Chapter Eighty-One: Leaks
Jumpoint, Summer, November 1st, 3017
"Ma'am, a Draconis Combine force just jumped into the system." The Dropship Kapitan told Nondi Steiner. "It's not enough forces to take and hold Summer, but there's enough here to give us some problems."
"I thought we had two Sting gunships for escort?" Nondi asked. "We were trying to keep this a secret, hence why we only hired a battalion of the Kell Hounds for an escort."
"What seems to be the problem?" Morgan Kell asked as he walked onto the bridge with his brother Patrick.
"We just had a Draconis Combine force jump into the system, and they seem to be specifically set up to hunt us." Nondi stated, looking at the forces that were detaching from their Jumpship and beginning to head towards them. "How many aerospace fighters do we have available?"
"Not enough to deal with that," Morgan said. "Those Sting gunships you and Katrina swear by better be able to do their job extremely well or we won't make it out of here, that's a Vengeance, and it's being escorted by an Achilles."
"We'll start a hard burn towards Summer." The Kaptain said "If our escorts can cover us long enough, we may be able to get within the Summer defense envelope."
"I wouldn't count on that." Nondi told him. "But we don't seem to have any other option at the moment."
"I'll deploy my Aerospace assets to cover our approach." Morgan said, "I'll take Patrick and get the girls ready for a hard burn."
"This will not be fun." Nondi said.
"This is Escort one, we see you on our scopes Kell Hounds Squadrons." The pilot of the lead Sting escort said over his communications systems. "I hope you're as good as your reputation says you are."
"We hope so too." The squadron leader replied. "I hope those Gunships deliver on their promises."
"They have so far." The lead Sting responded. "Let's go hunt some dragon, I've had a hankering for burnt chicken anyway."
"Copy that, initiating combat interception."
The mass of Aerospace fighters began to get into their formations, intent on taking out the prize now headed for the planet below. The Sting gunships and twelve Aerospace fighters standing in the way of forty Aerospace Fighters deployed by the combine and an Achilles dropship coming in with them.
"Escort two, I need you to try and eliminate the Achilles." Went through the second escort's systems. "That's the only thing with enough thrust to overtake our VIP's"
"Copy that, focusing on the Achilles."
The first Sting lashed out with PPC's, LRM's, and Large lasers as soon as it entered range, shattering and melting armor, along with outright destroying many of the lighter forces against them, before spinning around and kicking in full thrust in order to keep up with the force of fighters. Even the heavier SlayerAerospace fighters were not capable of surviving the sheer amount of weapons fire that could be poured into a single target. Eventually, after a quarter of the Combine's numbers had been whittled down, they stopped trying to catch up to the VIP's and focused on the Sting that was harrying them, ignoring the Kell Hound's fighters in order to bring down the assault dropship that was matching the heaviest firepower they could bring to bear.
While the first Sting was making a mess of the Aerospace fighters that the Combine had brought with them, the second one was focusing heavily on the Achilles. While the lighter dropship had a better thrust profile over the long term, in the short term they had to contend with a heavier armed and armored dropship that had a Lot of guns to use against them.
"Captain!" the Dai-i yelled. "This is not a DroST that we are up against." The Achilles shuddered around them. "It has way too many weapons for that."
"Rotate, and come about to heading 130, hold course for five seconds, and then begin a reverse burn, let's get our nose pointed at them." The Combine captain calmly said instead of replying to his worried XO. "We shall have to see if they can handle most of our forward firepower."
Summer, Lyran Commonwealth, November 4th, 3017
"Nondi, they can't leave the system, so they're going to try and complete their mission anyway." Morgan told her. "Our forces dropped them down to ten Aerospace fighters, and both of their dropships were destroyed or extremely damaged in the fighting."
"I know." Nondi replied. "And I just sent an priority HPG to Katrina."
"Why?" Morgan asked. "I thought we weren't supposed to used HPG's on this op."
"We weren't, but this is justified." Nondi responded. "If what I suspect is true, then we will have to deal with it before we will be able to leave this system."
Kentares IV Draconis March, Federated Suns November 8th, 3017
"Duke Hull," Mary said from her reception desk. "You have a priority call from Intelligence chief Dunham."
"Patch it through Mary." I told her. "Thank you."
"Mark, you're going to want to come to the Messenger ASAP." He told me over the encrypted phone line. "We just got an HPG from New Avalon that you need to see."
"I'm on my way now." I told him and hung up the phone, telling Mathis to have someone bring the SUV around.
15 minutes later…
"What's going on?" I asked Dunham as he brought me to the mobile HPG in the Messenger.
"It's better to see for yourself."
I walked in, and Dunham started the message.
"Mark, I hate to have to ask another favor of you, but Nondi needs your help." Katrina's message said. "I need some of your help, I'm not currently able to divert any forces to subdue Lestrade, and the Kell brothers are currently trapped with Nondi." She visibly sighed. "I was only able to get this to you in a timely manner because of the work that the Davions have put into their own HPG network." She stated. "Melissa and Elsa are safe, several LIC agents were able to get them hidden away before they were discovered, but when Nondi, Morgan, and Patrick tried to arrest Duke Aldo Lestrade, he turned completely traitor and declared that his system was now seceding from the Lyran Commonwealth." I have LOKI and the LIC on site, but we haven't gotten any information out of Summer in days, and you're one of the only people I trustto pull this kind of thing off."
"I don't have much longer to record, but I need you to launch an Invasion on Summer, and save my sister and my children. Before the worst comes to pass."