Alternate History - Gallia Triumphant!

[Capt. Henry Morgan]

23 October 826 AS
Edinburgh/Aquitaine System

The destruction of Cambridge University several weeks past, rather than calming the situation down, only inflamed the resistance further. In the aftermath, roughly half of the BAF defected to the resistance, and managed to carve out an independent Bretonia in the Omega-3, Cambridge, and Poole systems. Since then, a rough stalemate had settled in. The Free Bretonian Navy lacked the forces to liberate New London, and the Gallic Royal Navy was stretched thin trying to secure both occupied Bretonia against the FBN and their home territory against the Council. The situation wouldn't last, though. Everyone knew something had to break soon.

That's why, in an attempt to bolster flagging morale amongst the occupation forces and project the appearance of strength and security, King Charles himself was on a tour of the Hebrides and Occupied Bretonia. His latest stop, after touring Roussillon and the recently recaptured Tau-44, was the newest jewel in the Gallic Crown. Planet Bordeaux, formerly known as Gaia. Development on this once-pristine world had been rapid, and most of the Gallic nobility had already constructed lavish estates on some of the choicest land.

Despite the heavy security that accompanied a royal visit, Bordeaux was the resistance's best opportunity to strike. For the first time, the King would not be on his ship, and Bordeaux's defenses weren't as well established as those on Leeds or New London. Simultaneous large-scale raids by the Council in the Taus and a renewed offensive by the Liberty Navy in Cortez and Magellan drew away most of the forces normally stationed in Aquitaine, and would slow the arrival of reinforcements.

The Gallic Royal Navy had dispatched most of the ships in the system to deal with the enemy attacks in the Taus and the Libertonian Border Worlds, leaving the system's defenses to local patrols and the King's own escorts. Some of the GRN's officers were uncomfortable having the King so lightly defended, but they were confident that the enemy wouldn't be able to get any significant forces into the system undetected. That's why they were taken completely by surprise when a diverse flotilla of enemy ships from the Free Bretonian Navy, the IMG, the Gaians, and the Fifth Vagrant Fleet suddenly appeared in orbit of Bordeaux. As soon as the ships got their bearings after the jump, they broke and attacked, managing to inflict heavy losses on the Gallic defenders before the GRN managed to regroup into an effective defense.

In the chaos, nobody on the Gallic side noticed when a number of troop transports and light fighters undocked from the VCS Olympia and flew directly for Bordeaux.

---

23 October 826 AS
Bordeaux Spaceport, Planet Bordeaux

Taskmaster Eva Flores' troops were fortunate that Bordeaux's defenses weren't completely in place yet. They'd have never made it into the atmosphere on any other populated world. The fighters escorting her transports managed to clear the skies of whatever defenders could scramble without taking any losses. Now, her troops were on the ground, working to secure the spaceport to prevent anyone from leaving the planet. During a lull in the fighting, Flores thought about how they had reached this point.

Ever since Tau-44 had fallen to the GRN life had been difficult for the remnants of Natio Octavarium. They had managed to evacuate their entire civilian populace from Canberra and joined a Crayterian flotilla evacuating as many of their own civilians to Coronado as they could. The Octavarium Cabinet and much of the government bureaucracy had chosen to evacuate aboard the exploratory ship Redshift. The Redshift had been scheduled for a shakedown cruise and jumpdrive test at the beginning of the year, but the project had been put on hold due to the Gallic victory, and instead resources had been put into shoring up the Fleet. The only government official not aboard the Redshift was Taskmaster Escher of the Octavarium Intelligence Commission, who had chosen to remain aboard the OCS Black Cloud to help with the defense. The Fourth Octavarium Fleet and Octavarium Intelligence Commission worked worked with the Crayter Military to give the civilians time to escape.

After the civilians made it safely out of the system, the military forces soon followed. The GRN, preferring to consolidate their gains and avoid taking further losses, chose to allow the Crayterian and Octavarian fleets to withdraw. They soon regrouped in Coronado to take stock of their losses. The Redshift had suffered some sort of malfunction in its jump drive and failed to appear in Coronado. That, combined with the loss of the Black Cloud with all hands meant that the Octavarian remnants were now without their leadership. The civilians from 44 were soon settled into a hastily-built refugee colony on Baja, with no distinction made between Crayterian and Octavarian citizens. Former OMG Guildmaster John Riley took charge and formed a governing council to lead the new colony and see to the people's needs.

