Chapter 1: A New Beginning

The year was 2498 ... or the year 22 Post Discovery, (P.D.). The human race was at her Death's door. Her mighty fleets had been destroyed. Her colonies had been enslaved for food, or even worse, turned into wastelands. Her humans penned as food animals.

Now, Terra, the once bright jewel of the Terran Federation, was but a husk. It burned under a nuclear and chemical bombardment unprecedented in known history. Her once great cities were now mere wreckage. Her forests and farmlands had been turned into blackened ash.

Up near the Moon, the huge ship that had wrought this devastation on humanity turned, and headed back into space. As she went, she continued to fire her missiles at the planet Earth, as a last gesture of utter contempt.

The last twenty-one surviving Lighting class fighters of the Federation Defense Forces, flew towards the enemy ship, knowing they flew to certain destruction. Behind the fighters, trailed the last two surviving bombers of the fleet.

Captain Charlene Harris brought her fighter around, and looked at her pilots on the screen.

"Ok! Listen up! We fold in three minutes. When we come out, we will be going in hot. Keep your forward shields at full power!" A series of 'Rogers' came back to her, as she spun up her fold engines.

Twenty-three small craft disappeared, and reappeared near Terra, already aligned against their planet's killer.

With a quick look at Terra, Charlene started issuing her last orders to her friends.

"Ok, people! We've lost this one. But let's show these bastards what hell is like. Arm the Odin's! Bombers one, and two, stay behind us. Launch your ordinance after we get through the shields. We know that whatever ships we have left are coming home, so let's see if we can at least cripple this bitch for them. Go to full power, and let's kill us some bugs!"

As Charlene went to full power, the rest of her pilots acknowledged her orders.

Charlene looked through the canopy at the huge ship. As her craft passed the hundred-mile mark, she pressed the fire control for the huge missile. It dropped away as she also keyed her Galahad missile packs, which started unleashing their cargo of death.

"Fire Odins and Galahads, now!"

The huge Odin missiles dropped from the fighters. They, and their companion Galahad missiles, sped towards the enemy ship, at top speed. Twenty-one Odin's hurtled through space at the huge ship. The enemy ship finally detected the attack, and opened fire with hundreds of defensive laser batteries. Seventeen of the missiles, and sixteen of the fighters, blew up in the white-hot barrage of fire. However, the last four missiles slammed into the shields that surrounded the huge enemy ship. The combined explosions shattered the local shield generators. The remaining five fighters and the two bombers flew in through the gap that had been created in the enemy shields. Lining up, the bombers each launched their six antimatter torpedoes. Then they tried to get away. Eighty heavy lasers ripped the bombers and fighters to shreds.

However, the damage had been done.

The twelve torpedo missiles, originally designed for ground saturation bombing, worked beautifully against the enemy ship. The missiles impacted on her portside, and turned a ten-mile area of the ship, fully one-third of its length, into molten slag. Hundreds of weapons platforms, defensive stations and shield generators disappeared in the resulting explosions.

Two light years away from Terra, three Terran ships were heading for Alpha Centauri, to help boost the defenses of the last colonies of the Terran Federation.

Captain Charles Windsor sat in his command chair. He watched as the stars flew by on the main screen. His thoughts were on his home, and his beautiful wife. They'd had an argument when he had left. As usual, it had been about their daughter. The daughter that 'was no more' to him, for what she had done to his career, and to his life in...

Suddenly his thoughts were interrupted by a voice he hated.

She stood there watching her crew do their duty. She was the ship's AI, the ship's soul, the ship's life.

As she watched, the emergency com system chimed for her attention. She activated the relay to examine the message. It was 'Code Omega'. That was the ONLY code that was NEVER to be ignored. She quickly walked across the deck to stand by the captain's chair. Even though she knew he hated it when she bothered him, she knew that she had no choice.

"Captain, I am sorry to intrude on your thoughts. However, I have received a 'Code Omega' from the council."

