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This was the ultimate battle. The simple citizens of Americono looked up in silent awe as the whole navies of two rival fractions warped out of hyperspace, hundreds of ships poised for combat. These two fractions had been fighting for a long time, but it was simple skirmishes between a few ships. Finally, a to-the-point politician of the Magna Union, or Union, simply, stood up and, exactly quoted, said "Let's cut this bullshit! Our two navies, every ship with a weapon, meets over Americono in 30 light-hours, or else we will glass that planet into nothing but a massive landing pad!" The politician sat back down, steaming, and the other men in attendance looked on in shock. Finally a Sukoyan representative nodded his head. Many others agreed. This was to be the ultimate showdown. Whoever walked away with the least-damaged Navy was the winner, and the loser had to bend to every demand made. The call went out at 3 times the speed of light, and all across the two territories weeping people said good-bye to sons, daughters, sisters, brothers, wives, husbands, fathers, and mothers. They may not return. Many, however, agreed, as this was to be quick, without a drawn-out war. It helped that both sides had a healthy barbarian mentality. Immediately the ships of both sides began preparing at the ports, men signing in for duty, fighter pilots uniting with their craft, and battle planning. Finally, after hours of preparation, the battle was to begin. The ships of both sides were different; the Union ships looked like huge rounded rectangles, with armament arranged in an olden-times pirate ship broadside configuration, while Sukoyan had arrow-shaped ships with huge turrets. The Sukoyan used rapid-fire lasers, which, while not as powerful, could wither down almost anything with a barrage. The Union used beam lasers that cut through anything like a huge plasma torch. Then Sukoyan beat the Union to the first hit as ships dropped out of warp. The captain of the corvette Khione saw a Sukoyan cruiser rotating her turret to fire at the battleship Iris. He knew that the Iris' armor was too thin to stop a volley from a cruiser's main battery, and he knew she had to bring her shields up slowly, and she wouldn't be able to get a firing solution in time. Two other enemy cruisers were closing in, but those wouldn't be within range for a couple of minutes. Khione's weapons would not penetrate the armor of the much larger cruisers. He pondered quickly, then, he turned to the pilot next to him in the small bridge, and told him to go full speed ahead. "But, sir, we'll be in the firing line..." "Just do it." The pilot understood, and the young badger went quiet. The cooling fins for Khione's Thorium powered nuclear engines glowed neon orange as the young pilot jammed the throttle lever forward. She threw herself in front of the Samurai's main battery, and first blood was drawn as Khione took a laser to her starboard flank. She absorbed the first and second blows, barley, but the third blast in the volley ripped her armor plates off. Then she was practically vaporized in the 4th energy beam that hit her broadside just a few feet behind the nose on the port side from the Samurai, with only a few survivors out of the 100 man crew. The survivors would land on Americono in the escape shuttles and be sent back home. Small pieces of debris drifted away, but, her sacrifice was not in vain. The battleship Iris got her incredible shields up before the cruisers could get another volley off. The 3 captains watched in despair as their energy volleys bounced off, the purple beams fading away as they reflected. The Iris dispatched one, the Gladiator, with a beam from her port battery, slicing the Gladiator clean in two with a beam almost in the center on the starboard side. The Gladiator's smart design saved many crewmembers, with her honeycomb of air-tight bulkheads, and many got to escape pods and jetted off. The second, Samurai, got it worse. She was blasted apart into several chunks by a blast from the Iris' port battery into the bridge, which was housed in a hump above the nose. The fate of the captain, who was standing in the bridge, is blatant, and the 17 survivors watched in the portholes of their escape shuttles as the graves of their friends drifted apart. The Khione's 93 dead crewmen were avenged in a 4 second burst of brilliant light. The battle had started off bad for the Union, and the last and final cruiser in the group, Bishop, had a cooling fin nicked before she got out of range. This was not enough to stop the hydrogen engines, but she was forced to slow lest she wanted a catastrophic overheat in the port engine. A swarm of fighters then closed in followed by three frigates. After minutes of desperately fighting the horde, she flashed a surrender signal with the gargantuan Universal Floodlight System. One of her engines had been blasted to pieces, and she had several breaches in her hull. The swarm left her and she limped off to the nearby Space Repair Yard 13AE, trailing coolant. In the space around Americono lasers flashed, ships engaged in a deadly dance to the death. Swarms of fighters were dodging around the capital ships like they were in a playground, fighters breaking up as they were blown to pieces, and small eject modules drifting towards the large planet. A Union frigate exploded, flames being snuffed out as they hit the vacuum. A handful of fighters crashed into the flying debris, shattering. The civilians of Americono had been warned of the upcoming battle between the armadas, but this was crazy. Escape shuttles rained down through the atmosphere like a meteor shower, and the early morning sky was lit up with lasers and explosions. All worked stopped as the amazing display flashed constantly. The medical personnel were busy dealing with the escape shuttles, many men and women uninjured but some suffering from things as minor as 1st and 2nd degree burns or a laceration to bad things like shattered bones and even severed limbs. Help had been sent from the nearby planets and also by the governments of both sides, but the medics were always busy. The battle hadn't even reached it's climax.

