Commodore Robot — Roleplayer Guild

Hyper Dreadnought Bitter Work, 2nd Fleet of Recalcitrant Justice Flagship
High orbit of Luga IX, Luga system, Chelonian Dominion.

The night sky of Luga IX was alight with actinic fire as giants clashed high above. Orbital fortresses, weapon satellites, and a squadron of beleaguered light cruisers found themselves in a doomed battle against the forces of the 2nd fleet of Recalcitrant Justice. From his crash couch aboard the Bitter Work Dominator Brosh-Vataga saw the battle, or massacre, unfold in real time and felt a deep melancholy. His duty was an unfortunate one, but it was needed to preserve the rule of law. The planetary branch of the Ministry of State had incited a revolt against Dominion authority on Luga IX 180 hours prior, they claimed that the current Vaata-Kreg was leading the Dominion towards disaster and that their only hope of survival was to break away from the Home Office on Chelona and start anew. It was unfortunate that their words had gotten such traction and that they had managed to sway all orbital defense forces. If they had remained loyal then perhaps the Dominator would not have been needed. Countless innocents would die for their transgressions, but that was the way it had to be. 

The Bitter Work shuddered as another volley of missiles left their Gauss launchers. The battle had lasted a little less than an hour, most of it spent maneuvering into firing positions. 2nd Fleet had more than one hundred combat ships at her disposal, but even without the massive numerical advantage space war always favors the attacker over the defender. The rebel cruisers had been turned into pincushions by invisible beams of coherent radiation from dozens of sources, and weapon satellites were little more than disposable missile clusters, without ammunition they were no longer a threat. The orbital forts had fared slightly better, two of them had miraculously managed to survive the first volley of fire from 2nd Fleet in fighting condition. This was not to last of course, the latest spread from the Bitter Work and the other warships in the fleet put an end to their fruitless rebellion. 

As the dust settled, the part of these operations that Dominator Brosh-Vataga hated the most was set to begin. The rebellious leaders would have to be made example of. Were this a normal insurrection they could have simply sent down ground forces to wrench the capitol from the traitor's hands and keep the infrastructure intact. Unfortunately the Luga system was home to one of the Dominion's precious antimatter worlds. Perhaps the rebels thought that their proximity to something so precious would force the authorities to pull their punches, if that were that was the case then they would soon be sorely mistaken. Letting any potential traitors live with something so important on the line was not even considerable. For the sake of the Dominion, Luga IX would have to be made example of. Bitter Work would handle the duty of purification as was only right. The flagship was the Vaata-Kreg's justice made manifest, it alone would put the world to the sword. 

Brosh-Vataga motioned for his comm officer to patch him into Luga IX's public broadcast network. The people deserved to know the crimes for which they were to be punished. Clearing his throat, Brosh-Vataga began, "Citizens of Luga IX, your planetary leadership has been found guilty of the most heinous crime of insurrection. They have deceived you through their lies into rising against the rightful authority of the Dominion and for their crimes I am afraid you must all suffer. Those loyal few of you who spoke out against these traitorous vermin and alerted us take heart, you shall be martyrs to the cause of peace and security of our glorious Dominion. For those who stood in open opposition know this; your names will be forgotten, your fleeting accomplishments shall be stricken from history, your legacy shall be naught but glass and ash. You threatened that which is most precious to the Dominion and for that there will be no recourse, no mercy, no hope for you and your ilk. Make peace with your gods for you will find none with me." The Dominator ordered the connection to Luga IX severed and nodded to his weapons officer as he sank back into his crash couch.

A quartet of massive warheads began to descend onto Luga IX from the belly of the Bitter Work. As they entered the atmosphere they began to divert course from one another to focus on their respective targets. At a height of 100km they began to unfurl and split apart. Each weapon unleashed a total of sixty self-guiding submunitions from their bodies down towards the surface of Luga IX. Each submunition was a 2MT fusion bomb, their simple targeting AIs were programmed for continental denial. Primary targets were population centers, followed by arable land, and finishing with military infrastructure as the lowest target priority. As the emissaries of death fell their AIs conferred in a silent congress on target placement and which bombs were to fall where. The simplicity and smoothness of the operation was beautiful in a way that was lost on the terrified citizens of Luga IX and the rebel soldiers who remained at their posts waiting for an enemy that would never come as the bombs found their mark. 

Luga IX had been a garden world with a population of 4 billion pre-rebellion. After Rebellion it was estimated that 180 thousand had survived the initial attack, but would not survive the next year without outside assistance. Assistance the Dominion had no intention of sending.

Watchpoint 43, Lagrange L2 of Borgash I, Borgash system, Chelonian Dominion

Space Traffic Controller 4th class Varo-Lug(full name Varo-Lug-Srid-Drag-Bar-Orv) was not having a good week. There were no good weeks on Watchpoint 43, not for Varo-Lug. He was a Space Traffic Controller, his duty was to control space traffic within his designated quadrant of space surrounding the fledgling colony of Borgash I, but there was the minor problem of having no traffic to control. Borgash was a recent acquisition, the request to construct a Rift Gate had probably not even reached Chelona yet (it had been submitted two years prior). No rift gate meant no civilian space craft coming to and from the system, which could still be fine, military vessels had their own rift drives and could potentially arrive and need directing. That is, if there were ever a reason for military vessels to head in even the general direction of the Borgash system, which there was not. And so it was that Varo-Lug's days were spent in a small cubicle staring at half a dozen empty screens, each displaying the same information but in different ways. He checked each one for what must have been the thousandth time this rotation. The IFF register showed nothing, just like always Rift sensors showed nothing, just like always, Radar showed a single blip, just like always. Lidar showed a single blip, just like alwa-"What!?" Varo-Lug surprised himself with his own exclamation.

There weren't supposed to be any blips. He checked and rechecked again, there was definitely something out there. A rather fast something, too fast and too hot to be an asteroid, it had to be some kind of ship. He ran back the logs to earlier in the shift trying to figure out when it jumped in but there were no recorded rift signatures. There had been nothing one moment, and then suddenly there was something. Unsure of what to do, Varo-Lug did the prudent thing, he attached the data to a priority message to his boss: Space Traffic Controller 2nd Class Groon-Krad. Groon-Krad, equally unsure of what to do (after confirming the data himself) also sent a priority message to his boss: Station Overseer Roon-Orv. Considering that Roon-Orv's boss was 150 light years away, he was forced to make a decision. By his order condition one was set throughout the deep space listening post. 

While classified as a listening post, Watchpoint 43 was in many ways indistinguishable from the class of planetary defense fortresses that it was modeled on. Most of its hangar capacity had been reduced to make room for sensitive surveillance equipment, and in many places weapon systems had been removed, but it was just as heavily armored, and still maintained the heavy graser batteries of its cousins. Those same batteries were now coming to bear on the unidentified ship which had just entered the Borgash system. At the same time what amounted to the Borgash defense fleet(3 sloops and an outdated protected cruiser) came about on intercept vectors with the newcomer which they would reach in a little more than 11 hours. From Watchpoint 43 a message was broadcast at the intruder on all frequencies, "Attention unidentified vessel, identify yourself immediately or be fired upon in accordance with Dominion Navigational Law."
@Willy Vereb
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