Solar Wind "Supernova" - Part 101

This is a fan fiction. Events depicted here are not canon, though perhaps they could be. Special thanks to all my readers, you guys are epic (b~.^)>

Red Death is now a meme!

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Solar Wind Chapters:

Character Guide / First / Venlil Contact / Cradle Campaign

Battle of Terra / HF Rebelion / Defense of Khoa / Sillas Campaign

Supernova / Fall of Talsk / Interludes and Realignments

Those Who Fear Nothing / Seven Bowls of Wrath / The Road to Victory

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Memory transcription subject: Admiral Xantos, Aafa

Date [standardized human time]: 0424, March 20, 2137

The humans were advancing in a slow, grinding manner. They had learned from their mistakes, as well as those of Kalsim before them, and the human fleet was taking no chances.

UN destroyer squadrons were spread out like feelers in front of their main force. they were scouting space, picking the paths of least resistance, and guiding the battle fleets forward. At key points, single ships would make slashing attacks to remove sub-space disruptors and open narrow lanes wider. I had ordered ships to reseed the disruptors, and was having an effect, but still they advanced. The humans also were running with their own disruptors on. This meant that there was no chance for us to harass them on their way in the way they had against the extermination fleet.

Instead, High Command had opted for a single stand at our home and was amassing all the ships we could. We had managed to recover almost two hundred thousand ships from the Shadow fleet. The number left me disappointed, since it meant that in the small fraction of a standard year that we had been in the open we had lost almost fifty percent of our total power. A huge portion of them were lost to the human cyber-attacks, including several of our newest battleships. We were protected against that now, but the losses stung.

The regular fleet bolstered our numbers, giving us over fifty thousand cruisers, and almost as many lighter escorts and patrol ship. I would have said it was a potent force, but I had also watched human ships swat cruisers the way a mazic swats away flies.

We counted around one hundred thousand Coalition ships in total. If the humans lead with their ten dreadnought battle groups, we could lose tens of thousands of ships in minutes. While only tiny fraction of the human fleet, they performed far above what their numbers would have indicated. It was vitally important that we crushed this destructive core of the human force as quickly as possible, but I had seen myself how difficult that was. We needed more ships to be sure, ships which we didn't have. But someone else did...

My promotion to admiral had brought with it certain information that I hadn't been privy to before. I learned of the secret alliance between the kolshians and the arxur, how we were using each other, and what the ramifications of that were. It was a horrific revelation, and went against everything I had thought was true.

It hurt that the arrangement made sense in a pragmatic way. We would leave enough arxur alive to be an active villain for the Federation, which would in turn allow us (the Shadow Caste) to maintain our power. All the arxur had to do was kill the right targets, targets we would direct them towards. So long as they were the only active predator it would work.

But all that fell apart when the humans broke out of their system. They showed that predators could be reasoned with, that they were intelligent and feeling creatures, just as we were. And worse, they showed the mountain of lies that the Federation was built upon.

It was more offensive to me that the leaders of the Shadow Caste had no problem being monsters, and that their greatest fear wasn't the predators, but was actually the idea that they might lose power.

The greatest insult of all was knowing that I had no choice but to go alone with the betrayal. There was no way I could escape it. And as I watched another Arxur Dominion battle fleet come out of sub-space a single thought crossed my mind.

Saia... You knew all along, didn't you? You tried to warn me, but I didn't listen...