The Aschen Rim

A full hour passes with Kyrian doing about jack all in the command deck. He emptied a pot or two of coffee, ran up some strange exotic music and set Arkvaes to do some scans of the system. The planeswalker was running through a list of the lifeforms in cryo storage on ship, sorted by edible and non-edible, when his scans actually picked up something. A ping on his internal HUD brought him around to look at the glass dome which double as a 360 Holo screen.

It seemed that there were unnatural formations nearby on one of the moons, not to mention subspace comm relays going off nearby with no obvious source. Kyrian downed his cup of coffee and activated a simple protocol in the subroutines, launching a small baseball sized probe from the Data World out to the other side of the gas giant to give him a better scan of the region. It seemed his relaxation would have to wait, as now his job came into play.

In the deep fringes of the star system, the Mining Outpost remained somewhat oblivious to the deeper machinations of the Empire, aware of the large construct, people began to gather on the observation deck.

Elsewhere in the system; a series of messages were being transmitted back and fourth.

---

Priority Alarm..._

Xenos Invasion force detected_

Invasion Target: The Shining Hinterlands; Sector Hellas_

Designation: Mining System

Output: Strontium, Trinnium, Hydrogen, Helium, Iron, Titanium, Tungsten_

Adamantine Precursors

Strategic Value Absolute

Xenos Invasion in progress, recommended course of action?_

Creation Cannon?_

Negative, strategic value absolute.

Deploy Strategic weaponry?

Negative, estimated reduction in mining output unacceptable.

Liberation Fleet?

Affirmative, minor elements in sector. Estimated time of arrival = 1 Centar

Delay... Unacceptable.

Loss of strategic assets in Hellas unacceptable, strategic value is ABSOLUTE.

Escalate Area Denial?

Affirmative.

Execute request order: Imperial Defense Force task force Alpha.

Response Incoming...

Deploying Task Force Alpha._

---

On the edge of the star system, elements of Task force Alpha began to emerge from FTL, with several spatial distortions and flickers of energy, three Sagittaron class Battlecruisers, two Athena class missile carriers, and a handful of escort frigates winked in system.

Commander Thompson, of the Aschen Battlecruiser Hyperion watched the display before him as the light from the massive construct filled the observation bridge of the Battlecruiser.

"Close blast shutters and move to priority one alpha, the Sarissa and the Medusa are going to flank wide in system, and initiate a thunderbolt salvo." The Commander said, grasping the console as alarms began to fill the halls of his vessel.

"All batteries initiate powerup for salvo fire, extreme range; fire and maneuver. Keep our FTL Drives spooled up hot!" The Commander called out, while the three Battlecruisers fanned out in a wide inverted Delta formation.

"Formation Tachyon, draw their attention while Athenas move wide in a pincer formation, once Thunderbolts are away we're to move in and engage, all hands action stations!"

Thompson's eyes turned to the holographic display field, being fed data from the relays in system. "Saralvo, Hyperion, move in wide and secure that mining outpost. All ships are weapons free!"

Spreading in wide in combat formations, one of the Battlecruisers broke off, shields and weapons fully powered as they made a break to the moon of the gas Giant, their sole purpose was to protect the station there, while the rest of the task force engaged the alien construct, to buy time for additional elements to arrive.

The probe Kyrian had sent out into the system caught wind, or in this case subspace particles, of the communications bouncing around, but Kyrian was too busy at the moment to pay attention. He was half stuffed into a side panel of his command deck, rewiring some of the control cords. Even with the high tech look of Arkvaes it was still made using Dark steel, an alchemically fixed metal, and Eldrasian components which were partially organic.

Kyrian cursed as he got shocked by a magical crystal powering some of the components before he finally pulled himself out of the wall and manually replacing the panel. It was then that a youthful male voice came out of the quantum soundscape that filled the entire ship. "Kyrian, I think you attracted some company. Probably from the energy surge you made fading in from the Aether."

Kyrian held up a middle finger to the air as he walked over to the command chair and pressed a couple holo screens to bring up the info. Just as the A.I.'s voice said, several ships were jumping into the system via subspace. Kyrian rolled his eyes at the primitive form of FTL travel and sighed.

"Caeus, I hate it when you're right. What designation are they?" The A.I. brings down a holo screen off the dome maim screen with an image of the Aschen insignia. "I... don't remember this...

There is an audible sigh from Caeus who changes the insignia to a middle finger to repay Kyrian before speaking in a tired and annoyed tone. "I remember you complaining about them once before, something about being violent over acting mortals. They are called the Aschen, and seem to be remnants of Terran mongrals."

Kyrian stared into the space where he imagined Caeus to be and shook his head at the A.I. "And you wonder why I don't take you out into public."

