The Alliance Emerges

Marta raises an eyebrow. "Leave... how? I don't think there's any way for us to escape them. We have no way out of the planet, and they're just going to chase us down. Either we die resisting our we take ourselves before they can take us. Fatalistic, maybe, but... do we really have a choice?"

"There is always a choice. We are criminals, now. But if we put out communication, we could have life in prison instead of death here. We can try surrendering and offering to leave peacefully if they give us a way off the rock."

Marta sighs deeply, clearly not pleased with the proposition, but she replies, "If that is what you feel is best, then fine. I have little desire to surrender to imperials, but if it works then I will not complain. If it doesn't, well..."

She points to the self-destruct failsafe on her armor, and shrugs. "I will do what must be done, let's say that much."

*Knight Commander Thomas, now rearmed and armored, made his way back to the first contact point. He once again scoped in on the aliens deployment area when he heard their broadcast.*

Thomas: *muttering to self* Yeah on behalf of authority figures I'm sure none of us recognize...

*As Thomas was beginning to pack up and be ready to move to shadow the aliens seeing as he couldn't think of anything else to do he noticed the pirate renegades he helped and then looked back at the aliens*

Thomas: Enemy of my enemy...

*The Knight Commander as quietly as possible slid down the rocky face towards the pirates he then slid into cover beside them*

Thomas: *whispering* Yo

Because Godwin's Law applies everywhere, a vessel type very familiar to the Centauri appears over the planet. Specifically, an Interdictor-class cruiser of the Sith Remnant. Pants are presumably soiled as shuttles come down and two platoons worth of Sith troops pour out. Last to emerge is a cloaked figure flanked by two others in black armor. He looks to the huddled brigands and says, "Fight with us and we will take you in as Sith. So promises Darth Thanatos." He turns to his troops, waves to the Khroniktan, and says, "Attack."
"It will be done, my Lord."

Marta frowns, and looks back towards the incoming Sith force. She whispers to the others, "Goddamnit. I think the Sith are probably the one group that I am less sympathetic towards than imperials. I don't care what you all do but I am not going to fight with the people who put half of Chiron under an even worse heel and killed millions."

Farren raises a brow at this development, and declines by failing to follow the order. After Marta showed her commitment to death, Farren decided against remaining loyal to her command, despite her obvious worthiness for it. He would find a way to survive. That was his way.

He puts on his ranger cloak and disappears, moving back to the original site of the base, and then a little beyond it.

He raises a white flag there, then runs away from it, setting explosives in case the treachery of the imperials leads them to move in an ambush for the presumably surrendering troops.

Thomas: The Ordenreich has heard stories about the Sith. All of them bad.

*The Knight Commander turns to the Centauri woman*

Thomas: Whatever you decide, I'm with you

As the marines continued their advance, Captain Sandrunner charged headlong into the fray roaring with a voice like thunder. A pirate tried to lift his blaster against the zealous lion-man, but was met with Sandrunner’s blade running through his gut. The runic glow illuminated dimly through the pierced flesh of his abdomen. He ripped it from the man’s side, spilling his steaming bowels onto the earth, and cleaved two other men in twain. His feline eyes locked with those of each man as their spirits fled the mortal plain.

He pivoted to face a group of pirates that had mustered the courage to lift their blasters against him. As their hands clenched around the triggers, the Aryite lifted his hand in defiance against them. The energy screamed from the maws of the weapons before they collided with a wall of shimmering radiance that stood between them and the paladin’s hand.

It was then that the sky rumbled with the entrance of the Sith vessel. Sandrunner stared with his eyes wide at the descending shuttles before his voice thundered over the engines.

“Layundor sheorote!” he roared as he pointed his blade at the Sith soldiers. “Oyeduim shemot’al!”

The Khroniktan marines immediately abandoned their pirate quarry and raced across the desolated battlefield. Each marine stood nearly twice the height of any Sith and took several yards with each stride. Within seconds they disintegrated and reassembled the entire battle formation and placed their ironsights between their visors and the Sith. The crystalline Titans stood at the center between two lines of marines and held their weaponized arms parallel with the ground. Sergeant Fireclaw stood behind the frontline, staff in hand. Its arcanium crystal glowed with an otherworldly aura. Captain Sandrunner stood directly in front of the Titans with his feet spread shoulder length apart and aligned perpendicular with the Sith’s battle formation. His blade was gripped tightly in his gauntlets and held parallel with the ground with the hilt at his cheek.