The military was a different story. The Crayterian government chose to place their remaining military forces on a defensive footing, a decision that didn't sit well with everyone in the Crayter Military. They tried to convince the Fourth Octavarian Fleet to merge with the Crayter Military, but nobody in the Fleet was interested. They wanted Gallic blood, and they wouldn't get it by sitting in Coronado and waiting. Admiral Xander chose to resign his commission and join them, and brought a significant portion of the Olympia Battlegroup with him. The new combined forces of the OIC, the Fourth Octavarium Fleet, and the Olympia Battlegroup christened themselves the Fifth Vagrant Fleet, under the overall command of Taskmaster Penrose, formerly Commander Kelly Combs of the OIC, and set about striking Gallia's supply lines in the Taus, boarding transports and destroying GRN stragglers wherever they could find them.

Flores' ruminations were interrupted by an alert on her visor. She quickly opened a comm line.

"Warlord Bravo 6, Warlord Bravo 6, this is Warlord 6 Actual, over."

"This is Warlord Bravo 6, go ahead, over."

"You've got a frog squad trying to sneak up on your right flank, over"

"Copy, Warlord 6 Actual. We see it, moving a squad to intercept, over."

"Acknowledged, Warlord 6 Actual out."

As Flores closed the comm line, she saw a squad from Bravo Company break off and take up position to intercept the enemy soldiers. Content that the situation was in hand, she checked on other units' progress and what her command suit's sensors could see of enemy movements. So far, Taskmaster Xander's plan was working out flawlessly. The audacity of jumping an entire fleet so far behind enemy lines had put the GRN on the back foot, and they were completely unprepared for the ground attack. They already controlled most of the spaceport, including the landing pads. The garrison was, naturally, proving to be the toughest nut to crack, but Flores knew her troops would take it down soon, and they'd soon be able to begin sweeping the city to hunt down and capture King Charles and put an end to the war once and for all.

Once again, her ruminations were interrupted by an alert on her visor. Rather than enemy movements, however, the alert was for a group of allied ships flying towards the city opposite the spaceport. IFF data indicated a mixed group of Vagrant and Bretonian freighters with a handful of fighters escorting. Freighters? Confused, she zoomed her suit's optics in for a closer look at the ships. Visual inspection confirmed what the IFF data said, but something looked a bit off about the ships. As they moved closer, she made out what looked like gas dispersal rigs attached to each of the freighters.

It took a moment before the implications sunk in. "Madre de dios..." She quickly reopened the comm line, hoping the order wouldn't come too late.

"BREAK, BREAK! This is Warlord 6 Actual. All units, engage NBC protocol. Repeat, All units engage NBC protocol now! Over!"

As the chorus of acknowledgements came in, the freighters flew overhead, spraying their deadly payload over the spaceport. Soon after, an alarm went off in her helmet. Something was eating away at the seals on her suit. Suddenly, she understood why Taskmaster Penrose hadn't been interested in the ground attack planning after the capture of the spaceport itself. Flores and her troops were never meant to capture anyone. Their role here was merely to keep the Gauls confined to the planet. Flores knew she was going to die on this world, so she did the one thing remaining to her. She checked the weapons on her suit, then joined the attacking troops herself. If this was to be the end, Flores would make sure her sacrifice, and the sacrifice of those under her command, would not be in vain.

---

The attack on Bordeux had been the brainchild of Taskmaster Penrose and Commodore Sarah Mountbatten of Free Bretonian Navy. They had created a cocktail of biotoxic nanobots, replicated from a sample taken from Canberra Star City, and spores from the Carlisle bacteria, then sprayed it over every populated area on the planet. What remained of the deadly cargo after that was sprayed at random before the freighters left the atmosphere. Bordeaux, as new construction, did not yet have VIP shelters in place. Within hours, much of the civilian populace was dead, at first mainly from the nanobots, but more from the bacteria as the spores came to life. The few that managed to seal themselves in died within a day after that, as the nanobots slowly breached what makeshift containment people were able to erect on short notice.

The nanobots were not designed to self-replicate, and shut down over the first couple days. The bacteria, on the other hand, found fertile ground, as nothing in Bordeaux's ecosystem had a defense against them. Over the coming months, the flora and fauna across the entire planet was infected and died off. This once beautiful, pristine world was fast turning into a tomb, devoid of life.

Gallic investigators later learned that the King himself, along with his entourage, managed to get off world on the Governor's private yacht. It was the only ship on the planet that was not at the spaceport, and they managed to slip off world while the attacking forces were withdrawing from orbit. The yacht, not being a military ship, was not equipped for decontamination, and some of the bacterial spores were brought on board. Weeks later, the ship was found adrift in space, everyone aboard having died in agony as the bacteria dissolved their internal organs. The investigators shuddered at the realization of how close the Gallic people had come to a massive epidemic.

As Gaia died, one thought was on everyone's mind, from Gallia to the deep Omegas. King Charles and much of the Gallic nobility was dead, but was peace worth the price paid?