Kyrian turned back to the screens and input commands for the defensive systems to go online while he waited for the Aschen to contact him or attack.

"Five Hectars out, approaching unidentified construct, all stations report ready for combat." The Hyperion's Executive officer reported, checking the console.

The Commander nodded slightly as he turned to a large holographic display of the star system. "Send hostile challenge and ID, the remaining fleet assets should be arriving soon."

At that moment a transmission cracked over the communications system.

"Athena Carriers in position, going into radio silence until Xenos construct engages."

The Commander nodded, before he turned towards the Communications officer, who was keying up the wideband radio and subspace communications.

"Attention unidentified Xenos vessel, this is the Battlecruiser Hyperion, identify yourselves or we will fire upon you."

The message was translated into data streams, and into basic elemental concepts and symbols, as well as mathematical formulas for translation, and even a binary code was transmitted to allow the alien vessel to translate the Aschen Language.

"Three Hectars out." Navigation reported. "Weapons range in two Millicentons, Athenas calibrating targeting systems..."

---

Hectar: Unit of measurement in the Aschen Empire, roughly 15 Million kilometers.

Data was coming in on all venues, multiple ship to ship transmissions of all kinds from the mundane to the military. Kyrian wasn't paying attention to them however. He let Caeus take care of that. Instead he was preparing the ship defenses and letting the probe do a system wide Deep Web scan using vibratory levels of consciousness instead of waves or beams to gain information.

As for physical protection the Data World had multiple planke layers of Hard Light Mesh in a field around the ship as well as electro magnetic fields similar to that of an actual planet but moldable and programmable for multiple uses including defensive ones.

There were other layers of defense but these were the most notable and interactive for Kyrian to use. He was just finishing the distribution of the EMF when Caeus spoke once more.

"Kyrian, they are trying to talk to me and I don't like it." The planeswalker sighs and points at the screen in front of him where he jestures for Caeus to put the message up. After listening to it Kyrian opens the comm channel and gives a video reply while speaking in Galactic Basic to keep it simple.

"Listen here boy, I'm not the best at being social so I'm only saying this once. This is Kyrian Vox, Keeper of Data World Arkvaes. I see that prison gank maneuver you're trying to pull. I suggest you put your toys back in the box, before you piss me off personally. If you play your cards right we can enjoy the view of this beautiful system together... over coffee or something. Whatever you young mortals like to do."

Kyrian hated social interaction on many levels but it was a far better outcome than wasting the Aschen ammunition and limited technology.

The Commander looked to his communications officer with visible confusion.

"We've been very clear of our borders with every civilization we've come into contact with." The Comms officer reported, before he turned towards his display, keying up the reply on the speakers.

"Aliens just don't get lost." The Commander replied. "Are we within weapons range yet?" He asked, bringing up a flickering holographic display showing the general dimensions of the large vessel.

"Not yet." The Executive officer replied. "Athenas have positive weapons lock, but the strategic value of the system precludes some of our heavier weaponry, I suggest we stall the Xenos until the main fleet arrives." They replied, causing the Commander to pull his lips into a thin line.

"We're in the frontier, it's going to be awhile until the main fleet arrives; why do Xenos always have to show up in the ass end of space."

The Executive officer shrugged, and the Communications officer keyed up a reply for the Commander, like before it was a wide-band audio only transmission.

The transmissions intercepted by the Data world were complete and total gibberish, impossible for even the most sophisticated AI to decipher. Random numerical hashes that only the intended recipient could decode with the right set of ciphers that changed in real time. Caeus would be sifting through what could be described as random noise, garbage transmissions. Aschen encryption at it's finest, no thanks to their advances in Artificial intelligence.

The only decipherable messages were those beamed directly to the data world by the Hyperion.

"Xenos Vessel, your insolence is amusing, but will serve you no purpose here. This is the sovereign space of the United Aschen Empire, your presence here is in violation of our national sovereignty. You are advised to power down your weapon systems, and explain your invasion of our space."

As the comm reply came in, even Caeus took a long agitated sigh with the Aschen responce and Kyrian shook his head at the uneducated mortals. "You would think after attaining FTL travel they would be mature enough to see past all this 'cake or death' mentality garbage." Kyrian really wanted to show these idiots some manners but diplomacy was better than bloodshed.

Hitting on the comm again Kyrian pinched his nose before replying. "You're really not in the best position to be making demands of your elders, Aschen. You don't even understand who I am. I gave you a name and everything, if your historical records can't find me then your nation is far too primitive to even have territory. Let me show you what I mean."
As Kyrian prepared a display to make the monkeys understand, they might find actual records of Data World Arkvaes or Kyrian Vox. Arkvaes has been in and out of galactic history since the invention of writing, usually thought of as a sign of political change and academic achievement. A few war stories mention the data world as an observer and guide for one side or the other. Kyrian however would only be mentioned once, in an altercation near BlackRock where he was confined then mysteriously disappeared.