Meanwhile, alarms flared aboard the Khroniktan ship. They had seen the Sith Interdictor emerge from hyperspace and pivoted the Motokhenajhi to meet them broadside.

“This is Admiral Tigris Ironclaw of the KAV Motokhenajhi.” Lord Tigris growled in Galactic Common as a technician opened a comm channel. “This planet has been claimed as a territory of the Khroniktan Alliance. As of now you are trespassing in Khroniktan Space. You will identify yourselves. Warning, this is a fully armed Khroniktan Frigate, and we will not hesitate to rip your hull apart at the first sign of aggression. You have been warned.”

The Admiral gestured to a Rokin technician who waved a talonned hand over the console. A dim wave of light passed over the Sith vessel as the Motokhenajhi’s instruments attempted to scan for possible weapons, schematics, locations of crew members, cargo manifests, computer data, and any other information that appeared valuable.

Marta frowns at the carnage now taking place, with the new figure engaging in a slaughter of her remaining comrades. At the same time she looks over at the Sith with equal disdain, remembering their occupation of her home base, U.N. Temple of Sol. Considering the situation, she turns to Knight Commander Thomas, and says, "Let's try and bring ourselves to a better vantage point. Got any sniper rifles? We should pick off who we can while they're all distracted by one another. As far as I'm concerned there's no good way out of this and we might as well bring down whoever we can."

*The Knight Commander smirked under his helmet after the Centauri woman, Marta, finished speaking*

Thomas: A woman after my own heart...

*The Knight Commander unfolded the second sniper on his back and tossed it to Marta.*

Thomas: I never leave the ship without a spare rifle. What you go there is a Valiant class sniper rifle. Standard issue rifle of most spec ops regiments of the Ordenreich. Its been outfitted with rounds designed to take out tank armor so hopefully they will be more than enough. Lead the way.

With her own smirk, and pointing to where Knight Commander Thomas came from, Marta says, "Right. Let's head back that way, towards the high ground. If we stay low behind cover they shouldn't easily be able to hit us and we should get a good vantage point over the battlefield."

She quickly begins to scramble back up the ledge and gestures at Knight Commander Thomas to follow her, and she takes up position against a large rock formation. Then, she begins to scan the battlefield through her scope, looking for good targets. Finally, she looks back over to Knight Commander Thomas, and says, "I think we need to try and concentrate fire if we can. One shot might not be enough against the armor and shielding these things have, but two shots should make a difference."

(OOC: Pass, as none of the major powers responded to Farren's actions)

The Sith troops begin firing on Khroniktan troops, with the shuttles attempting to fire down as well. One of the Sith acolytes, who had been part of the team sent to P'Taria, calls down firestorm on the Khroniktan formation. Darth Thanatos and his two acolytes then leap into the fray, lightsabers ignited and slashing away. Thanatos singles out Captain Sandrunner, giving him a blast of force lightning.

In orbit, the Interdictor-class cruiser's only response is fire back and launch fighters, a squadron of which swoops down to strafe the Khroniktan troops.

(OOC: How large is the frigate? The Interdictor-class is a capital ship.)

Thomas: Yeah, you probably noticed I already tried to take a shot at those things and for my efforts I got chased by lightening. Beware the kickback on that thing, its pretty powerful. It was meant to be held by a knight with powered armor but it won't break your arm or anything.

*Knight Commander Thomas sighted down his scope and exhaled a deep, calming breath and spoke in a hushed voice*

Thomas: On your mark...

“Takmayla raashna-shaltu!” Sandrunner called to the troops as he outstretched his palm. The force lightning collided with an invisible barrier that rippled with luminance. Several blaster bolts zoomed toward the Aryite. His eyes glowed with an eerie golden light. To the Chosen, time seemed to slow until he could see the attacks almost before they happened. He spun the runeblade with a flip of his wrist, deflecting two laser blasts. Captain Sandrunner pivoted on his forward foot, sidestepping two more blasts, before lifting his blade to deflect a fifth. The final blast refracted off of his shoulder plate. An unknown force seemed to guide his blade and movement as he deftly dodged and deflected each blow with unnatural reflexes.

