CAINEv2

Interlude - Day of Reckoning

In times past, the people of each generation would always remember the day on which the greatest war in their lives began. In that one moment when fresh news shook the entire world, when all hell broke loose, when memories would record in perfect clarity a moment of their lives --- what, where, and when. Years and decades later, as they reminiscenced their past, contemporaries would always return to the same questions and answers: What did you do... when emissaries of Pope Urban II called upon the faithful to 'take the cross' and launch the Crusades? When Nazi Germany invaded Poland, triggering the Second World War and all of its horrors? When Chinese Convoy 524, en-route to beleaguered Iran, burned in the Persian Gulf under the fury of American missiles, sparking the near-apocalyptic Third World War?

For the last generation of the Avalonian Republic, a snapshot of their lives would forever burn itself into their memories the moment they saw the mushroom clouds in the emergency news broadcast, burning red with fury against the pitch darkness --- the telltale sign of multiple strategic nuclear warheads that ravaged Rennes, shining metropolis of the planet Broceliande and capital of the Avalonian 2nd District.

Total calamity ensued.

Even the night skies could not keep their peace, for incandescent flares of power soon erupted over the low orbit of Broceliande. Two flagships and their escorts, meeting in what was originally a strained but peaceful, almost routine diplomatic exchange, engaged one another in a sudden duel to the death.

The visiting team was a mere five starships: the colossal 1st District Flagship, Fleet Carrier (CV) Excaliber, plus four Bucellarii-class Armored Cruisers (CAs).

The home team was the proud Republican Guard Flotilla, with a total of twenty capital ships --- five Foederati-class Battlecruisers (BCs), ten Comitatensis-class Battlecarriers (CVGs), and four Bucellarii-class Armored Cruisers, led by the equally enormous 2nd District Flagship, Fleet Carrier Oriflamme.

There was originally a third team, but the 3rd District was running late. After news of the disaster spread, they never arrived at all.

With a four-to-one advantage in hulls, three-to-one advantage in tonnage, and equivalent technology on both sides, the result of any combat would be a foregone conclusion even without considering the planetary defenses. Nobody from the 1st District would be stupid enough to gamble on such odds.

Assuming they were sane.

Not that any fighting was expected. A century of cold war between the three Military Districts of Avalon has allowed each faction's intelligence to thoroughly infiltrate the others' military rank and file. There were no orders and no preparations. This was purely a diplomatic visit, beginning with a mutual display of power through a joint military parade.

Even as late as five minutes prior, only three people knew exactly what to expect, their surnames one and same. But with a single confirmation through Marshal Comorus Kernow's neural-implants, a seemingly harmless codeword flooded its way through the entire fleet network, unraveling hidden sealed orders kept onboard the internal networks of every warship.

It wasn't even a new operation. They went through a full simulated wargame of it once under a hypothetical scenario --- two Terran-years ago.

Speculation of system error escalated, then immediately pacified as Marshal Comorus stood up over the secured fleet broadcast channel and spoke only two words, his voice colder than the darkest depth of space:

"To war."

Some lingering doubts remained, but within seconds, the detectors onboard every ship rang out with news of thermonuclear detonations: not one, not two, but seven. Not merely over the 2nd District Capital, but originating from the depth of their heavily-fortified headquarters, shield generator complexes, and planetary defense centers.

Operation Crecy had taken more than ten years to prepare, an effort performed under deep cover by the 'Black Prince' Arkadi Kernow himself. Its agents, cloistered from each other and every other aspect of the plan, were a mix of willing infiltrators and unwilling operators, all of whom worked within those high-security military installations, with not a single clue toward their true mission until deeply-implanted Geas pre-programming overcame their bodily control.

Ward-breaker rods and teleportation beacons were soon deployed in key positions within those complexes, painting bullseye markers for a trusted three-man team to deliver the presents.

All those other faithful and double-agents thought they were working under Operation Sluys, collecting intelligence for an operational codeword only the most senior of them recognized: Agincourt --- yet another layer of deception that fooled 2nd District intelligence into believing that it would take years still before the 1st District was truly ready to heat this cold war into a hot one.