As for Kyrian's example, he punched in the code and activated the Steller Dyson Field, which started as a ring of blue energy expanding from Arkvaes and soon grew upon itself into more intricate and complex patterns and shapes. As the energy grew, it came to encompass the entire star system in a beautiful holo-field of blue energy framing the solar system in its artistic design before fading altogether.

The comm came on again as Kyrian spoke to the Aschen. "That was a dyson field able to absorb a stars energy. You don't get to see beautiful tech like that everyday I assure you." Kyrian hoped this artistic and scientific display of knowledge would appeal to the Aschen's better nature. But from the way they were acting it was the equivalent of showing a selfish bratty child a pretty picture and expecting them to care about the artist.

The Aschen were still confused, looking to eachother, especially the Commander, who was stroking his chin.

"Who does this asshole think he is?" The Commander asked aloud, and the XO simply shrugged.

"Meddlers, probably." A female voice said, and the young tactical officer, Captain Lafaye. Of course this was in truth the Alteran who went by the name Ganos Lal, she had been sent by the others to watch Kyrian closely, as an extradimensional being of this power was capable of altering the very balance of the universe.

"My tactical assessment isn't to do anything to provoke him, wait until your reinforcements arrive." She said, keeping her hands clasped behind her back, staring out the CIC display at the data world.

The Commander nodded in agreement, even as the energy pulse shot outwards in all directions, washing harmlessly over the Battlecruiser's shields.

The insults were visibly agitating the commander, though, as he brought his fist swiftly down on the console. "We should show this disgusting Xeno the strength of our resolve." The Commander retorted.

The Commander keyed up his response after a few moments of counsel by Captain Lafaye, who continued to remain silent behind her commanding officer.

"Xenos Vessel, if you wish to contact our civilization, there are other means to do so, If we are interested in further contact, We will send a vessel to the following coordinates." He said, transmitting a set of coordinates to a location far beyond the Aschen Empire; a region of space known as the Perseus Arm.

"However you are still trespassing in our space, this is your final warning. Leave now or be destroyed."

Silently, the strange tactical officer began to exert her will, her mind reaching out to something beyond the perception of even Kyrian and Arkvaes.

The Aschen responce to Kyrian brought with it the sound of his forehead hitting his palm. The over violent race before Kyrian had a major flaw in their reasoning, and Kyrian would be damned if he let it go this time. He immediately got back on comms.

"Don't give me that reach around shyte of a responce. I came here to watch the star shine and drink caffeinated beverages. Tell me, if someone came by your home and wanted to smell the flowers would you expect the worst of them and point a gun at them? Politically that is what you are doing, and I doubt the others of my kind would like that very much. And just imagine what other civilizations would think."

Kyrian knew that these mongrals would respond to something on their own level better than his own. Mentioning political conduct would put them in a vulnerable position. The last thing these people would want is a political incident on their hands, and the thought of others like him backing that play would only be more icing on the cake.

Granted Kyrian had little to no contact with other planeswalkers nowadays and other DataWorlds even less so, but the Aschen did not know that. Besides, he could probably summon at least two planeswalkers even without calling first to help make it more convincing if need be.

At this point the Aschen needed to be knocked down a few egotistical pegs, and realize that compared to some powers that be their entire nation was just a rock on its shoe. Kyrian didn't want bloodshed of any kind but these simple minded negative manifesting mortals were getting on his last nerve and he was about to pull off all the stops.

Lafaye watched everything as they began to unfold, her eyes on the displays and the command screens.

The Commander was gritting his teeth; the Xenos never learned.

"The final warning has been given, all vessels are to go weapons free. Neutralize the threat." He reported, there was no response, no reply.

The two Athena Missile carriers that had positioned themselves on either side of the system calibrated their missile payloads, gunnery crews inspected their weapons, and weapons batteries swiveled to life aboard both Battlecruisers.

The Tactical officer gently tugged back her sleeve, revealing a device on her wrist, her hand moved over the device and she allowed her sleeve to fall back into place.

Something strange was happening, but it was once again imperceptible to the Aschen or the Data world.

The Athenas opened up first, each launching a salvo of six Thunderbolt missiles. Thunderbolt missiles were AI guided large scale strategic weapons systems designed to neutralize large constructs, planets, and even star systems depending on the given payload. In this instance, the payload was a nuclear fusion warhead, hundreds of 1.5 Gigaton fusion warheads in a Multiple missile system that would deploy from the head of the singular thunderbolt missile.

Hundreds of live warheads among hundreds of decoy warheads would make discerning the true missile warheads from the false ones nearly impossible. Of course that was the easy part.

The Thunderbolt missiles cleared their silos one by one, angling out towards the Dataworld and completely disappearing as they slipped into an Einstein-Rosen bridge, only to emerge less than 2,000 kilometers from the exterior of the Dataworld.

Immediately upon exit, the Thunderbolt missiles exploded into hundreds of smaller warheads that dispersed outwards in a large cone like pattern from each missile, live missiles and decoy missiles that exploded on impact with the Data world's shields or exterior, releasing 1.5 gigatons of TNT, which was one-thousand five hundred megatons, Tsar Bomba was seventy five megatons.

Ganos Lal watched in silence as the weapons moved along their trajectory, she would not intervene quite yet.

She simply watched, anticipating as to what exactly this 'Pretender' would do.

A sigh escaped Kyrian as his probe detected multiple bends in spacetime and fusion signatures heading his way. With a final comm relay Kyrian sealed the fate of this confrontation.

"So you would shoot the teacher for giving you a bad grade... very well." As the Aschen were determined to pick a fight Kyrian gives his console the bird before pushing the holographic button to activate his defenses fully. A wave of energy made up of a similar frequency to that of brainwaves vibrates outwards from the Data World in a sphere of pure consciousness. The ship itself was powered by the soul of a planeswalker, and that soul was becoming aware of the space around it.

As this expanding field of awareness encompassed the missiles and the spacetime bridges that changed their position the awareness began to change the reality it encompassed, what it perceived in its imagination becoming reality using its higher consciousness. Similar to the dreams of mortals, whatever the mind imagined came into existence. In this case, the awareness became an almost impossible probability.

Each and every missile big or small that became effected by this consciousness would have a malfunction in its guidance system and flipflop their targeting to return from whence they came back towards the Aschen fleet, and any future logs or records of the event would show this clearly.

If for some reason the awareness of Arkvaes and its multidimensional reconstruction of probability failed, Kyrian would in either case still decide to spare his Data World any conflict.

It had been educational to see Aschen protocols in person, but enough was enough. Using secondary Dark Web Transference FTL systems. Arlvaes' awareness altered its own physical self, fading its form into Dark Matter versions of its own atomic and molecular structures. Using Arkvaes to do this directly was tiring for the planetoids systems, and meant a longer rest time for the Data World, but the ancient library was invaluable to the multiverse for many differing purposes.

The world would fade into a black mass within seconds of pulsing its awareness, disappearing entirely from this level of multidimensional vibration far from any being's reach except for Kyrian who was spiritually attached to Arkvas.

After the warheads would either be sent back to sender or miss the now no longer present planetoid Kyrian would return this time through an Aether Walk that was the signature ability of his race. He would be somewhere off to the side of the situation staring both at the Aschen and where Arkvaes used to be. An aura of atmosphere held there by white magic kept him alive and well as he stared down the Aschen, his emotions starting to calm down now that the Data World was no longer in danger.

It was at that moment the Alteran intervened. Reality itself bent, kneeling to her will over that of the Data World's. The missiles maintained their course, unwavering as what was supposed to jam their guidance systems never took hold.

Ganos watched the event unfold in silence, Meddlers she thought to herself, as nothingness was enveloped in nuclear fire.

While Kyrian watched from the safety of the Aether, he would find the Aschen seemed to disappear entirely, all across the Milky Way they disappeared.

Though; they did not actually disappear, Ganos simply made it so that they were no longer perceptible to the planeswalkers or the data world's.

The same was said for the Aschen, Kyrian could manifest his data world once more and they would be unable to perceive him, and he would be unable to perceive the Aschen.

The Commander looked to the read outs, as his Navigation officer turned to report.

"Target neutralized; whatever it was; was completely vaporized." The Officer reported.

The Commander turned to where Ganos Lal had been standing, to see she had disappeared, he couldn't recall if he had seen someone there or not.

An interesting thing occurred shortly after Kyrian moved locations. He watched as the missiles continued their path towards the gas giant the Data World had been next to and watched the utter destruction as it and its surrounding moons were destroyed in place of Arkvaes. He shakes his head at the Aschen for being so brash as to not specify their target strategically enough and released some white energy for the poor miners now dead because of a simple misunderstanding and lack of communication.

Kyrian was not happy about it, but if some of the Aschen crew members learned something about how not to be a peaceful nation it might turn out well I'm the end. He could only hope now, but that was not what he was interested in. He watched as the Aschen fleet disappeared from his sight. Even the radio signals and souls of the dead miners had gone. It was interesting, and he did a small experiment.