A deafening roar erupted from Fireclaw as he slammed the butt of his staff into the ground. The earth shook, trembled, and rippled like a puddle assaulted by a stone. Beneath the rock a shockwave roared and rumbled. It surged beneath the feet of the Khroniktans until a wall of stone exploded from the ground between the two formations. Obsidian spikes protruded and snarled at the Sith troopers. The wall stood half the height of the Khroniktans – the same height as a man.

The marines charged forward and slid behind the natural sangar and palisade as the firestorm engulfed the area. Thanks to the advanced battlesuits and shielding that protected each of the marines, the inferno did little more than temporarily blind those that did not reach the cover in time. They knelt behind the rock formation and braced their blast rifles on top. Immediately they unleashed a deadly barrage of focused gamma rays. The air ignited with streaks of dark violet and reeked with the scent of ionized air – and scorched flesh.

As the marines dove for cover, the Titans merely stood defiantly against the onslaught of the Sith. The air rippled and distorted in front of them as their shields absorbed the blaster fire. One reassembled his arms into a pair of gamma cannons, while the other opted for dual arcanium gatling guns. The first directed two high intensity beams of gamma radiation into the ranks of the Sith while unleashing a bombardment of arcanium missiles. Meanwhile, the second Titan directed his gatling guns at one of the shuttles and released a barrage of armor-piercing destabilized arcanium rounds. Upon tearing through the armor, they would explode in a shower of crystal shards and magical radiation, crystallizing flesh caught in the blast.

Sergeant Fireclaw raised his hand as the two acolytes leaped into the fight. He focused his mind on the paths of the winds. His will manipulated the flow of energy and heat that gave life to the world. The dust and air churned and surged into a violent tempest that attempted to catch the Sith magi and suspend them in the air.

Finally, the lumbering Juggernaut groaned its maw towards the battle. Its piercing eye glared like a ravenous lion leering at its prey. An ominous hum resonated from the twin muzzles beneath the main cannon as streaks of purple, crimson, and gold lightning coursed between them.

--

“Concentrate shields!” roared Lord Tigris. “Release the drones! Energize the ion cannons and prep the arcanium torpedoes. Let’s send these darmgenim into the depths of Tartaraz!”

“Aye, Admiral.” Squawked a technician before broadcasting a ship wide signal. “All personnel to battle stations! We are under attack by an unknown entity. I repeat, we are under attack! This is not a drill! May Leolik give you strength and courage. Meylah!”

As the cruiser fired upon the Motokhenajhi, their laser blasts collided with the ship’s shield. The space surrounding the Frigate rippled and warped as the energy was absorbed. Several pinpoints of light illuminated across the surface of the crystalline ship before releasing bursts of energy at the oncoming fighters. On the opposite side of the vessel, the hull rippled like water. Dozens of objects poured from the ripples and slingshotted around the ship to meet the star fighters. They glistened like small stars against the ebony blanket of space. The drones flew past the fighters at blurring speeds before flanking them on the sides and rear and deploying an array of missiles and laser blasts. Their gazes focused with uncanny precision on their targets and showed neither fear nor hesitation as they wove between the fighters, dropping hazardous mines in their path.

“Lord Tigris!” chirped a technician. “We’ve just gotten word that our ground forces are under attack. They’re requesting air support…”

“Acknowledged.” Replied the Admiral. “Send a squadron of Falcons to assist.”

“Affirmative.”

A moment later several KA-Falcons, larger versions of the drones, launched from the underside of the Motokhenajhi and rocketed through the planet’s thin atmosphere in pursuit of the fighters.

Surveying the carnage from above, Marta said to Knight Commander Thomas, "The battle seems to be going in favor of the imperials, as it is. As much as it pains me to say this, let's equal up those odds. Let's go for the one who came down first: if we can take them down, we can stop him from doing... whatever it is that's causing that storm. I also think he's the one who blasted you earlier with the lightning."

She took careful aim at Sergeant Fireclaw, and waited for Knight Commander Thomas to do the same. She glanced over, and once she thought he was ready, she opened fire on the target: Sergeant Fireclaw's head.

