when they got back. In all, the suits look quite old in design, though the materials used and their thickness shows they are new. "Ready?" Azuk said as he watched Rah put on her helmet and seal it. She simply nodded, and Azuk pressed the button to cycle the airlock.

The internal airlock closed, and the lights on the door showed that the bolts had locked it into place. A hiss could be heard through the helmet as the air was pulled out. The display on the helmet showed the pressure steadily dropping as the airlock cycled out. The top corner still showed that the helmet's communication system was active, and linked into Hunter Squadron's communications. In all, eight pilots make up the squadron, and only two are ever out on regular patrols, and usually with two more on standby. Rarely was the full squadron launched.

When the pressure hit zero, the other airlock opened into the hangar bay and the open shutters at the front of the ship, opening into space. Beyond the hangar, the gas giant of Procyon VII was easily visible, along with Procyon VIIc in the distance. Even on the sublight engines, it'd be hours before they reached the world and its spaceport. That was fine.

Azuk walked around the hangar to his interceptor. The squadron had two bombers, two interceptors, and four fighters. He flew the interceptor while Rah flew a fighter. With such, it enabled proper protection of his craft from anything that'd be directly attempting to attack them. If that ever happened, of course. In the past three years, Azuk only flew two actual combat missions, both against pirates, and both solved with a single torpedo into the broadside which blew the shoddy warships apart.

The ladder of the interceptor, a craft marked with a large '2' on the nose, rested against the floor of the hangar bay. Beyond the fighter to his right, Rah had already climbed into her fighter and lowered the cockpit's canopy. Azuk gave the weapons a quick glance and a look over the hull for anything out of the ordinary on the interceptor as he climbed into the cockpit. The other reason he preferred the interceptor was that the cockpit is a bit larger. For a larger person such as him, it was just enough space to be comfortable.

A Tesgno interceptor was a design that the Caliphate kept largely secret. While the idea was sold to the Alliance and corporations, the Tesgno make the true ones. In all, the interceptor is just short of 20 meters in length, 15 meters across, and with a 5 meter height. From the top, the interceptor looks like it has the shape of spade from above. Below the cockpit is an autocannon that fires 30mm rounds at several hundred rounds per minute. Behind that gun is a bay that holds a pair of antimatter torpedoes. In the false wings that make up the sides of the arrowhead design, rocket pods can be easily removed. There is usually one to each side, and each rocket carries a high powered conventional warhead. It's usually effective against smaller targets, assuming it can hit, or saturating an area where ships may enter. Just outside those, there's three missiles to each side, and those have nuclear warheads.

Azuk's seat still had the correct adjustment, and he pulled the straps down over his shoulders, to a buckle between his legs. With a press of a button above his head, the canopy of the cockpit dropped down and sealed along the edges. The helmet readout showed the pressure rising, turning the cockpit into a safe breathing space. It was an emergency pressurization in case of a suit breach and the interceptor being the only safe atmosphere. With that done, he powered up the engines and power core, then read over all of the instruments. Even after just a couple years, it still felt almost like a second nature as he went over everything quickly.

Over the radio, and identified over his helmet's HUD, Azuk was pulled from his pre-flight checks with the voice of the squadron leader. "Hunter One here. We're about to enter the hangar. Stripes, you ready to go?"

"Hunter Two here." Azuk said, ignoring the nickname that the squadron leader gave him. "Hunter Four and I are ready to go. Just get back here and we can launch."

"Yeah, will do Stripes. We'll be in... in about two minutes. Go ahead and launch now. It'll save a couple minutes." Hunter One said.

Taking that as enough of a reason to launch, Azuk pushed the vertical throttle up to launch the interceptor up off of the hangar bay deck. Once a few meters off the ground, he carefully pushed the forward throttle and launched the interceptor forward and out of the hangar bay. As he left, with Rah close behind, he shut off the vertical thrusters and flipped the switches to activate the microgravity mode of the interceptor.

"Hunter Two, we're airborne." Azuk said while making a left turn to begin a counterclockwise orbit around the Valorous. He glanced down to his sensors to see the marker for Rah's fighter off to his right and behind him some distance.

"Got it Stripes." Hunter One said. "Alright we're in the bay. Enjoy your shift you two."

"Won't do, Captain." Azuk said. "Enjoy your rest of whatever it is you desert cats do. I don't think the rec room has sun lamps though."

There was a throaty chuckle to the remark. "Go to hell Stripes. Hunter One out."

