Turn 52 - Illuminates My Soul
As the Drac force burns in from the Nadir, bypassing the Star Fort there, you force yourself to not focus exclusively on the incoming threat.
And instead you read some reports from the Special Branch. They’ve finally cracked the maze of shell companies that obscured the ownership of the law firm that has been coordinating the, well, perversions of the oligarchs, and they discover that it is actually owned and operated by the sixth oligarch, the one who’d been the most slippery fish of them all. It appears the old bastard runs the entire thing as a means of generating endless blackmail on his rivals in the media business, thus ensuring that his firm remains the ‘top dog’ in the market with the single largest market share of them all.
It turns out that the wily old bastard is merely continuing in his father’s footsteps, as the long deceased man had been one of your grandfather’s… agents, using blackmail, bribes, and assassination to eliminate your grandfather’s enemies. His father had served your great-grandfather as a spymaster, but evidently your father and the bastard in question had a falling out, leading to the old man going fully private sector. Now the bastard is sitting in his web, with agents and intrigues spanning the political, economic, and media landscape of Griffin’s Roost.
But webs, and spiders for that matter, are most dangerous in the dark, when they can hide and work their schemes and plans in secret. You now knew about him, and with the final keys to the puzzle in your hand you are in a position to decisively crush this monstrous arachnid (to keep the analogy going as long as you possibly can to keep from screaming in rage).
The good thing is you no longer need to wait. You finally have enough legal evidence and proof to wrap up the entire evil stinking mess and consign it to the trash can of history, where such foulness and evil ultimately belongs. You not only have the direct evidence of the crimes of all of the big fish, but you now have the full financial history of every single account used to pay out bribes, payments to enforcers, thugs, and murderers, all of the blackmail material, all of the communications, everything.
You call in Janet and give the order. The oligarchs fall. Today.
Special Branch, accompanied by the Royal Grifftiger Mounted Police and with the full assistance of the Imperial Guard strike simultaneously across the Griffon system. Over four thousand suspects are arrested in the first fifteen minutes, within the hour that number has been multiplied by ten. By the end of the day over a hundred thousand individuals, most of them ‘little fish’ involved in peripheral corruption, money laundering, and participating as couriers and such, are in custody and the jails are bulging at the seams.
What makes it especially sweet is that you are in a state of martial law and emergency thanks to the incoming attack. That lets you ignore the little niceties and courtesies like ‘timely arraignment’ and ‘bail’, as your garrison forces on Griffin’s Roost prepare for the invasion you keep their construction crews busy building prison camps to hold all of the prisoners, who are being held incommunicado without bail or counsel ‘for the duration of the emergency’.
The best part? There is absolutely no need to cut any plea deals in exchange for testimony. You already have more than sufficient evidence to put every single perpetrator involved away for life…
at the minimum. For most of them you have enough for a noose.
That reminds you, you could be really vicious, at least to the big fish… technically you are in a state of war, technically their actions have distracted you from the prosecution of that war, so technically you could charge them with High Treason with a lovely little ‘in time of War’ rider, which would allow you to have those convicted of that cut, drawn, and quartered rather than merely hung by the neck until dead.
| [] | The bastards deserve it! | Unknown Effect |
| [] | Dead is Dead, no need to be excessive about it | Unknown Effect |
The planet goes to full lockdown as the enemy armada approaches.
SARAH noted that the course of the invaders would pass by a transient pirate point about 6 hours short of orbit, and that the Dracs appear to intend to insert the station they’ve been towing along with them into orbit to support their operations rather than use it as a KEW.
Sure enough, as the Drac forces pass the pirate point it erupts, 20
Monoliths jump in and release 180 dropships, including sufficient
Overlords to drop 15 regiments of mechs on the planet, along with 65 of the abominations of technology that are the pirate
Stinger dropships. The newcomers detach and accelerate hard, quickly matching velocity profiles with the incoming force.
325 enemy dropships. Yet even with those massive numbers, your defensive forces actually outmass the enemy. 60 dropships, 5 defensive space stations, including 4 of the new Mk 1 Naval Defense Stations, are a frail shield against the horde, but your formation includes
Royal Sovereigns, freshly repaired after the battle at the Zenith,
HMS Renown, the
Devastations… what you lack in quantity, you make up for with quality.
Defensive aerospace fighters soar from their bases, 26 wings strong. Even the training wings from the Aerie take to the skies, piloted by a mix of instructors and the best of the graduating class pilots. On the ground the garrisons are at their posts, all fortifications are fully manned, and the mobile forces are ready to react to wherever the enemy lands. 1st Armored Division, 3rd Armored Division, 1st Rapid Reaction Force, the Imperial Guard… You match the incoming enemy, at least in numbers of regiments, but theirs are battle hardened, and probably all mechs, while yours are a mix of mech and conventional formations who have never heard a shot fired in anger.
The engagement begins.
A swarm of sub-capital missiles, lasers, and cannon erupt from your forces, answered by the 20 modified
Overlords of the enemy, each firing a quartet of light cannons in reply. Your forces keep the range open for as long as they can, delaying the engagement to give the long range naval artillery the chance to soften up the enemy. The fighter’s surge forward, beginning their own orbital dance as swarms of
Sabre and
Swarmer fighters engage your heavier birds. You have
SARAH turn off the unit icons for the aerospace fighters, as there were so many they were obscuring the rest of the engagement.
The mass of enemy dropships close inexorably, the light and agile
Achilles,
Avenger,
Leopard-CV and
Stinger dropships screening the
Overlords, taking hits that would have jeopardized the landing force. It is obvious that as far as the Dragon is concerned their only objective is to get those Mech carriers to the ground, every other dropship in the force is expendable to that goal.
You hold your breath as the first
Overlord catches a Piranha missile in the drive and detonates. 2 more of the transports join the first in death, but ultimately the screen was too thick, the
Overlords reenter, burning in to land on Castor. Enough transports to carry 14 regiments, and they’re landing. Your ground forces will be facing an extremely stern test.
In orbit the battle continues, freed from the need to defend the transports the enemy assault dropships maneuver aggressively against your forces, which ironically plays to your strengths rather than theirs. The engagement grows fiercer and fiercer. The enemy forces are attriting rapidly, but you are taking losses of your own.
HMS Hardy, the oldest of the
Tyrannosaurus class vessels present is swarmed by a quartet of
Achilles and left a drifting hulk. HMS Eden is destroyed in a collision with a half-crippled
Leopard-CV, while HMS Doon suffered a death of a million cuts from the enemy aerospace fighters. HMS Devastation attracts a disproportionate amount of attention from the modified
Overlords carrying the light sub capital cannons and is battered into destruction, although not before taking out the last of the 20 ships focusing fire on her. HMS Repulse had been in the thick of the fighting, seemingly enduring the incoming fire and shrugging it off, before the
Devastation-class vessel suddenly detonates in a massive explosion that briefly rivals the brightness of the sun.
Both the 1st and 2nd Planetary Defense Wings of aerospace fighters are utterly devastated in the combat, taking crippling losses and being effectively destroyed as effective formations for now. The 2nd Patrol Wing is likewise rendered hors de combat.
Losses, yes. But ultimately? The Drac forces in orbit are annihilated to the last fighter, and then your remaining forces burn hard for the pirate point and the 20
Monoliths. An hour before they arrive, the Drac jumpships attempt to jump out… and 14 of them disappear, 2 more detonate in massive explosions, but 4 are left behind, drifting without power. By the time your forces arrive they are able to board those four, finding the crews dead and the vessels rather crippled but repairable.