But now, as Operation Poitiers revealed itself, there was no time left for spies to send the information back up their networks. Even 1st District fleet officers didn't have time to regain their composure before their training and discipline kicked them into action.

Scores of unmanned REDEINs (REmote Drone Escort INterceptor) launched in massive waves, their hard-points loaded with counter-missiles and point-defense laser modules, defensive weapons intended to foil unexpected aggression.

Dozens of METAACs (MEchanized Tactical Adaptive Armament Chassis) sortied with their pilots, the aces of the fleet, each with a transformative, multi-purpose humanoid mech specifically equipped and tuned for their individual prowess.

Even the drone escort frigates slid out of their docking stations, soon needed to serve as screening vessels and cannon fodder to protect their host ships.

Fleet engagements normally began with long-range Anti-Capital Cruise Missile (ACCM) exchanges, but both sides were already within each others' energy weapon envelopes, and 1st District skippers wasted no time slamming in an initial salvo from their gamma-ray laser turrets even as their broadside launchers went into sprint-fire.

The Republican Guard were proud elites, and rightfully so as they went into battle-stations immediately. Panic failed to seize their senses despite total surprise and an incoming avalanche of destructive fire. Even onboard the leading battlecruiser Orleans, where hi-tech Electromagnetic Shields (EMS) and ethertech Vector Negation Shields (VNS) failed under concentrated fire, where lightspeed grasers gouge deep into its armor, shattering bulwarks and killing men, its crew still fought back valiantly, counter-missile racing out to meet the first incoming wave of shipkillers even as their own faltering batteries returned fire.

But under Avalonian naval doctrine, battlecruisers were glass-cannon raiders and skirmishers. Their role was to flush out racks of ACCMs from rapid-fire launchers before withdrawing behind the main wall-of-battle. Their thin armor and meager defenses completely outmatched in any close-combat, especially against Armored Cruisers which were built for it.

The Orleans did not survive a second salvo. The blinding fury of its destruction the first of many that night.

Yet the opening volleys hardly balanced out the skewed force balance. Despite overwhelming surprise, the Republican Guard was quickly recovering. Its own strike craft, already prepared for launch with the now-forgotten military parade, hurled into space like a swarm of angry locusts --- terrifying clouds of red blips on sensors, awesome not only in numbers but also their organization and discipline, trailing behind six fearsome names renowned throughout the new world as the ace killers of the 2nd District, half of the 'Twelve Peers'.

Rear-Admiral Geoffroi, commanding-officer (CO) of the Republican Guard, ordered his troops with insurmountable confidence that a victory was in the making. Surely, the 1st District had underestimated the integrity of his command, and overestimated the morale impact of their surprise attack and nuclear strike, which clearly did destroy 2nd District Headquarters.

Now, they would have their vengeance.

It would have been true, had the Black Prince not sprang a second surprise on them with his grand scheme.

Over a century of internal turmoil within the Avalonian Republic had spawned a number of paramilitary organizations, each deriving its power from a unique mastery of magic that gave them some degree of advantage over military and enforcement mages --- the Auxilia. Some of these organizations were officially sanctioned as knightly orders, serving as special arbiters of the law. Many more were proxies, paid by one District to terrorize the others while publicly claiming their righteously independent actions. A last few were true rebels who sought only to topple the corrupt, existing system.

One of these rebel groups, the Nisshoku Getsumei or Moonlit Eclipse, was known for their derived East-Asian magic that allowed a physical entity to cross over into the spiritual.

A daring raid by the Black Prince and his elite black ops team nearly a year ago had captured two dozen of these mages --- Arcane Servitors (Arvitors in short) to be enslaved by binding them within magic-extraction crystals. The very same that powered countless ethertech equipment and weapon platforms, including the powerful Cataphract METAAC mech, designed from the ground-up with special magic-conductive circuitry that could channel spells through its entire body.

