Snippet #2788961

Admirals office, Esteem

Ean shrugged at the Admirals question. "Already told you I was a soldier once. I've killed on orders, put down a hundred men who I'm sure were as scared shitless as I was. But I killed them for the same reason hey tried to kill me, orders."

Ean leaned forward, clasping his hands together and sighed deeply, his hat covering over his face. "When I got those orders there was always a reason for it. It wasn't always a good reason, but there was a reason. Sometimes it was revenge, sometimes it was for profit, sometimes it was for pride, honor, or some other silly thing."

"But these Asylian guys, they're not doing this for any reason other than because they feel they can. Their bullies, plain and simple, and they clearly got no qualms about slaughtering civilians and innocents. For gods sake they plan to kill children, and for no other damn reason but to quote prevent future infestations"

Emily's face was a set of hard lines, and Ean shook his head at the very thought of it. After a moment he leaned back and took a long draught from his flask. Once the cap was back on he got started again.

"As for the tech I helped develop, it's pretty straightforward. It wraps a ship in a lensing field, basically a strong magnetic sheath holding photons in stasis. That forms the shell of your "egg". After that, a gravitational manipulator generates a black hole and anchors it to the front of the ship. That's where the acceleration comes from, the black hole pulls the ship forward, while the anchor keeps it positioned in front, like a carrot on a stick I guess. They've done something similar with a few adaptations, they took an idea from another of my ships systems, our Thunder gun. Basically they have sort of missile that they launch towards a planet, it doesn't show up on any sensors as anything other than a hunk of metal, in a fight you'd probably mistake it for debris from ship damage. Problem is that once it actually gets to a planet, or to another ship for that matter. They're able to tether it to their ship, allowing them to nearly instantly move forces from one to the other. Only way I can think of to counter it is with a hard barrier between the ship and the anchor"

Ean rubs his neck again and then continues "Other than that, you might wanna look out for their gravity sling. It's essentially the same as the shockpoint drive, but it works for short distances, allowing them to reposition almost instantly. I haven't figured out how they got that one to work, but I imagine it's similar to their troop transport method where they're just using something in the area as an anchor to relocate to, maybe a drone or something."

The captain looked back at Emily and nodded at her "I forgetting anything hun?"

Emily spoke up with slight agitation "There's a couple things. One of the weapons they hit us with was biochemical in nature, several of our men just turned to ash. We don't know how or why, it seemed magical in nature but none of our sensors or sorcerers were able to detect or determine what happened. I'd be on the look out for that, you guys have more comprehensive anti-magic defenses, but even so."

"Other than that, I feel you should also know, we were fighting them for about two hours trying to get our Shockpoint drive charged, and kick their forces off our ship. At first the fight was going in our favor, we had surprised them and managed to get some distance. However after only fifteen minutes they started to predict our movements, almost like they knew what we were thinking. I've checked and double checked almost twenty times now, but the only conclusion I can come to is that they somehow studied us as they fought us, and learned how to counteract all our tactics. Your empire may have more than a hundred years of experience in warefare, but I wouldn't say that's a good thing. The longer a battle draws out with these guys, or a war, the more they're going to learn and adapt to counteract you. You might need more than just Allies to beat them."

Emily shrugged then and crossed her arms, turning off to one side as though she'd stopped caring as she said while walking off to one corner of the office. "But that's just my opinion, take it as you will Aschen."

Ean grimaced and waved her off, whispering. "Please don't take that personally, She's had it rougher than most of us. She's our helmswoman and our tactical officer, and she doesn't take well to losing, or authority. After what we've been through, well... We're all on edge I guess."

He sighed again and leaned back in the chair, pulling his foot up and resting it on his knee. "As for your offer, If you lot don't mind having a gaggle of mangy strays and wastrels that nobody else wants around hanging out with ya, I've got no problem sharing everything I've heard and learned about em with ya." He tapped his nose then and said something particular interesting "matter of fact, I don't know it for sure, but I might be able to give you a general heading as to their home sector. You can take and use that how you will."

Med bay, Glaive

It took almost two hours before the operation could be called complete. Doctor Amed'dali sighed and stepped out of surgery, exhausted and sore from being so tense for so long. She eyed the Aschen soldiers and personal standing about the area, their curiosity and disgust evident to her. Well if they wanted to complain they'd have to take it up with their betters, she thought, They're the ones who invited us.

Engineering, Glaive

Where Doctor Amed'dali had just finished up her battle in surgery, Ean's chief of engineering Sasha Gourndy was still fighting to keep the ship from exploding. She'd managed to bring the temperature of the core down to a level she was comfortable in saying wouldn't result in everyone in the sector dying anytime soon, but she still wasn't happy with the output. The Reactor was so far gone at this point, she put the rough estimate of the ship being sail worthy again between two to three weeks. "Captain ain't gonna like that." She muttered to herself, eyeing the Aschen personnel she'd yelled at to 'fuck off my shop' until they decided to patiently wait outside of wrench throwing range. She growled at them with all the disgust the short woman had in her body, She sure as hell wasn't going to let anyone else touch her darling in such a state, no matter how high and mighty they thought themselves.