Charles straightened in his chair, his orders snapped out to the crew.

"Lieutenant Sanders, contact the Dolphin and Dachshund. Notify them we are dropping out of fold. They are to set coordinates for an emergency jump back to the Sol system. Banks! Bring us out of fold, and set course for home."

"Aye-aye, Sir," replied Lieutenant Lisa Banks, as she went to work at her navigational board. Her light brown hair, though tucked into a ponytail, kept falling over her shoulder as she worked.

'Damn it, I should have cut it.'

"Captain, I have notified the Dolphin and Dachshund. They are dropping out, now," Lieutenant James Sanders reported from his communications station.

"Captain it's going to take about two hours for the fold home," Lieutenant Banks reported.

"Thank you Lisa. Commander Gomez, I want all pilots ready to launch..."

He stopped as the AI interrupted him again.

She was receiving a data stream from Pluto's sensors and brought it to Captain Windsor's attention.

"Sir, I am receiving telemetry from Pluto on the threat. Do you wish to see it?"

"Yes. Put it on main screen," Captain Windsor said as he looked at the AI with more than a little annoyance.

"Yes, Captain."

The main screen changed and the images of Pluto, her five defense stations, and her small space dock came onto the screen. In the distance, the T'Lari menace appeared. First the destroyers, and a few cruisers came into view.

Then the huge battleship appeared. Everyone who was viewing the screen gasped in shock. Across the status bar at the bottom of the screen, the telemetry feed wrote the size and statistics of the ship. Though they all read it, they could not believe it.

The crew watched as the huge ship approached Pluto's stations, and opened fire. Fighters and bombers burst from the stations on Pluto. However, they were smashed out of space by the cruisers, even as they opened fire.

With her fighters and bombers gone, the five space stations separated, to engage the enemy ships. A trio of destroyers hurled themselves at one of the stations. The first blew up when all five stations hit it with lasers. The second slipped through and slammed into the shields of one of the stations. The resulting explosion dropped the shields. The third destroyer smashed into the ten-mile wide station.

The resulting explosion hurled parts of the station, and the destroyer, into two of her sister stations and back onto Pluto. The remaining stations quickly went down under the T'Lari fire. Then the battleship turned on Pluto. Her entire bow opened up with more laser firepower than any of them had ever imagined. That was the last image received from Pluto, as the screen went black.

As the crew sat in shock, the AI shut the feed link down.

"Oh! My! God! AI you're dismissed," he said, and watched her disappear.

Then he took a deep breath, and started issuing orders.

"Commander Gomez, we will launch all available fighters and bombers. If any T'Lari destroyers or cruisers survive, those will be your only targets. If the rest of the fleet can't take that battleship out, I will not sacrifice you against it."

"Thank you, Captain. Truthfully, going against that monster would scare the most experienced of my pilots. They would do it, but it would affect their performance."

He shook his head to clear the image from his mind. He continued, saying, "I am ordering all fighters to be loaded with Odins and with Galahad missile packs. The bombers will carry six D-95 antimatter torpedoes and four Galahad missile packs."

Standing up from flight ops stations, he spoke as he walked to the doors, "I'd better get down to pilots briefing room, and get everything ready to go."

"Thank you, Timothy. Lisa? Are we ready to drop out?"

"Yes, Sir," replied Lieutenant Banks at her navigational station and responding to the Captain's orders, "Sir, exiting fold in 3... 2... 1 ... Now!"

The ship lurched and dropped back into normal space, as the emergency gate formed around them. Then they were cruising through empty space.

Lisa typed commands into her console, causing the ship to start turning. Bringing the ship around, the two destroyers were now on her flanks.

"Sir, we will be ready to re-enter fold in fifty seconds."

Opening a communications channel throughout the ship, Captain Windsor addressed the crew that he had known for over two years.

