All is Fair

Chapter One

2285.7.7 - Outskirts of the Ningxian System

Commander Zheng Yun stood on the deck of the NSB Requital, feeling the constant acceleration of its drive pressing him downward. Not that there was truly a down in the void of space so far from his homeworld of Zhongning. Nor was the false sense of gravity anything more than a poor simulacrum of the real thing, a force which none of the Requital's crew had felt in any meaningful amount for months.

"Captain, the vessel is coming into range now. What are your orders, sir?"

Though he did not hold the formal rank, Zheng was indeed captain of the Requital, an interplanetary patrol ship not large or prestigious enough to warrant such a high ranking officer. Indeed, he was in overall command of the small fleet that had been sent to investigate the unscheduled opening of an artificial wormhole on the edge of the system. Requital was equipped with a jump drive capable of temporarily opening a stable wormhole to rapidly move great distances. It was capable of interstellar travel, but as a patrol ship belonging to a navy with jurisdiction over only one star system, it had never actually left Ningxia. In this case, it had opened a wormhole for itself, the Hawk, and the Traveller, two smaller ships incapable of faster-than-light travel on their own.

"Keep the deflectors up, put the guns on standby, and power up the PDLs, Lieutenant."

Zheng did not waste time explaining his orders to Lieutenant Verner Paulsen. The man was experienced, and knew that caution was never excessive when help was millions of kilometers away. Paulsen's family had moved to Ningxia from Earth just before the Antimatter Crisis, some seventy years ago, but he was just as much a Ningxian as Zheng, who's ancestors had been on Zhongning for centuries. The world was initially settled mainly by migrants from China, but in the many years since, waves of immigration brought in new people from all across settled space. The myriad of cultures had blended into something unique, and whenever Zheng was deployed to space, he mourned the separation from his home.

Zheng patched himself through to the Hawk. "Lieutenant Commander Mellos, take the Hawk in closer. I want to see whether this ship has a jump drive or not. If it doesn't, we need to be on the lookout for a gateship." Frustrating seconds passed, as the distance between the ships inevitably caused latency. Mellos' voice eventually sounded in Zheng's earpiece, "Yes, sir. We're intiating an increased burn now." Minutes passed, as the Hawk inched across the vast interplanetary void, nominally covered by the Requital and Traveller, though the unknown ship was still outside effective weapons range.

After a predictably tedious wait, Mellos spoke once more, "Commander, we can't be sur yet, but this ship is too well maintained to be a pirate vessel, and looks to be of Tavastian design." Tavastian design? That ruled out space nomads, but what would a lone Tavastian ship be doing on the edge of Ningxia, so far from the gateway stations? "Lieutenant Commander," Zheng hurriedly asked, "can you see their radiators?" Seconds passed, as possibilities rushed through Zheng's head. An invasion? Then why a lone ship? Perhaps it was an accidental misjump and nothing more. Mellos' reply would tell.

"Negative, Commander, we can't see their radiators."

Zheng's heart plummeted. There was only one reason for a ship to retract its radiators in open space. "Mellos, bring the Hawk about now. Get away from that ship!"

Three seconds passed. Then five. Then ten. No response from the Hawk.