One of the shuttles is destroyed outright before it can raise shields but the second manages to limp its way out of range of the Gatling gun, but not any of the fighters. The two acolytes are blown into the air but Darth Thanatos manages to root himself into the ground. He looks at the Juggernaut, focuses on it, picks it up telekinetically, and flings it away. He then turns to one of the Titans and proceeds to attempt to crush it with the Force. If it works, the Titan will crumple. Either way, he'll turn his attention back to Sandrunner and blasts him and any in his vicinity with Force Scream. One of the acolytes in the air keeps his head on straight and throws his lightsaber at the Marines, intending for it to scythe its way through them like the proverbial knife through hot butter.
Many Sith troops fall as rounds find gaps in their armor or repeated hits break through armor in the same region but more often than not, rounds shatter on their armor. One platoon attempts to take cover and fires down on the Khroniktan troops while the other platoon attempts to flank them. The flankers that get close enough lob grenades over, some of which are thermal detonators and some pulse grenades intended to disable powered armor. Thermal detonators use a fusion reaction to provide the explosion of approximately five meters.
Up in space, some of the fighter squadrons move off to engage the droids while the others attempt to dart their nimble interceptors away from the mines, though some do hit and are destroyed. The overall mission of the fighters, however, remains to strafe the frigate and distract its guns for the cruiser to make its way up to the other ship and open up a broadside of turbolaser fire at point blank range. It also attempts to hold the frigate in place with tractor beams.

*Thomas nodded as Marta explained her plan. He wasn't looking at her as she explained it but he was listening. He was adjusting his scope during her explanation settling into his "sniper" mode. As she finished he didn't speak as he didn't want to ruin the frame of mind he put himself in to take the shot. All he did was give a thumbs up to Marta letting her know he understood. They both settled their crosshairs over the Sergeant and he took his shot at the same time Marta did*

The Juggernaut flicked like an insect. However, the moment it became airborne the Khroniktan artillery released its charged bolt of energy. Intense cosmic radiation laced with streaks of arcane lightning ripped through the air, distorting the fragile fabric of reality, directly in the path of the remaining shuttle.

As the Sith lord captured the Titan in his force crush, the mech-suit stood haphazardly, but defiantly, against the psychic power. Only moments before, the Titans had descended through the celestial maelstrom that raged between the dimensional wall and the In Between Realm. A Sith’s wrath was almost a nuisance. Upon seeing the Sith attempting to flank the marines, the Titans directed their gamma cannons at the heads of the advancing wings and unleashed a continuous stream of suppressive fire. Arcanium missiles mixed into the streaks of ionized air.

Shchli-thum!

The air surrounding the battle-mage ripped and buckled as his shield shattered like glass from the first round. It ricochet off the smooth metallic surface of his helmet and sent a wave of sparks cascading onto the black obsidian earth. He stumbled to the side but caught himself with his staff. Fireclaw attempted to lift his hand to form a protective shield, but the second bullet fractured his concentration and collided with his head with a violent crack. The mighty Aryite teetered and stumbled before collapsing with a sickening thud. A long wicked crack slithered across his helmet.

“SHAAAELL!” Captain Sandrunner thundered as his comrade and uncle fell like a tree. His eyes widened like twin yellow moons. The paladin’s brows contorted into rage. Furred lips peeled back in a snarl as his jaw snapped open in a deafening roar. He glanced about the battlefield. Two marines fell to the ground from a grenade blast. Sith marched on all sides – threatening to swallow the Khroniktans in a maw of laser fire.

Mafsha clenched his gauntlets as an aura of righteous fury washed over him. His feline eyes shimmered with radiance. The runes across his sword blazed with heavenly light as tongues of golden flame consumed his empty hand. Shadows fled from the divine storm that surged around the Chosen like a herd of gazelle from a ravenous lion. He stretched his hand out to the fallen form of Sergeant Fireclaw and uttered a prayer – commanding his body to be healed and whole. A bolt of light shot from his hand and enveloped the battle-mage. As the universe yielded before the warrior-priest’s voice, Shael let out a groan.

Satisfied that his uncle would pull through, he directed his healing hand towards what wounded he could see and fired another round of light bolts. The Aryite Chosen gripped his blade in both gauntlets and swung in a wide sweep. An arch of searing white light shot through the air towards the Sith troopers. He was like a small star on the battlefield with the fierce aura of holy energy that surrounded the lion man – all eyes would be on him.

Then came the Force Scream. The psychic blast slid him back a few feet, but the warrior-priest stood firm. He retorted with an ear-splitting guttural roar as his maw opened impossibly wide.