Using an Alternate Reality he did a mental scan of the region throughout multiple layers of existence. In some of them the Aschen had disappeared same as this one, but in others the Aschen were still there. He did all this be connecting to an alternate timeline of himself and he could sense that some other versions of himself were doing the same thing. It was odd then how this came about.

He decides to look into the matter further on his own later. For now he shifts to a nice position in order to view the star of this system, summons a cup of coffee, and lounges in space for about an hour as he relaxs in place.

After his R&R he once again PlaneWalks into the Aether and back to Arkvaes to continue his job as eternal Keeper of his universe's last surviving legacy.

"Tick, tock, tick, tock, tick, tock."

The mutterings of an insane man echoed through the bridge of the "Mind Shard", a 7.2 km Mindfuck-Class Psi-Battlecruiser Hybrid being manned by Warner. One who made his reputation throughout his home world by sacrificing it. All of it. All of it was to be sacrificed to his dark gods that plagued his mind, a means to try and stave them off. A means to calm his mind for even a minute. It didn't work. He was now stuck here, with the best chance he had. He was to be a part of this mission. Objective Blackbird. He didn't like this one bit. Not one bit...Still, he'd play nice with the people giving him this job. It's not like he didn't want to do it, but this waiting...endless waiting. It was killing him. Physically making him 1 minute older every minute for minutes on end until he feels the way aging works - slow, yet painful. The stars around the ship began to shift once more as over the intercom he felt relief. They reached their destination!

Four ships exited from a jump suddenly and were on the fast track to entering Aschen space. Two familiar EFSF Battleships that The 6th Order had employed in their service before exited the jump with two unnamed and unremarkable admirals at the helm. Next was the Mindfuck-Class Psi-Battlecruiser Hybrid, and finally a single Guardian-Class Cruiser. The new ships were shiny, gleaming with the same kind of radiance that a car would after going through a car wash. With the ships came an odd formation with the Guardian-Class Cruiser taking point in front of the ships while the Mindfuck-Class Psi-Battlecruiser Hybrid began to power up its engines for another jump and finally the two EFSF ships prepared their weapons to begin firing.

They expected Aschen ships...like drawing a moth to a flame, it was like these ships wished to be found. They had no concern for stealth...then again, this could merely be chocked up to the fact that none of them were stealth vessels.

Warner stood as the view of Aschen space appeared before him, a wide grin under his mask from those charred lips of us gave way for cracking and bleeding due to the burns. Still, he didn't care. No matter how much blood dripped from beneath his mask, he had a mission. A damn fine one at that. "All men! Prepare to jump into enemy lines the instance they show up. Once we're there, let's give 'em some Mind Reaving! Aye? YEEEAH!"

Out in the vast reaches of the Aschen colonial frontier, there were few, if any Aschen patrols. During the Crimson Slaughter attack on the Cosmora Archipelago, all military assets had been recalled to take up defensive positions around the home worlds, this left the Colonial Frontier quite vulnerable; though finding populated Aschen colonies amid this massive swathe of space was like finding a needle in a very large haystack.

But someone was watching them.



It was a fairly unremarkable vessel, not matching any known Aschen design parameters, but slowly sailing through the velvety blackness of space.

The sheer numbers deployed during the treaty conferences as a token had been propagating across Aschen space during the events that were unfolding across the weeks that the Cosmora Archipelago was under seige, it was a gesture to take over patrol and early warning duties while the Aschen focused on withdrawing their deployed fleets to regroup for a counteroffensive, or the ultimate defense of their homes.

The singular Yubari class light cruiser of the Imperial Taiyou Navy was deployed among the thousands of vessels interspersed for patrol and early warning detail across the vast expanse of Aschen space. It's detail was to patrol a 500 light-year sector of the outlying Sigilus and Karmak colonies nearby.

The singular Yubari class cruiser was attatched to the 304th Imperial Task Force of the Imperial Taiyou Navy, which was overseeing the entirety of Subsector Karmak, and it's associated colonies.

Captain Noriyu Sasuke was in charge of the ITN Hatsuyuki (初雪), an unremarkable cruiser, with equally unremarkable weaponry, but still bore the power of dual-dispersion wave-force cannon that ran the spine of the ship, 4x 55cm heavy guns, 12.7, and 25mm anti-fighter guns, and a complement of Cosmo Tiger star-fighters. Though it wasn't very large, at a mere 280 meters in length, which meant that it could be mistaken as a frigate in some civilizations.

The bridge of this lone ship was a buzz with activity when the Sixth Order vessels jumped in, appearing on the edge of the Hatsuyuki's scanners, she engaged her main sublight engines; and began to move along an intercept course.

As well as broadcasting a message to the approaching ships.

"Attention unidentified vessels, this is the sovereign space of the United Aschen Empire; state your intentions at once!"

Radio silence...