"Give me a status report!" Zheng demanded, "What's going on out there?" He dropped into the captain's chair, hands clamping the armrests. "We've lost contact with Hawk." Ensign Ana Frexia responded. "It looks like they've been hit with a particle beam and their communications are down." A particle beam? At this range? Lieutenant Paulsen seemed equally dumbfounded. "Particle beams don't have that kind of range," he stammered, "the charged particles push each other apart and the magnetic deflectors would stop..." He trailed off. Zheng finished his line of thought for him. "They have a neutralised particle beam. A capital ship grade weapon." He left the rest unsaid for the sake of the crew's nerves. If they were up against a vessel with such powerful weaponry, their three patrol boats stood no chance of survival, let alone victory.
"Send a warning to fleet command," Zheng ordered, "and begin powering up the jump drive. Frexia, what is the status of the Hawk?" The Ensign remained silent for a moment, reading her display before speaking, "Sir, they've just been hit again. I think their drive is offline." Zheng cursed quietly, considering how they could get the Hawk out of range the Tavastian ship's weapons. Before he could come to an answer, Paulsen interrupted his train of thought. "Commander, I can't get a message out. That ship's jamming our long-range signals." Zhongning would notice the anomolous signals caused by jamming, of course, but wouldn't place a high priority on investigating it, especially since they'd already sent out three ships. No help would be coming.
"Only one option is left to us then." Zheng sighed. "Everyone strap in for maneouvring. We need to get close enough to take out that ship with our guns." He patched himself through to the Traveller, "Lieutenant Commander Xiang, we are moving to engage the enemy ship at close range. Retract radiators, sync your missile salvo with our own to cover the advance, and ready guns." Xiang responded in the affirmative, and the two vessels began a hard burn toward the Tavastian ship.
As they neared the position where the Hawk was first hit, Requital and Traveller launched synchronised volleys of missiles at the Tavastian vessel, which Zheng hoped would force them to repurpose their particle beam as a point-defence weapon. Within seconds of their being launched, missile after missile began exploding. Quickly. Too quickly. The cover wouldn't be enough. Zheng gave the order to fire a volley of railgun darts at the enemy. A desperate move at this range, since the ship could easily evade them, but if their point-defence was automated, it might take the bait.
Requital and Traveller hadn't even closed half the distance to weapons range when the last missile was destroyed. The darts started being targeted next, and the smaller projectiles were quickly deformed and sent wildly off course, each within milliseconds of the last. Another volley met a similar fate, and as the two ships launched a third, part of Traveller's hull suddenly began glowing red-hot. "Lieutenant Commander," Zheng cried through the comms to the other ship, "you're being targeted by a long-range laser! Take evasive action!" Without wasting time responding, Xiang evidently ordered his pilot to do so, as the Traveller immediately began rotating to disperse the incoming laser fire across its thick nose armour. The Tavastian soon started accounting for the rotation, concentrating fire once more on a small area, until Traveller changed the speed of rotation. This lethal game continued for several minutes as the two Ningxian ships closed the distance, occasioanlly firing volleys of kinetic darts to distract enemy point-defence. As the distance closed, however, the Tavastian lasers became more and more effective. The Tavastian laser began pulsing on and off repeatedly, causing violent explosions in Traveller's frontal armour as parts of it rapidly heated up and expanded. Traveller was sent just slightly off course, but before it could correct, several more lasers that had previously been shooting down darts quickly retargeted to Traveller's lightly-armoured sides.
Within seconds, Traveller's engines cut out. Before Zheng could even try to communicate with them, the ship was engulfed in a blinding explosion - vapourised in an instant. Zheng sat slackjawed as he watched his data feed, unable to process how quickly the ship had been destroyed. Then the Requital's sensors detected a temperature spike on the ship's nose. "Take evasive action." Zheng tried to shout, but his words barely came out as a whisper. "Sir!" Paulsen yelled, "Even if we make it into weapons range, we can't destroy this thing on our own! We have to retreat!" Zheng could barely think. He was in shock. He knew that, but it didn't help. He had just spoken to Xiang and now... "Paulsen, you have the bridge." That was all he could get out. The Lieutenant Commander looked confused for just a moment, before comprehending. "Prepare a tactical jump." Paulsen ordered, "Put a large asteroid between us and that ship. We can't let them know ehere we've gone or they'll jump after us."
With that, a distortion formed in the space ahead of Requital, as light from elsewhere in the system made an impossible journey through a nearly-invisible wormhole. The Tavastian ship couldn't see it, and so from their perspective, Requital simply vanished into the void. They would realise it had made a jump, but would have no idea where it went. Zheng went over the battle in head head, over and over again. How could such a small ship carry so much firepower? It had only used beam weapons, highly energy-intensive. It must be using an antimatter reactor, but only Earth could produce antimatter. Or rather, only Earth could produce antimatter legally. If Tavastia could produce their own antimatter, they could use it for much worse than simply powering advanced lasers. Zheng could not let them reach Zhongning - he could not let them reach his home.
After a long deceleration burn, the crew of the Requital found themselves floating in microgravity once more. Even the pale immitation of gravity now gone, Zheng was reminded by their absence of all he now fought to protect. The people of Zhongning, its pleasant air, the beautiful valleys and oceans. And he was also reminded of what had already been lost. The Tavastians had invaded, and killed a ship full of good, honourable soldiers. He didn't yet know how, but Zheng knew, somehow, he would make the Tavastians pay.

Chapter Two

2285.7.21 - Two weeks into the Tavastian invasion
After fleeing from the lone Tavastian ship, it had only taken hours for the crew of the Requital to learn that a full-scale invasion of Ningxia was underway by Tavastian forces. Numerous stations and habitats on the system's outskirts had been conquered or destroyed within days, and now Ningxia's meagre fleet was concentrating around Zhongning to make a stand against the aggressors. A pitched battle would be hopeless; Ningxia was not a military power, and Tavastia had been a force to be reckoned with even before the Entropy Cult siezed power.
Zheng didn't know the entirety of what central command was planning, but he did know his part. He was to cripple the enemy's supply routes by wreaking havok behind their lines. This was a task he was more than happy to carry out. The day after the invasion began, Requital returned to the scene of the battle to search for survivours. The Traveller had been completely destroyed in the battle - that he already knew - but Zheng had hoped to rescue some of the crew of the Hawk. The Tavastians had other ideas. Once Requital had jumped away, the Tavastian ship had closed i on the defenceless Hawk and bombarded it with particle beams, murdering its inhabitants with high doses of radiation. Zheng had heard of the ruthlesness of the Entropy Cultists before, but to see it himself, to have it end the lives of those under his command...
Focus was needed now. Requital had linked up with another ship, the Hongwu, an experimental corvette equipped with Earth-grade weapons systems, but lacking a jump drive. Thus the two had been paired, and set an initial goal of destroying a key Tavastian supply depot, which fleet intelligence believed was housing large quantities of antimatter. Destruction of that depot would to much to weaken the Tavastian fleet, and give Zhongning a fighting chance against the technologically superior foe. Every bit of damage Requital and Hongwu did, along with the efforts of similar raiding groups, the better the chance of victory.
"Commander Zheng", the Requital's comms spoke, "is the jump drive powered yet?". Captain Azcuaga of the Hongwu outranked Zheng, and thus she was in chage of the operation. "The primary battery is charged, Ma'am, but the emergency backup is only at twenty percent". Standard procedure in a combat zone was to maintain enough power for an emergency short-range jump after a normal jump in case of unforseen threats, a rather likely scenario due to ongoing events. "Do what you can to hurry the process, