Battle of Histirion Part 1: The Battle Begins

Histirion System: Carnaith Space

Ajas looked over the final fleet specs, everything was ready, the smallish Shadowblade contingent had turned up on time and was ready to provide support and a small force of Silent One warships had been deployed as well in support as part of their larger contract with Capitol. The Axioms too had deployed more to the system, 450 lesser EPA vessels and 12 blinkers had warped into the anomaly with seemingly no affect whatsoever, however there was also one vessel he had never seen before in the Axiom fleet… He told sensors to keep an eye on them and while he didn’t know if the anomaly would affect his own fleets being on the same side as the Axioms, he didn’t want to take a chance. He was sure it was sentient and he was also sure the CAE and allies would already be sending forces to stop them here.

The Capitol fleet of 1000 vessels sat in a wedge defensive formation, with Hydra destroyers being sent off on patrols around the edge of the anomaly zone.

“Sir are we just going to wait here?”

“For the time being yes, we have received reports that the Alpha Ceti and Union invasions are underway, however this is more… Complex”

“Understood sir” All they could do for now was wait, and see what the other parties involved had plans, he was sure the Axioms would talk to them about the new… decorating they had done.

"The Union of Worlds quantum gate has been silenced."

A strange presence occupied the center of the formation of Axiomatic and EPA vessels. It was a ship like no other, befitting of its title as the flagship of the blinker fleet. Noumena, a vessel made not of ceramic and metal but out of extremely warped spacetime and overlapping wormholes, causing light to bend and distort around its empty silhouette. So strong was its presence that the EPA vessels had their formation almost immediately broken up by it, being forced into orbit around the flagship.

"Quantum gate collapsed before second plasma coil could be sent in. Recommend it be handed back to Capitol forces."

"It is done."

As quickly and mysteriously as it had appeared, the spacetime warping normalized and Noumena was gone. An unfortunate EPA degaussing vessel was slingshotted towards the strange, pulsating afterimage of the star Anzus, but beside it and the frigate sent to recover it, the ships quickly reorganized themselves around the dozen Blinkers that orbited Histrion.

"Dad's still somewhere out there." Chief ELINT supervisor Nrx  said, looking at the heavily-censored visual feed from the silent control room of the E-class battlecruiser that directed the efforts of the other 450 EPA ships, or at least directed it in theory, as in practice the vessels of E Pluribus Axioma were almost entirely guided by autopilot whenever blinkers were near.

"Must be quite something." His brother, Xrn, replied with a melancholic tone. Somewhere in the impossible geometries of Histrion (or perhaps everywhere) was the afterimage of a Capitol ship, somewhere onboard that ship was the only one in the household of three who hadn't made the switch from the Capitol navy to the EPA fleet. Something about Capitol ships had kept him, maybe it was the cramped confines or the fact that a surprising ammount of problems onboard could be fixed with a sledgehammer as opposed to EPA's fragile, computer-heavy ships. Maybe it was something greater than that, a sense of belonging to the ship he had served with for so long. Now he was one with his ship and fleet.

"Crazy old man." Nrx added as the sway of lateral acceleration came over them. They were heading for the edge of the system to meet the other fleets. "Crazy old men, all of them. Who even crews Capitol ships nowadays? We have warm water in ours. And the gravity doesn't break down every four days."

"The computer that controls heating and gravity freezes every two days, so I'm still not sure we gained anything." Xrn said, putting his helmet back on as a sequence of dull alarms sounded over the interior of the ship. "We'll meet with the Cap fleet soon if you're feeling this nostalgic."