The four ships remained on course, the two EFSF battleships staying behind the Guardian cruiser as they advanced now. One of the admirals of the EFSF ships sent an encrypted message to the next, questioning the strange design and activity. This wasn't an Aschen vessel, and judging by the way they spoke they weren't of Aschen descent. Perhaps they were from another Aschen-controlled world? No...they wouldn't be allowed to have such weaponry unless they were an ally or the Aschen themselves.

"The Mind Shard is ready, sir!" Came one of the technicians to his Admiral.

The Admiral looked back to his technician and nodded."Give the order."

"We've received orders to punch it." Warner said, no comms and no way of hearing the other EFSF ships. He merely needed to hear their minds to understand. Before they could give the order for their ship to make the short jump, they were already two steps ahead of them. Within an instant, the ship made the jump it had been preparing for, so as to position it within at least 6 km of this new ship. Once it was that close, the radiant psychic energy that came from the ship would begin to try affecting the mind of those on the other ship. Those within the Mindfuck-class ship were all psychics due to the nature of the radiant energy. Non-Psychics found their minds assaulted when on-board, and what's worse they had the chance of catching the Mind Rend mental disorder. Mind Rend occurred when a ton of psychic energy pours into a subject's brain all at once. It caused their brain to work on overtime trying to fight off the multitude of psychic attacks, fatiguing them and leaving them with little energy to think or act. Though curable, it left scars within a person's mind. Regardless of whether Mind Rend affected them, the psychic energy sought to confuse and disorient the pilot and gunners. Though not harmful, it may cause panic due to the hallucinations or even unintended damages.

There seemed to be no reply from the alien vessel, so the protocol was carried out, followed to the letter. The Captain of the cruiser sent out a wideband signal to the rest of the task force, signalling the cruiser's location, the estimated number of possible hostiles, and all other pertinent information to the Aschen and their own commanders.

The order was given to go to Battlestations, and the cruiser's weapons swiveled to life.

It's engines also thundered to life.

Many of the crew aboard the Taiyou ship had extensive cyberization, and little natural brain matter left for which the psychic energies could influence. Those that did began complaining of splitting headaches; and those without extensive cyberization began to slowly succumb to the hallucinations that began to plague them.

But this crew was disciplined.

The Captain kept order in his bridge, despite the piercing psychic energies gnawing at his brain.

Barking commands in Taiyou, the bridge crew worked to activate the ship's defenses. At six kilometers, they were within knife fighting distance.

"Taihō ni meirei o ataeru!" The Captain barked.

"Taihō ni wa mokuhyō ga arimasu!" The command crew shouted, as gunnery crews moved the massive gun batteries to target.

Inside the gun batteries, the crews worked diligently, despite the overwhelming psionic influence on their minds, the splitting pain, the hallucinations, they all focused on their one goal. A testament to the discipline of this strange and foreign ship.

"Fune o korosu sheru" The Gunner captain barked. "Wakarimashita!" Followed from the crew.

"Gan denchi wa junbi ga dekite hōkoku shite imasu!" A Bridge officer shouted.

Once the gun batteries acquired their target, the Captain verified the targeting, again and again, before giving the final order.

"Ute!"

The strange ship opened fire, brilliant plumes of yellow erupting from it's guns in a staggered salvo, hurling massive 50 centimeter in diameter shells towards the alien ship.

Each shell was roughly 3 meters in total length, which stood a fair bit taller than the average human. They were coated in a highly conductive alloy to facilitate the penetration of shields, and a hyper-dense nanosteel-tungsten penetrator. There was a split second delay between the fuze, which was engaged via the pressure of the tungsten penetrator.

These shells were designed to rip through armor, and then detonate their one-hundred and fifty kiloton nuclear payload immediately after hull penetration, causing massive cavitation within the ship, gutting it from the inside, and likely killing the crew onboard in an instant.

Each shell was manufactured to exacting standards, so that they could penetrate shields and armor, and deliver lethal results.

If only to silence the psychic onslaught that was starting to disorient many of the crew.

A reply came over on the comms, reinforcements were on the way.

Being at point blank range, the Mind Shard was punctured through the hull by some of the shots made to strike the ship. The shields were strong, strong enough to withstand these kinds of attacks, but one too many 'shield puncturing' weapons can wear down and cause a weakness within the shield, allowing some of the shells to strike the hull as the nuclear hellfire burned those within the various areas struck. Though it wasn't enough to disable the ship or cause enough damage, it was enough to require them to act more cautiously. At least, that would be the case if Warner weren't in charge. The mind slaves on board had no sense of self preservation, and neither did their Admiral.

"Prepare a jump, we're going to appear right in the center of their ship. We'll tear them asunder!"