Shael’s vision was foggy. The sounds of the battle faded into a low rumble. His head spun and throbbed like a neutron star. Then a comforting warm light swaddled the battle-mage. He blinked his mind back into reality. The black and gray blobs molded into the sharp edges of the obsidian landscape.

“Shaaeellll…. Shaaaeeeellll!” echoed Mafsha’s distant voice. Fireclaw slowly rose to his feet with the support of his staff. The mage folded a hand over his chest and crossed his fingers – middle over index and ring over pinkie. An azure aura materialized over his armor. His gaze found his nephew, who was deflecting a volley of laser fire with quick spins of his sword.

“Shael! Samjhil! Lakutro Bafzakh’vumba! Si’akhnu lyhkrazima lylkun wao’ham ki’tziemkhelav!”

Fireclaw nodded before taking his staff in both hands and slamming it into the earth. He focused on the flow of elemental energies that churned through the astral plain. It would take hours or even days to call forth the native spirits of this world, but mere seconds to harness its energies.

“Lavo hal'ah, tzoyam gatziym mi'yam,” he canted. “Lavo hal'ah, ga'ush yeshut mi'esh! L'hasmiyr tzeh eker mi'Go'ath va'Brailan, Oh Nefesh mi'Bazakh. Ani lykro ot'ra, Zhorigoth!”

Come forth, wrathful winds of the west. Come forth, raging essence of inferno! Empower this offspring of Go’ath and Brailan, Oh Spirit of Storm. I summon thee, Zhorigoth!

At the completion of the spell, the battle-mage reached into a compartment on his suit and took out a small stone. A streak of lightning was cut and filled with sapphire across its surface. Fireclaw hurled it into the air as it sparked with electricity. It hovered thirty feet above the battle field before exploding into a hundred shards and a cloud of dust. As the shards and dust floated and churned in the air, a booming chorus of thunder rumbled across the sky. A raging cyclone of dust and earth erupted from the ground. Lightning descended from the heavens in a vicious bombardment. The two forces joined with a deafening boom that shook both ground and sky.

Streaks of electricity heaved through the twister as it mutated. The funnel’s head bulged and branched out with two tendrils of thick black cloud. They stiffened and strengthened as the maelstrom intensified within the anomaly. Hooked fingers, like claws, formed at the ends of the stormy tendrils, while piercing electric blue eyes burned with calculating rage. Zhorigoth, the Go’athian Stormcrafter, looked down upon the Sith with contempt. The elemental parted its maw, and the screech and hiss of a hurricane and roar of booming thunder erupted from the being’s throat. He clenched one of his ethereal hands, and a long javelin of lightning materialized in his fist.

-----------

Meanwhile, in the planet’s orbit, the space battle continued.

“Ionic disruptors at the ready, Admiral.” Cawed a technician.

“Fire!” Lord Tigris growled in response.

Large pools of cobalt light materialized across the broadside of the Motokhenajhi. Beams of ionized particles lashed out at the Sith cruiser from them. The beams focused on a single point and attempted to overload and disrupt the shields. As the frigate assaulted the Siths’ shields, another wave of defense drones flooded from the ship and swarmed the fighters like angry hornets defending their hive. They flared their energy cannons, vomited their mines, and weaved between the enemy pilots. However, some rushed headlong into the fighters before erupting in a violent explosion of reality-warping cosmic energy, gamma radiation, beta particles, and martyrdom.

*The Knight Commander gave a sigh of relief as the second round pierced the alien's helmet and he went down.*

Thomas: Target hit. He's down hard. Wait a minute...

*The "killed" targets companion stretched out his hand which started to glow which, from what he could see from his scope, started to heal the wound and sure enough the target stirred.*

Thomas: goddamn space magic...

*The Knight Commander was about to take a shot on the healer when the thing pulled out a stone and threw it into the air which proceeded to start a lightening storm in which a bolt struck just a hair to his left almost hitting him.*

Thomas: GODDAMN SPACE MAGIC!!!

*The Knight Commander weighed his options then started fiddling with his rifle switching the guns setting from armor piercing to explosive. He then pulled out a cylinder from his hip pack and began to fiddle with it. After a few seconds the cylinder began to glow purple and started to hum.*

Thomas (to Marta): Ma'am you might want to keep back this stuff is experimental and highly unstable well at least it was the last time I was in the Ordenreich.