Nearby in a space station around one of Americono's moons, both governments watched the counts go up, men and women lost and ships lost. There was also a ships remaining count that was slowly going down. Both sides could surrender at any time, but neither side wanted to do so. The Union had lost almost no crew, only about 200, but their ships were taking a beating. They listened in on the light-phone channels as the battle progressed, but there were no rules besides the surrender rule. So, the Fleet Commander, a sly wolf, smiled as he flashed a signal to his aide. The red kite talked through his headset, and then nodded.

Back over the battle, a Sukoyan cruiser's engines exploded due to overheat, blowing 18 feet of the ship into fragments. Though only 2 crew died, the ship flashed a surrender moments later, all propulsion gone. Then a battleship, the first to go in the battle, went out of control as her bridge was wrecked by a laser hit. Then another blew a hole clean through one flank of the ship and out the opposite side, followed by another a few feet forward. Escape pods were seen soon after, but, then, a flash of light, and the 3rd largest known warship in the entire known universe arrived on-scene.

Aboard the Artemis, a frigate, the Captain looked in horror at the massive ship. The engineer looked up. "S-she's Union, s-sir..." The aging stoat just watched on the screen as the ship swiveled, her laser cannons pointed right at his ship. He could probably park Artemis and one of her sisters in that barrel... they would have to snuggle, but he probably could. Then he saw the cooling fins on the side of that barrel begin to glow. He shouted, "ABANDON SHIP! GET AFT!" The engineer sounded the abandon ship alarm as the captain ran from the bridge, diving down the stairs and rolling, followed by the bridge staff. The navigator slammed the hatch as the whole ship shuttered with the impact from the laser. Artemis's whole nose was shot off, including the bridge. The section was almost vaporized by the gigawatts of heat and power that had just connected with the smooth metal. The entire bridge crew stumbled to an escape shuttle, cramming the small craft to max capacity. The First Officer ejected the shuttle, and the Captain watched out the windows, panting, as the rest of the craft left the ship. The last one barley made it before another laser hit Artemis center-mass, turning the once-beautiful ship into a ball of light and dust. The First Officer was doing a casualty check, and, thankfully, everyone had made it. The Captain sighed. "I wish every one of Artemis' sisters good luck." They were going to need it.