Nrx had by then turned back to the plotter table, where the officers were. Nrx's modest surgical augmentations -new hands, following the childhood accident- certainly felt less impressive when compared to the navigators, chief weapons officers, first mate and the captain, all of them who hunched over the tactical plotting hologram, bundles of cables coming out of their eye sockets and mouths, speaking in buzzing frequencies.

for the entity groups within the destroyers of the silent one ships, less then a couple of perceived picoseconds would have gone by before the tens of millions of projected models of the allied actions based on intel so far would have been compiled between the shared micro nodes between the ships of their fleet. their information gathering proxies throughout the empires, coupled with its listening posts, had given them intel of actions not observed from the systems borders. potential ship movements of every allied vessel, taking into account commander histories and tactical uses, classes of ship available to each empire within the Confederacy of allied empires, and the collected assets of the forces available in the system.

The anomalies potential estimated capabilities taken into account for this.
The ships moved with a synchronized collectiveness, or within groups along the border as they moved to position themselves nearer to the shadowblade vessels. with movements in their flight patterns reminiscent of a school of fish, or a swarm of insects with objective and purpose. an almost beautiful form of flowing black oily metal and glowing green as their hulls seemed to blend together.

"“Good-bye and hello." the communication would have gone out to the shadowblade support units on the edge of the system, a smooth neutral sounding voice that would have issued from whatever system of transmission they used. "We are sufficiently prepared for whats to come. are you likewise prepared? shadowblade?"

The anomoly itself had not been ignored, small groups of the ships had broken off, lingering by the edge of the orbital disk. watching it simply, if it could be said that the anomaly was damaging its internal systems with things that could not be comprehended, even through its vastly narrower systems of operation. there perhaps was little sign, they looked inward, observers watching the center of the star.

moments passed, then one of them would have moved away from the group, moving inwards towards the edge of the anomaly, purposefully, almost suicidally...

The Shadowblade ships had finished warping in as the Silent ones sent out the message to their command ship... this drawn-out warp-in system had been adopted amongst the conflicts with Carnaith in the Imperial omniverse, as their use of burst warheads made short work of clustered forces. As to complexity? Shadowblades' ships were in-between the technological complexity of Axiomatic and Capitol ships, but much more reliable. They had taken the jobs of long-term patrols in jointly controlled space with Capitol due to this fact, as well as their matte black hulls blending in with the void. Aboard the central command ship, The fleet commander known as Stillute watched as the message from the Silent ones echoed in through his mask, a combat model with a more complete wrap-around plate.

"We are ready as well, those who do not speak." He said, monotone, as he looked out of the viewport in his heavy cruiser. The edges of which were tinted red with its' localized shielding. He watched through the corner of the display as the lone ship split from the group that slowly made its' way across the panorama of space, off to the left being the axiom anomaly.

"What exactly is happening in there? And what are the Capitol contingents' edits to our orders?" he asked as he turned left slightly.

"Unknown, sir. readings are coming from no-where yet everywhere at once... as for orders, we are staying put for the time being." The man at the central sensor read-outs said, the display for the readings displayed in front of Stillute. There was a reason that personnel were slaved to their host ships' AI during combat or combat-imminent situations... it resulted in suppressed emotion that allowed a clearer command structure throughout the bridge, gunnery, and response crews. Nonetheless, the ships were ready for the operation ahead.

Suddenly, a large force of one thousand and thirty-two ships, split into two groups of five hundred and forty-four and four hundred and eighty-eight ships, each in two different directions of the main APP fleet and on opposite sides of the anomaly, warped in. It was Carnaith. There were ships here that hadn't been seen either during the 1AW or at Tau volaris by any of the APP, forming up at the fronts of the respective battlegroups. These two groups took care to avoid the main anomaly area, and they consisted of various formations of Carriers, cruisers, battleships and all other manner of combat craft. A message, no contact notice attached, just the message read;

"This is admiral Jaseron of the Carnaithian Imperial Navy. We have already requested that you vacate the system of Histrion, but you ignored this request and continued to reduce it to its' current state. We offer no more chances to those who inhabit the area, but those who do not have any interaction as of yet have a single chance to remove themselves from this quarrel before we respond in Kind."

