Sunrise
As you look closer at the tacmap, you see that one ship is further out from the planet than the others. This is likely the ship which just jumped in, and as such you order it destroyed first. You bark out the command, and orders are repeated into mikes, engines fire as the ship orientates to bring the main gun to bear.
"Load sequence complete"
"Beam stable"
"Engine pods burning to track"
You stare out into the void and reflect briefly on what drives men to abandon their posts, to rebel, to refuse to comply, and then put such thoughts aside. "Fire."
There is a roar, spitting and snarling, ripping through the Gate, and a beam of blue light, pale and wavering lances out with impossible speed, lashing and curling across the void before it embraces the target in a balmy glow. For a few seconds, you see engines on the ship fire as it desperately tries to leave the crosshairs, and then with an earsplitting scream, a white line connects your ship with theirs, blindingly bright, and the viewports polarise. When the light fades enough to see out, there is nothing left, and for an instant it is like the ship, dimly lit by the red emergency lights, is alone in the universe
"Firing successful"
"Other hostiles moving inwards, vectors say gunnery range in five"
"Main gun charging, ten percent"
"Hostiles will be here before the main gun is at full power."
"Firing options are full charge or attempt low-power shots"
"Standing by your orders"
SHIPCOMS: 395/500 - Allows orders to be given. Very tough, requires few crew to man.
SHARDCOMS: 10/20 - This tiny structure, situated above the bridge, allows for superluminal conversion with Orion Command
BRIDGE: 889/1000 - The control center. Keep this running at all costs! Requires minimum of 500 crew to man
MAIN GUN: 3990/5000 - This relic weapon has splintered planets, burned fleets, and is the main armament upon the Gate. It requires 4000 crew to man fully, but is capable of operating with barely a thousand, as long as "Rapid fire" is nowhere on your list of plans. It is not charged yet.
REACTOR 1:2000/2000 - The only fully-manned part of your ship, and the only part you don't understand, or particularly feel like experimenting with in battle.
REACTOR 2: 300/500 - Backup reactor, in case of critical damage to the main. Will just about let you spin up the Shard and flee, if operating with full capacity and Reactor 1 is offline.
SHARDDRIVE: 1499/1500 This superluminal warp fragment, no larger than a fist, and encased in a containment block the size of a city, allows you to travel both interplanetary and interstellar. If you lose this, the ship will either detonate instantly or just be stranded.Either way, you'll be removed from command.
ENGINES: 693/1000 skyscraper-sized rocket pods for in-system movement. Largely autonomous, each one is manned by just twenty crew.
SUBWEPS: 0/6000 : This refers to all your multitude of other weapon systems, such as ICBMs, point defenses, interceptors, rail turrets the size of office blocks, and so on. There are no crew on these systems, and they have been securely stowed.
Poll
7 (21.2%)
Author
Topic: The Derail Games: A game of Awesome Chess. (Read 171283 times)