As Azuk and Rah circled around the back of the cruiser, Azuk did a check on his weapons readouts and the status of his engine. The heat output and sinks looked fine, and the weapons test fires showed as functional. With that done, the interceptor and fighter flew along the starboard side of the light cruiser. The flight controller assigned a new patrol route for the two pilots and they'd simply assume position and activate the autopilot. If anything happened, they'd take control. The position the controller assigned put the two about a kilometer forward of the Valorous with speed matched with the cruiser. It took only minutes before the two were in position with autopilot active.

"Hunter 2 here. We're in position. Let's go." Azuk said, letting go of the control arms and allowing them to retract somewhat to give himself a bit more vertical room.

"Assuming we get aboard, want to get a drink when we get to the spaceport?" Rah asked as they let their craft fly itself.

"With our luck we'll be stopping just for fuel and leaving again." Azuk said while he went over his sensors. Nothing. "But sure, that sounds like fun. I don't think I've actually seen you drink." Rah was just assigned to the squadron a few months prior when they last visited Great Home - the arid homeworld of the Tesgno and capital of the Caliphate. She had been transferred in to bolster numbers after a failed anti-pirate raid.

For the next few hours, the only sound over the radio was the constant conversation of a variety of topics from home life to just what they were thinking. With nothing to do unless something happened and without the ability to just sleep a few hours away, the flight offered the chance for conversation and getting to know ones fellow pilots better. It was, almost literally, a captive audience. One couldn't easily escape after all.

As the pilots neared the spaceport over New Home, Azuk took control over his interceptor. The act was registered on the flight controller's board and Rah's own computer. "Relax. Just wanted to feel in control. We have, what, ten minutes now to the spaceport? Let me fly." Azuk said without prompting from the controller. He knew it'd be asked though.

"Alert." The flight controller said. "Sensor contact detected. Aft. Fifteen thousand kilometers. Unknown design and transponder. Hunter 2, Hunter 4. Check it out. It appears to be closing on us. Judging by the signal, I am estimating battlecruiser hull size. Hunters Five and Six are on the way to support if necessary."

"Sometimes I hate my timing." Azuk said while pulling a hard turn that, in the microgravity, could still be felt given the high speed. "Understood. We're on the way."

Fifteen thousand kilometers meant that they'd need their warp drives to get to the craft. Tesgno small craft were built with a miniaturized warp core to get across larger distances more quickly for emergency situations. This is considered one of them. Unknown vessels weren't something that the Tesgno toyed with. As the frontier of known space, there was a chance it could be a first contact scenario.

"Lined up for warp jump." Azuk said. "How are you looking Rah?"

"Ready to fire on your mark." Rah said.

"Mark." Azuk said, hitting the throttle to maximum, then activating the warp drive with an extra lever next to the throttle. From there, the craft controlled it itself, dropping the interceptor and the fighter out of warp just under one hundred kilometers from the contact. "We're done. Rah, you with me?"

There was a pause, and then her fighter showed up on his sensors. "Here."

"Good." Azuk said, then turned his attention to the larger contact.

Even from this distance, Azuk could make out a large contact, far larger than the so-called battlecruiser hull that they had mentioned. The only thing to compare it to are the Alliance's Ambassador Class dreadnoughts, but even this one was larger than those. The whole design had the look of a sleek, almost alien appearance. There was nothing like that in known space. The only thing that could describe it is that it has the appearance of a large, bulbous arrowhead.

Azuk activated his communications and targeted the large unknown sensor contact. "Unknown craft. You have entered restricted space held by the Caliphate of Procyon. State your nationality and intentions." It was crude, to say the least, but he never got actual first contact training. There was no reason, in the eyes of the commanders, for an average grunt, even if they fly, to have such training.

As they closed the distance, there was no response. Now they could make out the white coloration of the hull, with green highlights in a few places. Why one would bother to paint such a large vessel was up for debate, but the fact remained that it seemed to have a bit of character to it. It was still intimidating despite that. The radio in Azuk's helmet cracked, and alien voices could be heard on the other end. The crackling was interspersed with a deep, guttural language. If Azuk had to guess, it was almost human sounding, but in a language he didn't know of. What he did know is that this wasn't a Terran vessel. He could see, along the front of the vessel, a marking that had some alien word with the prefix of 'IHN'. Whatever that meant, he couldn't guess.