As the engines powered to lift once more, the ship readied for another jump as the pyschic attacks increased in severity, trying to push them into a panic while prepping to suicide their ship into the other by appearing within their walls. The other ships were getting ready to leave. A small demonstration was good enough for them, showing that the psychic armada would be worth adding to their fleet's numbers.

Powering through the psychic attacks, the crew of the line Taiyou ship worked diligently to try and keep the vessel maneuvering after the first salvo of weapons fire.

Engaging at full throttle, the ship pushed forward and began to move in a wide arc encompassing the battlefield, while the Captain was maintaining order despite the onslaught of psyhic energies.

It seemed not to let up, so with one outburst, the Captain shouted.

"Dai 2 no borē o junbi suru!" He bellowed.

Sweeping back around, all batteries unleashed another torrent of ordinance towards the Mind Shard, but it was starting to become pure pandemonium aboard the Taiyou vessel.

With control slipping away, the Captain grabbed the manual controls and pushed the engines full throttle, surging towards the Mind Shard at full speed.

"Tennoheika, Banzai!" He cried out, as the Taiyou cruiser made for a collision course for the Mind Shard, unaware of the impending jump.

Engines roared now as the ship endured another flurry of blasts from the opposing ship. The blast tore holes in the sides as poor and defenseless psychic casters flew out from the hole of the ship. Some had worn flight suits and were lucky enough to survive at least an hour in the vacuum, though most were torn to shreds by the blast. The psychic attacks began to decrease in intensity only because of the lack of men continuing it now. However, this didn't stop them from their goal.

"Engage jump now!"

After having been charged up properly the ship's jump thrusters began to heat up as the ship shuddered and croaked.
The damage to the ship worried those within...there was a delay. Did the jump fail? One of the lieutenants turned around to look at Warner. "Sir, I think the ship--"

And before he could finish his sentence, the ship engaged the jump. It was late, but not delayed by too much. It'd attempt to jump straight into the Taiyou ship. Directly into it. If it were to succeed in its jump and land within the other ship, it'd likely split the two ships asunder, shunting debris and scattering gore in all directions.

While this occurred, the other patrol ships made their jump. They had made their mess to alert the Taiyou and Aschen. Now to watch their reaction...

Sitting in the dark of her ship’s bridge, Rei thought about what she’d agreed to, as ship advanced through the cold darkness of space. “Specter…” She spoke suddenly, voice cutting through the silence of the large bridge as she took a look at a readout on a holographic display nearby, it’s red glow casting lurid shadows on the bridge.

“The Cryo-Arithmetic output holding steady at 60 percent. I would not recommend further acceleration at this point Mistress…” Specter replied to Rei. The engines did well enough, despite the fact that they weren’t often used. Often Rei took a local gate or was satisfied with the use of the inertial suppression technologies aboard to not think much about their use. However, to push them to 100 percent or more of output could potentially cause problems. The engines used a warp technology to shunt the heat from the ship and engines into a miniaturized event horizon, thereby preventing most systems from picking up it's signature. At 100 percent of output, the issues began, with the risk of being drawn into the ship own engines, not to mention the disaster it could cause within the localized space near the ship.

“… fine. Release all systems from standby mode. Begin the deceleration burn sequence.” She instructed, still unsure what to do with the information the Isom had provided.

“Deceleration to begin in 10 minutes, all systems green. We will be within Aschen space within the next four hours.” the AI informed her.

“And by the way Mistress, now that I see you’re really going through with this, have I ever told you how much of a lunatic you are?” It commented.

In truth most of the time all it had it’s own interests in mind, but it also couldn’t argue with the fact that so far Rei hadn’t do anything to it that would preclude or harm it’s functioning.

In fact most of the time she let it do as it pleased, which seemed to include a bit of chaos on whatever local station’s net they happened to be docked at. Most of the time she didn’t even care, as usually Specter provided her with bits of information through her ear piece she wouldn’t have otherwise had.

“Bite me asshole, now do your job.”

"You know, I really wish you didn't act on mere vision, Angel." Special Agent Johnson said cooly as they both stood in front of a massive three-dimensional holographic projection of the local sector.

"There's nothing out here but dust, and echoes..."

Quietly, Marlene put her hand up. "Shh, adjust the gain on the wide-spectrum thirty degrees nominal, look for anomalies in the background radiation, and temperature gradients." She said, zooming in on the projection. "This is the Koshiir Ra Crossing, there's so much background radiation, and our position between the Ketu Supernova, and the Sea of Lost Souls will provide just the right refraction of gamma radiation that; if it's who the visions foretell... they'll light up on wide spectrum like a Saturnalia fireworks display."