Two squads of elite METAAC pilots knew they had recently received a 'special' upgrade to their machines' Arvitor core, and each of them had a special trigger of the do-not-touch variety added to their latest control interface update. Security was air-tight and even the specialists who did the installation had no clue what the function was. Running unknown equipment without permission was a court-martial-able offense.

After all, there was a way to defeat this magic, but only if the enemy knew what to prepare for.

Now, as those METAACs spearheaded the charge into masses of hostile markers that hopelessly outnumbered them, Excaliber CO Commodore Marcus Kernow finally gave them the order with bared teeth, a sadistic and predatory grin lighting up his entire face:

"Gentlemen, this offer comes once-in-a-lifetime: push, the button, and inscribe your names into history with the annihilation of our foes."

Six of the twenty-four were entitled 'Knights of the Round Table', the ace of aces, pride of the 1st District. Those glory-seekers needed no encouragement, and the others soon followed, accepting any unknown protection they can get in this chaotic and utterly-insane operation.

With a click from each METAAC control interface that linked directly to their neural-implants, twenty-four machines vanished from every sensor display --- except one, but Aurasense ethertech sensors were inherently prone to magic overload, and their field of detection this day was oversaturated with targets.

The two opposing forces soon opened fire upon one another and at the Anti-Capital Cruise Missiles attempting to breach through to the capital ships. Unlike most historical carrier strike craft, the REDEINs' primary role was not to attack, but to serve as an outer interdiction screen against missiles as well as escorting friendly ACCMs. Their weaponry generally lacked the power to breach METAAC shields, for which they often resorted to kamikazes. After all, a downed pilot can just switch their control station's uplink to a new REDEIN and 'respawn', while the carriers would continuously launch REDEINs throughout the battle to keep their front lines adequately 'supplied'.

Alexis Skye, pilot of the METAAC Gawain, was the first to realize that his evasive maneuvers were utterly pointless. Not only were the incoming energy fire not focusing on them, those that should of struck shields went through them as though they didn't exist. The same could be said for his defensive-fire, which passed through missiles as though they were illusions.

Alexis had no idea why he could detect his foes but not vice versa, but he wasn't about to complain.

With the left mech-arm already gripping a Firelance Close-Assault Warhead (CLAW), he conjured, using spell-trigger acceleration, a preloaded Black Blade spell with his right hand and focused all attention on offense. A quick scan of his sensors found an enemy worthy of his attention, and he charged into the maelstrom on an uncertain bet. It had paid seconds later, as his Anti-Capital Black Blade, a seventeen-meter-long gash of disintegrating void power, a magical tear upon the very fabric of the universe, completely ignored the dimensional difference between material and ethereal and cut its unfortunate, unaware foe --- the METAAC Roland --- in two.

It took but a second long before his mates began copying him, charging through the tide of oncoming foes while tearing apart targets of value on their way to their true goal, the flagship Oriflamme.

Seven officers within the Republican Guard actually realized what was happening, but even for those who knew what spells to use, casting any advanced spell without preparation easily took a dozen seconds, seconds that they did not have.

Only one 2nd District METAAC pilot finished his Ethereal Sight spell, only to see the oncoming blade that ended his life.

Then, thirty seconds after engaging their Spiritshift magic, twenty-four METAACs began to reappear in reality in twos and threes, still within the horde of enemy strike craft growing without end from their capital ships. The pilots did not understand the lone warning and paid it no heed in the heat of battle, and nearly half of them exploded within seconds after their return to 'normality', their powerful vector shields collapsing too quickly under the stupendous weight of hostile fire and REDEIN kamikazes.

But the damage had been done.

Nearly forty METAACs destroyed. Five [Snape killed in action. Flight leaders thoroughly confused by the wave of destruction that swept through their formation like an unseen scythe of death.

In a deep space battle, that may not mean much, for it was the exchange of long-range missiles and warheads teleported by Starwarp 'Cannons' that decided the battle. But in a close-quarters ambush like this one, where METAACs could easily breach multiple layers of defensive missile fire and reach point-blank range where their maneuverability and melee-tactics dominated with impunity, the battle had just taken a decisive turn.