*Thomas slipped the grenade launcher off his back and loaded the cylinder into it. He then carefully aimed for the middle of the group of aliens, once he had his shot he fired. The purple grenade zoomed through the air and as soon as it landed the grenade didn't explode but it did erupt into a miniature black hole that began to violently drag anything loose towards it.*

(OOC: In case you didn't guess the grenade is basically a grenade form of the singularity power in Mass Effect. The Ordenreich is based off Mass Effect tech and is starting to become more familiar with Element Zero. While the Ordenreich still doesn't have biotics it is starting to use EZ in equipment which is the precursor to biotics.)

(OOC 2: I wonder what would happen if Pan's Sith used force powers on the singularity. Will it cause a biotic explosion like in Mass Effect? I wonder...)

Observing the downed target with her scope along with Knight Commander Thomas, and the fact that he was starting to heal from God knows what, she assented to Thomas, "...goddamn space magic indeed. How the hell are we supposed to take anyone out if this is always what happens? You should be dead by the time you take two shots to your skull, no questions about it!"

At the same time she watched the turmoil of the battlefield. Both sides unleashed a barrage of attacks, mundane and mystical, and it seemed that the world itself was getting torn apart by the battle. She was preparing to take a final shot on the downed target when she noticed he was chanting yet another incantation. She heard a crackle of thunder and shouted, "Lightning incoming! Take cover!"

She ducked, and just managed to avoid an incoming lightning bolt, although it just barely grazed Knight Commander Thomas. Then, she noticed he seemed to be tinkering with his rifle, and loaded what seemed to be a grenade into her rifle. Instructing Marta to back off, warning her of its instability (she complied), he then fired off the grenade into the middle of the battlefield.

A miniature black hole then appeared, and glancing over to Thomas, Marta said, "Well, I suppose that's a good way to pay them all back, but if that thing works how a black hole should, wouldn't this entire planet be annihilated? I wouldn't mind, but..."

A great many fighters are destroyed while a section of the shields open up, weakening it. Technicians scramble to repair and raise shields once more when the last thing they want to see appears: an Imperial II-class Star Destroyer. It immediately tries to run but it uses its gravity well projector to force it out of hyperspace. With systems down, it is a sitting target for the cumbersome heavy turbolasers of the Star Destroyer. With a single blast, the Interdictor-class vessel is blown into two large pieces of debris.

Down on the surface, the lightning elemental fries a great many Sith troops. Thanatos was forced back a few feet as well. With the subsequent appearance of a Star Destroyer and the miniature black hole, he leaps away to withdraw from the battle to focus on a rarely used ability: Force Storm. While it may share a name with the multi-shot Force Lightning ability, this form of Force Storm is a far more potent beast; particularly powerful Dark Side users were capable of annihilating entire fleets. Thanatos is, fortunately, not one of those. Unfortunately, the battle is small enough it doesn't matter. Space is torn apart where the two remaining ships and the ground "below" is devastated. It rages on, tearing apart practically anything in its sphere of influence. The nearly 40,000 strong crew of the Star Destroyer perish as the storm rends the vessel into a million pieces. It rages on for only a few minutes before Darth Thanatos loses control and explodes in his own small lightning storm. Within moments, the Force Storm dissipates, leaving naught but destruction in its wake.

(OOC: Eh. The black hole would have wrecked the place anyway.)

(OOC: If you guys play Mass Effect a singularity mimics the qualities of a black hole but its not a true black hole. Plus its much smaller than a real one and is the product of an unstable Mass Effect field using Element Zero which a true black hole is not. So its not as destructive or powerful than a real black hole)

*Knight Commander Thomas depolarizes his face plate allowing for Marta to see his face under the helmet.*

Thomas: Trust me ma'am, if that were a true black hole we be dead right now. No that is a product of years study and weaponizing Element Zero. The product my people use in our spaceship propulsion systems. (Sarcastically) I am insulted by the fact you assumed I did not think that through before executing it!

*The Knight Commander gives Marta a small wink then repolarizes his face plate and returns to focusing his sniper on the battle*

(OOC: He's very calm for having the ground around him being torn to chunks as if in an ungodly powerful earthquake.)