It was a trap. Taranis the Thunderer, Taranis the Heavenborn, Taranis the Lord of Battles, had been deceived. Sat in the throne room of his massive flagship, his face contorted with rage, he shouted orders to his slaves and underlings and railed a thousand curses upon his foes. For all his fire and brimstone, defeat was inevitable. The war between the Star Gods had lasted for as long as time was measured and Taranis had risen to a considerable rank among his peers. But now the base cunning of Arawan and Nubb had cast all his plans asunder. As the battle had raged between the massive fleets of the Star Gods, the enemies of Taranis had precipitated the star they orbited into a supernova. Taranis had only time to open a hyperspace window before the shockwave reached his ship. Immediately, the Star God retreated his consciousness from his host into the metal frame that hid within the bowels of his ship. Taranis’ flagship was accelerated into hyperspace as several of his smaller motherships attempted to follow suit. The energy from the nova accelerated the ship a dozenfold, a hundredfold, a thousandfold. Sensors went dark. Every system on the ship went haywire. Bulkheads creaked, shields flickered.
For the Star God, it lasted barely a second. For the mortals on the ship, it seemed an eternity.
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Unknown star system
Deceleration was brutal. Dregaani slaves and Kotra warriors were hurled against the walls, many perishing as a result. Their lives were meaningless. From his iron sarcophagus, Taranis’ voice thundered through every intercom and loudspeaker on the ship:
“KOTRA MAK TEK! TARANIS HAKKI!!!”
The order fell like a hurricane on the stunned and bewildered servants. Though the body of their god had fallen limp from his seat, they heard his voice and knew his spirit endured. They could easily feel his rage at their failure. A defeat meant many sacrifices would be required to appease him. Those who kept their wits about them quickly regained their battle stations, trying to bring online the enormous flagship’s systems.
The quantum shields were barely operational, the cloaking field was flickering, sensors malfunctioned, but most weapon platforms were operational and self-repair systems had already engaged. Of the fleet, dozens of motherships could be seen reintegrating normal space in proximity of the flagship, several more were probably reappearing all over the star system and possibly beyond it.
Taranis extended his consciousness through the ship’s systems. It was a difficult task. The metal frame of the sarcophagus preserved his essence but it was taxing. In the eons since the Star Gods had started taking hosts, they had lost the ability to survive in their original state of pure energy. A living body of flesh and blood was now the optimal vessel for a Star God’s divine essence.
The sensors were still reeling from the uncontrolled hyperspace jump. The flagship was at the edge of a star system of 7 planets and several moons, all orbiting a massive main sequence star. It was impossible to get definitive readings on the planets to determine if they were inhabited. 38 motherships reported their status from all over the system, 13 were in the area of the flagship’s cloaking field, but it flickered in and out of existence, rendering it mostly useless at the present time. Over half the fleet reported their interceptor and bomber fleets still intact, not yet deployed in the recent battle.
But above all, Taranis did not recognize the system where he was. In fact, he could not make the position of his fleet at all. The supernova had blown his ships so far from known territory, it was probably in a new galaxy. A galaxy that likely contained no other Star God. A galaxy ripe for conquest.
From within his iron cage, the Thunderer smiled. Each mothership carried over 200 attack crafts and 1500 warriors along with their attendant slaves and his flagship had a hundred times that number. The remnants of his fleet were sufficient to carve out an empire. And when the lifeforms of this galaxy bowed before him, Taranis would return to Dregor and punish those who dared defy him.
While Dregaan and Koltra are humanoid, mammalian beings, Taranis is a "star god". Or rather, an energy being that styles itself a god, but in reality survives as a parasite on the lifeforce of other beings. He survives in an large, metallic sarcophagus at the center of his flagship until he can infest another lifeform, either one of his slaves, or a new beings from this new galaxy.
A Dregan Mothership is a formidable vessel armed with energy weapons, plasma torpedoes, mass drivers, and hundreds of point-defense railguns. It is either configured as a carrier with around 500 crafts both bombers and interceptors or as a planetary assault craft armed with atmospheric nuclear warheads and addition troops. Either type of vessel may land upon a stable planet to form an instant stronghold or base of operations. It is of a tall, oblong shape, with several docking bays on each side around its mid-section.
Taranis' Flagship, the Hand of Taranis, is an enormous vessel the size of a small moon. It is formed by a central pyramid-like structure surrounded by 3 concentric rings with various docking pylons stretching out for a few hundred to a few thousand meters. It possesses the same type of armament as the motherships but in larger quantity. It is incapable of atmospheric re-entry and can actually have a dangerous gravitational effect on small planetoids.
The entire fleet is severely damaged from its intergalactic, uncontrolled hyperspace jump. But here's an overview of their baseline technologies:
Quantum energy shields: An energy shield that affects the state of matter traversing it. It is very effective at deflecting energy based weapons though less so with kinetic weaponry. It can also absorb large energy discharges such as that of nuclear reactions. The energy is then converted to power the ship's own weapons. These shields are present both on capital ships and smaller crafts.
Automated repairs: Nanobots that coat every bulkhead inside and outside the ships. They have a limited ability to repair ships even during battle, making them very resilient unless concentrated firepower is applied. This process is independent of ship functions as the nanobots have their own internal, molecular power source.
Cloaking field: Taranis' flagship can emit a large warp bubble around itself. It displaces the space-time continuum in such a way that makes it nearly impossible to view or scan the ships around it. The effect does not discriminate between Dregaani ships and non-Dregaani ships, though most non-Dregaani ships have a hard time using their communications devices in the field's area.