On the bridge of the Napoleon, the Captain smiled. The bridge was huge, and the ship's electronics were top-notch. Fitting name for her, too, the symbol of military might. She watched on the view screen as the tiny Sukoyan ship was vaporized. The weapons officer smiled. "Target destroyed, ma'am." Captain Samantha was getting cocky, and young First Officer Matthias could see it. He was getting restless, but he didn't have the authority to speak up. Then she did something stupid. "Specialist Gordon, target that cruiser. Blow her to pieces." Gordon, a strangely small falcon, typed the orders into the screen near the viewscreen. The ship turned as Specialist Gordon, the helmsman, maneuvered the ship into position. "Okay, coming around, broadside needs to ready up." Maria, in charge of weapons, watched the instrument feed from the huge cannons, watching the capacitors, each as big as an average corvette, charge to their deadly maximum. Then a green light on a panel mounted to the wall glowed, followed by 13 more. "Ready for broadside, Captain." Samantha smiled. "Shoot at will." Maria tapped in the command, her spotted paws dancing over the touchscreen. Then a laser fired, indicated by the yellow light under the stenciled 4, but it missed. Instead it hit a frigate pulling alongside her, which thankfully was Sukoyan. The ship's midsection was shattered, and the two halves, ends still glowing red where the midsection once was, drifted apart, twirling. A turret, mounted above the hit area, drifted slowly away. "Unintended kill, Captain. 'Twas the Sukoyan frigate... Osiris." Then another laser fired, it was 9, and the cruiser, trying to dodge, got slammed by the beam. A giant chunk was torn out of the Mars' belly, again, the edges where the metal once was glowed red. She flashed a surrender seconds later. Another ship, again a Sukoyan cruiser, got hit in a bad spot. She was in desperate need of a refit, as she was one of the few ships still using the NH1GC reactors. They could get to ridiculous temperatures before they overheated, but the coolant used for the two Thorium reactors produced a highly explosive vapor when heated. This meant that the reactors would explode if there was a sudden jump in temperature or if an electric charge was sent through the gas; it remained explosive for several minutes until it reached the heat exchanger, where the vapor condensed into liquid again. Her name was Valentine III, named after the Queen of Old Britain on Earth. The laser sliced through the bulkheads easily, and then it struck the mess of piping in the reactor room, where it met several hundred gallons of this coolant, still over the 900 degrees Fahrenheit threshold. The vapor ignited. There was a small blast, and then it set off another, equivalent to 8000 pounds of TNT. The blast shattered 300 feet of the 800 foot vessel, and it peeled the remaining section open. All electrical power was destroyed, including the backups. The remaining crew struggled in the dim glow of locally-powered emergency lights to wrench open dead doors in zero-gravity, as the gravity drive was a piece of scrap metal somewhere in space. The oxygen would last only thirty minutes at the most, and few crew found their way to the pods. In the bridge of the Napoleon, Samantha was stunned by the massive explosion. "Who is the lead gunner for S9?" Maria looked at a tiny screen of to the side of her main console, and then said "Specialist Vernon Motes, ma'am." Samantha shook her head. "Get him a promotion."

MEANWHILE ABOARD D.P.S ODYSSEY

Odyssey was an old corvette, but she was one of the most decorated ships in the Sukoyan fleet, and here she had the opportunity of her whole career. Captain Jonah stroked his chin in concentration. "Private Forestt, do we have any information on her?" Private Forestt typed on his keyboard, a rare thing aboard military ships, and then looked at the LED monitor. He shook his head. "No, sir." Cpt. Jonah, a quick thinker, decided to experiment. "Well, she doesn't know we are here, and we are pretty damned close. I guess we should wake her up." He could see the engine exhausts of the massive ship clearly in the light from a Americono's red sun. "Put a torpedo right up one of her exhausts." The weapons officer nodded, and he tapped in a command. "Torpedo room One reports ready, sir." The Captain nodded. "Shoot." In the armored torpedo tube, a Mark 100 Torpedo's solid-fuel rocket ignited, propelling it through the vacuum. It's target was easy to track for the computerized brain, and the torpedo, meeting only 600 degrees Fahrenheit in exhaust temperatures, flew right into the heart of Napoleon's Number 4 engine. Then it exploded.