"Failure to respond will result in destruction." Azuk said, all while arming his torpedoes. The antimatter warheads would probably punch a considerable hole in the dreadnought - as he was going to class it given the size - no matter how large it is. It was meant to take on a larger than cruiser grade warship anyway.

"Energy fluctuation." Rah said. The two kept on their course, but a few flashes made them consider otherwise. "Point defense!"

"Break! Evade and launch our torpedoes." Azuk said while firing the retro thrusters to make a tight, almost zero inertia turn to evade whatever was incoming. His sensors showed a few incoming rounds. "Control, we need immediate assistance! Taking fire! Unknown vessel, dreadnought grade!"

"Repeat that. Did you say dreadnought?" Control said.

"Yes! Get us support damn it!" Azuk just about yelled into the headset while making another turn away from the incoming contacts. He could almost intercept them before they hit, but it'd be at great danger to himself.

"Navy is inbound with its dreadnought." The controller said after a long pause. "Both of you get out of there."

"Rah, are you there?" Azuk asked as he lined up his torpedo shot. The dreadnought hadn't moved yet, but he wanted to get rid of the payload to make escape even faster.

There was a cough on the other end. "Yeah, I'm here. I took a round. Cockpit is full of smoke. I am venting it now. I am getting out of here. Hurry up Azu."

A glance at the sensor contacts and Azuk could see Rah's fighter moving quickly toward where they had dropped in at. In that moment he looked away, he had lined up for the torpedo launch on the dreadnought. He pressed the buttons on both control arms, and felt the interceptor shudder slightly as they released the torpedoes. They each had a long burn rocket on the back, which would normally accelerate them faster than most point defense could track. Then the two kilogram antimatter charge would hit and detonate, resulting in a release of energy so great it could usually split larger craft apart. With the torpedoes launched, that was now irrelevant.

Azuk fired his retro thrusters again to slow the craft just enough to turn and fly off toward an escape point. The point defense of the dreadnought seemed to target him less and the incoming torpedoes more. He looked up just in time to see Rah's fighter disappear in a flash of light indicating a warp jump. With the lower weight of the interceptor, the acceleration took far less time to reach the governed "safe" speed. Really anything that was faster would be safe.

The interceptor shook violently as it approached the location they had dropped in at. Alarms flashed and blared in the cockpit, and Azuk was thrown out of his daze to escape. Looking over all of the alerts, it showed that the right engine had been hit with one of the point defense rounds and was shredded. The damage done to that engine damaged the left engine as well, and the life support systems for the fighter had failed. The small fire that had erupted was extinguished by the exposure to vacuum. But the power core was also going to reach critically low integrity levels within only a few minutes. That wouldn't be safe to bring aboard the Valorous or to keep flying. He had one option left.

Reaching down between his legs, Azuk turned a handle to unlock it from its position and then pulled on it. Pulling on it caused the explosive bolts that secured the cockpit's canopy to explode, sending small pieces of shrapnel out but more importantly blowing the canopy off and forward to a safer location. The rocket under the pilot's seat then ignited with one powerful burst that could very well have killed someone under the forces exerted had it been in atmosphere. The seat launched only a few meters above the interceptor before cutting off, leaving him drifting at that velocity. All of that happened in just a few seconds. He activated his suit's emergency beacon, knowing that eventually someone would get to him.

Now that it was in vacuum, the suit's life support activated, blasting the helmet with a burst of fresh oxygen before dropping to a more conservative pressure. Still, the timer on the helmet's readout showed only about three hours' worth of oxygen if he managed to conserve it very carefully. Knowing how quick the PDF is, he knew he would probably be dying by the time they got to him.

From his newfound seat though, he could see the unknown dreadnought in the distance and now the arrival of a Navy task force. The Navy's own dreadnought looked small compared to this unknown one, but one thing was different between the two: Azuk's torpedoes had left a mark on the unknown. Two large holes showed in the hull, and glowed with flames inside. It wasn't a deadly hit, but they couldn't be operating very well now. The Navy looked to be prepared to handle this without an issue.

Knowing that he had done his duty, and he was just waiting now for rescue, Azuk knew that he'd conserve some oxygen by getting sleep. He closed his eyes, with the image of the silent battle below being the last thing he had seen at the time. The only thing he worried about was getting rescued in time, but he also felt a dread of sorts. Making an enemy like this couldn't possibly be good. Despite that feeling of dread, sleep still came quickly with no other input.