It was unlikely any of the hostile ships would budge, but the large fleet seemed undeterred in its' stance, maintaining formation with some of their number facing the anomaly. On scanners, it could be read that weapons were charging, the lights of electrical arcs off of magnetic weapons mingling with the bright blue propulsion behind the ships to create a fiery effect on the void beyond their positions... There was no turning back at this point, for the plan had been initiated.

"Scanning... non-AI forces consist of Capitol, Shadowblade, and unknown bogies, admiral." A communications officer said. Out of the bridge of the ship they were on, one would be able to tell they did not yet reside in the Histrion system.

"Very well... It seems the rest of command was correct in accepting my idea that this was to be a staging ground. Notify them to set up defenses along the rest of the border immediately." Jaseron remarked, as he stared out of the large viewplate of his ship. He looked forward as to see how this would go... and yet, he was apprehensive. He was sending officers that hadn't seen actual combat into battle that the Empire had little experience combating... If only he had his fleets from home...

The small group ran their courses, waiting for the signal from the forces now in Histrion. This was a multi-layered plan of a very, very complex manner, and it was oiled with the experienced command of the combined factions and forces of the CAE.

As the Carnaithians made their jumps into the system, organized into groups.  The Tenebrean fleet did the same, their own force not as large as the carnaithians, being only 400 ships in total number, with over 150 on reserve elsewhere that began to shunt in alongside the carnaithians, bursts of reddish interference announcing their arrival among the carnaithain fleet. augmenting the arriving groups in both locations. Their ships arranged in their own formations and flotillas of mixed classes that had become iconic during the duration of the battles of the first ancerious war, Tenebrean carriers, cruisers, Their iconically styled aldebaran class battleships, as well as other forms of ship among the supporting fleet as they finished entering a distance from the outer rim of the system.

pending the transmission of admiral Jaseron. The Tenebrean commander, Admiral Novello, a tenebrean veteran of the Ambrosious battle would have conferred with the Command staff of the battleship that served as his flagship for the tenebrean fleet within the now armored and shuttered chamber of the captains nest., maintaining communications with them through the ships closed network Comms-link around the projection monolith in the center of his chamber, displaying the system in three dimensional form, the locations of both allied and enemy units highlighted for ease of reading. the crew of the ship already interfaced with the Ships entities and systems through the V.E.A. uplinks in their chairs, sensors and readouts showing weapons were primed and null shields were up to full power. The ships lesser Entity groups compiling the possibilities of the battle based on known units and commanders present. Although their data was significantly less, and they had issues taking the anomaly' and its potential for destructive yield, opting to overestimate its projected capabilities in order to yield the best usable results. communicating it with the rest of the Tenebrean fleet.

"Do we have a number of hostiles yet? "he asked, bringing up the comms-link window on the monoliths display, normally projected by his V.E.A. unit surrounding his versus tool.

"affirmative." Came the reply from the command chamber deeper into the ship. "Carnaith has a scan, we're verifying it now with ours as cross reference. But we know there are Capitol elements, Shadowblade, as well as a fleet of, some sort of unknown class of vessel, potentially new contacts. Affixing codename "Beetles" for ease of command, relaying it to carnaithian command now. aligning ship classes from allied databases." the officer/entity replied.

"Good. now keep on guard. This isn't the immortal empire. These ships aren't as big as theirs are, but intel we have on them tell us they're almost certainly as dangerous, and we dont know the capabilities of those unknowns." Novello said in response. unlike the carnaithain fleet, his Officers and pilots had been drawn from command staff and crew that had seen a good deal of action in the fist ancerious war, and as a result. they were both war hardened, and experienced in combat. an action that had been organized by Admiral Drogan in order to augment their fleet with the carnaithians.

Presently, Novello looked at the display showing the anomaly as the two groups that made up the fleet made their way towards the afflicted system. before requesting a comm-link with the carnaithian command structure, seeking jaseron.
"Admiral Jaseron. From appearances it looks like that assumption of yours was correct. Massive readouts of Spacial distortions coming from within the anomaly..."