The surviving thirteen of the 1st District vanguard dove straight into the Republican Guard's capital ships and ignited their Firelances. Close-Assault Warheads (CLAW) were close-ranged versions of the Anti-Capital Cruise Missile, but with a much larger payload, for Firelances were actually magically shrunken, the spell then dismissed after launching. Like the ACCM, they carried both onboard shield penetrators and defensive shields to shrug off point-defense fire. Launched from point-blank range, these 'lances' soared straight in, crashing into hostile hulls before their bomb-pumped gamma-ray laser warhead exploded, flooding their targets with both a thermonuclear blast and a hail of destructive high-energy radiation.

Already damaged by grasers and proxity-hit ACCMs, five battlecarriers (CVGs) and one last battlecruiser vanished as their hulls violently bloomed into balls of incandescent fury, indications of reactors gone critical. Three other CVGs and two armored cruisers were left as drifting wrecks, while the last two remaining CVGs were crippled beyond repair. Masses of REDEINs, their remote-control pilots dying onboard their carriers, turned autonomous --- still capable of basic formations and tactics, but a far cry from the coordination and ability once displayed by their pilots.

The rest of the battle went downhill from there. Within the hour, an overwhelming force had been decisively defeated by their lack of intelligence as a single strikegroup penetrated their defenses and dealt the fatal blow.

It was WWII Midway all over again.

The 1st District had gotten off with comparatively light casualties: one armored cruiser (CA) destroyed as the skipper did her best to protect the flagship, two more CAs gutted, not to mention REDEINs in the triple digits and most of the screening frigates, but unmanned craft were disposable.

It would have been easily tolerable had METAACs and marines not landed onboard the CV Oriflamme in an attempt to seize the mighty Fleet Carrier, which took years to build and each District had only one of. Unfortunately, the boarders did not manage to hack the central system fast enough, and Rear-Admiral Geoffroi's dying words took all of them with him to the grave as he scuttled the massive ship.

"The guard dies, it does not surrender."

Total of forty-four METAACs and their aces, including four Knight-of-Rounds, was a hefty price to pay.

But it was still worth it.

Midway had merely turned the tide in the Pacific theater of World War II. The 1st Battle of Broceliande Orbit both began and ended the first stage of the war.

Combined with Operation Crecy which laid waste to 2nd District Headquarters, the loss of their flagship was devastating. 2nd District Command had not merely been crushed, it had been destroyed, with no one left more senior than individual squadron commanders, none of whom had the charisma to rally the fleet's remnants under single banner. Most of them surrendered, some of them fought to their dying breath, and a few of them pledged to continue the war as subordinates of the 3rd District.

The 2nd District and the Republic's most populous planet, Broceliande, fell within a single day.

Yet what of the man who planned it all? The man who laid the foundations by establishing the Tinchebray breach that allowed agents and supplies to enter Broceliande without notice, who installed the pieces required for Operation Crecy which shattered any planetary support for the orbital battle, and who delivered the method that would allow a single strike group to pierce the heart of the Republican Guard Flotilla in Operation Poitiers?

Arkadi Kernow was officially marked Snape killed-in-action during a last-minute raid that was supposed to claim the life of the 3rd District Marshal as she visited Broceliande for diplomatic talks. Only the officers onboard the CV Excaliber's bridge knew that Commodore Marcus Kernow had sent down a few nukes, courtesy of the Starwarp Cannon, straight into his adoptive brother's operational area.

No one knew if Marshal Comorus Kernow would have approved. He was a cold-blooded bastard himself, but he was also too busy coordinating forces in other areas, despite his presence onboard the Excaliber during the entire battle.

The 'Black Prince' would never be heard from again, and to all but a very few, it was the real, biological son of 1st District Marshal who would be receive the credit for this 'heroic' victory.

Which was actually... a surprisingly lucky turn for Arkadi.