The lone ship sat amid the blackness of space, a region of the Aschen Empire known as the Great Wastelands, a sparse, cold region of space that was devoid of colonies, and considered to be an area of great mystery, and intrigue to the denizens of the Empire.

Johnson scowled, and looked back to the display, which so far showed nothing.

"I am not an asshole.. is that any way to talk to your computer Mistress?" The A.I. admonished, as the display of a young man of indeterminate nationality grinned. An alpha level was generally designed to mimic or even duplicate a person, and Rei really had no idea what the person who the A.I. was made after had been like. All she knew was on a good day it was a pain in the ass, and a bad day impossible to deal with.

"Yeah, it is, especially when it's a mouthy SOB... Maybe I'll get someone to reprogram you to be mute next stop over after this. Isom paid me enough to... " Rei grumbled under her breath giving the projection the middle finger before turning her attention back to the engine display. "Deploy the cloaking screens and see if you can't scan for anything out there. The maps don't show much except the occasional derelict and planet." She added, fingers flying across the console as she skimmed the display, hoping for something that would let her dump the video into it and run.

'Screens deploying and scanning now.' Specter acknowledged. Self preservation aside, the A.I. was genuinely looking forward to causing a bit of chaos on a larger scale. Most of everything lately had been small time, and he could see how his boss's face lit up at the potential of a large pay day and hitting someone like the Aschen were it could hurt.

But, being near or in Aschen space this long made Rei feel antsy, nauseous, and her heart race all at once. The sooner this was over, the better. "I'm gonna fuckin' kill Isom if this goes sour.." She thought aloud, anxiously tapping the arm of her chair and clenching her jaw as she waited for the scan to return.

Nothing should be going this well, by now she'd have expected to at least encounter a small localized patrol. "This is too easy.."

The audible ping of the wide-spectrum was the first thing that got Marlene's attention. Indeed her plan seemed to work just right, as the anomalies in background radiation came up briefly on the scanner, and disappeared as quickly as they appeared. Marlene's gut feeling intensified, and she grit her teeth.

"Adjust ECW Packages, we're gonna play CPF Patrol ship, It's probably nothing, but we're just wasting radio waves." She said, and Johnson adjusted the Minerva ECW System, while refractive panels that lined the hull of the Reverence S Stealth Corvette adjusted, projecting angles of light and making the ship appear visually like a run of the mill CPF Patrol frigate, the IFF Signal being broadcast displayed the same, and the vessel was starting to move, and while it was still half an AU out, it was closing fast.

"Attention unidentified vessel, we have breached your countermeasures, and have locked onto your trajectory." Johnson said into the radio. "Disengage your countermeasures and your engines, identify yourselves, and prepare for inspection; failure to comply will result in the immediate destruction of your vessel."

Johnson gave Marlene a sidelong look. "There's nothing out here, we're chasing shadows."

"I know something will be here! I can sense it!" Marlene retorted.

Johnson simply shook his head.

"Hokey religions and ancient weapons are no match for this state of the art cruiser, I'm telling you; there's nothing here."

The radio crackled to life on the bridge of the lighthugger, piercing the otherwise silent rapport between the pilot and her A.I.

'It appears we are currently being hailed. Response?' Specter asked with amusement as Rei swore a long string of rather creative expletives that seemed to involve doing all manner of terrible things to Isom. Some of which seemed to include placing certain objects in orifices that were never meant to have them.

"Send them the standard recording.." Rei replied as she made a face at the incoming scans. The Aschen ship seemed to be at least 4 light minutes out and closing, but she suspected half of that was due to Ghost Dance's own speed, even as it began to slow from near light speed.

'Well.. they are threatening to fire on us...' Specter mentioned, giving a shrug of his virtual shoulders. "Yeah, and? Did you forget the armaments on this thing? Or do I need to have you replaced?" Rei asked testily as she jabbed at a holographic screen, cycling through a few options.

'I did not forget... merely thought to mention that they aren't used often enough to guarantee their ability. The A.I. commented as it sulked grumpily, at least the best way it could. "Just.. send the standard response." Rei sighed as she adjusted her ear piece to project the ship's tactical computer into her field of vision. Specter did as he was asked and sent the Aschen ship a response.

"This is the C-cargo Ship Ely-ly-lysium, I have rec-c-c-ceived your message... I am a... I am a... autonomously A.I. piloted ship-p-p.."

Most of the time getting Specter to send the message that made it seem like it was a A.I. piloted ship generally got curious individuals off their back, but Rei wasn't so certain this time. It was worth a try, especially since Specter had gotten good at making the message seem garbled and glitchy, potentially hinting at a virus or some sort of corrupt disc sector that made most people think again about touching the ship. "Let's hope that gets them to go the hell away.." She muttered as she reached to take the controls as Specter's auto piloting hold dropped out.