On the Napoleon's bridge, all of the crew felt the ship shudder. "What the hell was that?" Cpt. Sarah knew something was wrong when the lights flickered. The meerkat in charge of Engineering looked up as a buzzer sounded angrily from the console. "Number 4 engine is gone, fires have been detected." The Captain needed something less vague. "What happened to Number 4?" The meerkat shrugged. "It was running perfectly, then the ship shuddered and all systems feedback cut off." Sarah, for the first time as the Captain, was getting worried. "Get a response team there; I want to know what the hell is going on!" There was another shudder, then the meerkat's eyes widened. "Number 2 just blacked out, loss of atmosphere reported in Engine Room 2. Number 1 is running at half efficiency." His paws were dancing over the console as he worked to see what the hell was happening. Sarah was losing it; if she didn't get this under control then she would have to answer to the angry Admiral. The Napoleon was losing speed, and electrical systems were shutting down, Napoleon's computer brain running down a list of the least-electronic components to save the important ones. Then the worst hit. "Captain, the fire's burned through the bulkheads! The shield generator is frying!" Sarah couldn't believe this. "Vent the atmosphere, damnit!" Then the meerkat's face was lit up by a blinking yellow light. "Captain, shield generator is running at half efficiency... SHIT! Full shield failure, repeat, full shield failure!" Sarah could see he was panicking. "Vent the atmosphere in Sector ZE! Give the crew ten seconds to haul ass or remember their training!" Then gravity was lost. The fire had destroyed the gravity drive. The First Officer grabbed his seat and pulled himself back into it, buckling the lap belt. "Straps on!" He pressed a button, and whooping sirens sounded throughout the ship. All of the crewmen floated to their seats and strapped in, except for the damage control. They had received the message. The last one barley got his tail clear as the airtight door slammed shut, followed shortly by the air vents opening. The atmosphere whooshed out with bits of loose debris following. The crew on DPS Odyssey were cheering as the head engineer called off the chaos happening aboard the dreadnought. A final torpedo struck her dead in the Number 3 engine, blowing it apart. Lights flickered out all around the massive ship and the E-lights filled the corridors and stations with their dim light. On the bridge, Sarah made a difficult call.

On board the station around Luna I, Fleet Commander Wattson was startled by the ringing in his earpiece. He signaled to his aide and stepped outside of the room to the observation deck, watching the battle in the distance. He tapped a button on his wristpiece. "This is FC Brian Wattson, what is it, Captain Sarah McRane?" The voice that came back was strained and somewhat distorted, which was odd for such a state-of-the-art ship. "Sir, the Napoleon's damaged bad, she has only one operating engine, and it is barley thrusting at all. Main power is gone, the shield generator has been cooked, and the gravity drive suffered the same fate. I am considering surrender. Your opinion, sir?" The FC couldn't believe his ears. "What the hell caused this?!" It took a moment for the Captain to respond. "I... I dunno, sir, the rear sensors didn't pick anything up. Wait... I've just been told by the USF Germania that there is a small corvette behind us. She may have attacked us with torpedoes." Brian sighed. He had to think this through. Then his decision was made for him as the Sukoyan battleship Hades opened up with her main armament. Sarah came back on the line, barley containing her panic. "Sir, we are losing the atmosphere in several compartments, and Main Cannons 3P thru 12P are not responding, main sensor suite is gone. I need a decision, or else I am surrendering." Brian then made the hardest decision of his life. "Surrender, but if there are any boarding attempts, open fire. Get back to a Magna Union station immediately." All of the ships paused firing as a cease-fire was called. Two Sukoyan corvettes escorted her out, her crew humiliated. Sukoyan had won.

No more tensions arose between Sukoyan and the Magna Union. The Napoleon had to be scrapped, which was an agonizingly painful humiliation. Sukoyan, despite heavy personnel loses, had punched Magna Union in the guts. Odyssey returned to a massive homecoming, as she had shot the Napoleon through the heart and set off a chain reaction that allowed the rest of the fleet to finish her off. Her bridge crew were all dishonorably discharged and forced to watch as the once magnificent ship was torn down to her only remaining use, scrap and spares.