"This is the Captain. We have exited fold for a reason. We have received a Code Omega from the Council, ordering all ships home. This means the Sol system is under attack. My fellow crew, I warn you. It does not look good. I will have the AI replay the battle we saw. Make your prayers for our loved ones. They will need them."

She listened to his statement, and screamed out silently, 'Loved ones! I have no love in me!'

Down in the launch bays the ground crews rushed to load weapons and missile pods onto the waiting fighters. For the next two hours, the crew readied for battle. They made sure all the weapons were ready. Then they ate a meal, and prayed for victory. Two hours later, the three ships dropped out of fold into a graveyard of destroyed and mortally damaged ships.

Captain Windsor rose and walked up behind Lieutenants Banks, and Sanders.

"My God!"

Shaking his head, he could not believe the size of the debris field.

Looking down at Sanders, he asks, "James, where are they?" Lieutenant Sanders activated his scanners. He looked at the main screen and then down at the small screen before him.

"Scanning for them now, Sir."

James watched his sensors reach out and find the few remaining beacons, as he absently rubbed a scar on his right arm with his left forefinger. The sensors quickly reached out, and found the enemy ship.

"Got them, Sir. They are near Mars orbit. Sir they are under attack by Federation fighters."

"Thank you, James," Charles placed his hand on Lisa's shoulder and said, "Lisa, prepare to take us into fold. James, contact the destroyers and tell them we are doing an in-system fold. Tell them the co-ordinates. We will engage the enemy ship as soon we come out of fold." Lieutenant Sanders quickly relayed the orders to the destroyers.

"Sir! The destroyers have been notified. They will fold when we do." James reported as he sat back in his chair, again rubbing the scar with his left forefinger. It had been caused by the bite of one of the bugs. Now it was payback time.

Charles looked once more at the destruction of the defensive stations, "Lisa, fold us now."

"Sir! I am engaging fold, now."

The ships disappeared. They reappeared, forty thousand miles off the T'Lari battleship's flank, and deployed their fighters. They also opened fire with their heavy laser weaponry.

Around the planet Mars, the last battle was about to take place between the three surviving ships of Terra, and the T'Lari battleship sent to destroy all Terran life.

The T'Lari ship was thirty miles long. It mounted two hundred laser cannons and a thousand missile launchers per side. It had taken the T'Lari over five years to build the massive ship. It was 'manned' by a crew of over one hundred thousand.

While the T'Lari fleets had sought out, and destroyed all the Federation ships that could be found, the T'Lari had built this massive ship. They had depleted three solar systems of resources, for this one mission: destroy the planet Terra. It was commanded by a nine-foot-tall T'Lari, named S'Haarla. His six armored arms moved around his command tub, reaching out, and pressing buttons and touching video screens.

His eight-inch mandibles chewed on a piece of dried and salted human flesh, as he sent more missiles towards the helpless planet called Mars as they went by once more.

'Once all the Human worlds are destroyed, I will be promoted to the Royal Guard and allowed to metamorph. Then it is a short step to Royal Concubine and Leader of the Race. But only if I destroy Terra, and all her sister planets, and bring glory to my name, ' he thought to himself.

One of the minor T'Lari warriors turned from his sensor tub array, and said, "Sir? Three Terran ships have appeared out of hacklar space. They are two destroyers and one of their puny battleships."

Admiral S'Haarla did not even look up as he issued his orders.

"Open fire and destroy them. I am busy destroying their home world. Keep them away from the damaged flank."

He sent orders to his missile bays, and another thousand missiles belched out towards one of the human's home worlds.

The weapons officer locked his weapons onto the enemy ships and replied, "Opening fire, now ... What a waste of good meat."

As he started targeting the human ships, the pair of destroyers opened fire and caused minor damage to the shields. Suddenly, the battleship opened fire with her lasers. Their shields dropped to forty percent, and then to twenty percent as he returned fire. He watched the energy smash against the enemy shields.