[RoS] Puppet Master

[mwerte]

Year 794 A.S. Month 2 Malta Standard Cycle

Zacarias Fiedan was born on Ruiz base. He was born to the Commodore of Ruiz (his father) and one of the Ruiz Defense Force fighter pilots. Such a relationship between officers and non-officers was, of course, against regulations so as soon as his mother found out she was pregnant she resigned from the Fleet in hopes of saving the Commodore's career. Though she was no longer a combat pilot she stayed on Ruiz and worked in a merchant's shop there to support herself.

After Zacarias was born grew up in this military family until he was 19 when he enrolled in the Officers Training School of Malta. His parents were proud of his choice, except instead of Fighter Squad Command or the Army Officer's, he chose the Fleet Officer Corp. Both the Army and the Fighter Corps despised the Capital ships and their "god-ego" captains. But Zacarias was determined because he loved the big ships. When he was younger he would sit and watch videos of them for hours on end.

So he left Ruiz, bidding his parents goodbye, and headed for Malta.

Year 817 A.S. Month 13 Malta Standard Cycle

"Hard to starboard, hard to starboard!!" The Captain of Requiem shouted. Zacarias' task force of 3 Destroyers, of which Requiem was the lead ship, were stationed in Beta to defend Ruiz Base. A Bounty Hunter Battleship had entered Beta to hunt for an Outcast fighter pilot who had pissed off a Universal Shipping head honcho. It was the task force's job to make sure he didn't succeed. The battleship's shields were falling, but it was still pouring firepower into Requiem, who's shields had fallen and was sustaining hull damage.

"Hit them with the full power of our guns!!" Yelled Captain Hombries, commanding officer of Requiem

"Get Merciless and Terror behind that monstrosity to disable her engines, we don't want the cowards running." Snarled Vice Admiral Tirfo, who was in charge of the whole task force.

Around the battleship Saber and Manta fighters were engaged in a broiling battle for supremacy. Whichever side won would be able to launch bombers who could turn the tide of the battle for the bounty hunters, or secure victory for the Outcasts.

KaBOOOM!! An explosion on the third deck made Requiem shudder and lose power momentarily. The enemy gunners had just scored a solid hit on the Outcast ship.

"Veer us about, loose the enemy in the rocks till the engineers get our shields are restored!" ordered Captain Hombries.

But the bounty hunters wouldn't give up and chased after Requiem scoring hit after hit. Unfortunately the Mantas got left behind, and without the suppressive fire of the battleship they started to fall quickly.

A missile streaked in and detonated against the hull right near the bridge of Requiem. Captain Hombries was instantly decapitated by a flying sheet of metal, the second in command was sucked out the hole that was opened in the ship's hull before the force fields could close the hole. Vice Admiral Tirfo was tossed by the explosion against the wall and slid down unconscious. And just like that, Chief Comm Officer Fiedan was in charge of Requiem.

This fact took a moment to sink in as the crew called for medics and got back to their stations. "Oh ****" were the only words he could muster.

Something inside him broke, but the rest of him started snapping orders and working furiously to save the ship.

"Bring us about, head toward Ruiz, this idiot seems intent on following us so let's lead them to our guns.

Inform Captain Donovian of Merciless that he's in charge of the task force. Let Ruiz know we are coming and" he grinned as he checked rear scanners "that the bounty hunter battleship is without its fighter escort."

"Aye Sir!" The new comm officer replied.

"Ok brothers, lets keep this ship alive.

Engineering, I need all the power you can muster, first priority is the shields, second is hull integrity , third is engines and fourth is guns.

Comms, let Merciless and Terror know what we are doing.

Repair crews get up here now.

Helm, keep us away from those rocks, we're over our Damage Taken quota already today.

However Guns we are NOT over our Damage Given quota today, correct that problem ASAP. Keep firing at that battleship, aim for the bridge, that should make em flinch.

Helm, try to shield Ruiz from their sight, we don't want them to catch wind of our plan do we?"

"Aye Sir!"'s rang out around the bridge.

Requiem moved at full speed toward Ruiz. The enemy was right behind them the entire way taking off chunks of her hull. They weren't going to make it...they weren't going to make it...they weren't going to make it... the ship shuddered under another barrage as the bounty hunters smelled victory. One more salvo and the bounty hunters would fracture Requiem's hull. Then it could turn and engage the other 2 destroyers...a battleship vs 2 destroyers is no contest, even a battleship as battered as theirs was sure to win. The gunners lined up their shot...

and bolts of laser power streaked toward Requiem. She dived and the shots passed over them and splashed harmlessly into Ruiz's shield. Ruiz's return fire wasn't so kind to the battleship. As the bounty hunters turned to try and run Ruiz turned whole sections of their ship into slag. And now the finisher, 2 squads of bombers streaked in from either side of the battleship and unleashed their antimatter cannons into the battleship's hull. Catastrophic hull failure began to occur and escape pods began to jettison from the doomed ship. The few remaining Mantas managed to grab a few as they fled but Ruiz picked up more. Bad times awaited those bounty hunters.

Merciless and Terror opened up yet again on the battleship, rupturing its Reactor Core turning the whole ship into a molten fireball. Victory!!

Aboard Requiem every alarm that could go off was. Hull breaches, reactor failure, life support going out the hull, losing power...all the alarms you REALLY don't want to hear.

"Ruiz this is Requiem we need to make full power to Corsica for repairs. Thank you for the assist." Transmitted Zacarias to his father.

"Anytime Requiem. And son...good job."

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After the repairs were completed a reward ceremony was held aboard Ruiz to commemorate the victory. And to give Zacarias his first official command, the Requiem.

For the next year and a half Requiem, Merciless, and Terror patrolled Beta, keeping it safe. Requiem remained the task force flagship, and Captain Fiedan proved to be an outstanding commander. Maybe it was all that experience he had from his father running the base. Or maybe it was from watching his mother manage the store. Whatever it was he was an extremely efficient commander.

They were then rotated to the far side of Eta, on the other side of the minefield, to protect and give advance warning to the rest of the fleet.

During that time the battle group received a Red Hessian Cruiser and command was transferred to that ship, the Malice. The defended Eta with spectacular results. 17 Praefect class Cruisers , 9 Dreadnoughts, 1 Osiris, and hundreds of gunboats/fighters/bombers all fell to the Outcast's guns. And that's not including any ships that were killed while working with other task forces or ships.

At the end of that tour of duty Zacaria was recruited by the RoS Archon to command their new flagship; PuppetMaster. PuppetMaster was one of the first new Outcast Battleships ever put into combat. It was originally given to the leader of the [LR]; Valdar under the name Graviton. This ship was returned to the Outcasts after the LR had failed in they're mission to suppress Liberty, and now with the RoS Zacaria would see more combat now then ever before. Puppet Master was comissioned as a flagship of the Reapers of Sirus fleet. And in that position it would strike at the very spawn of evil itself; Crete.

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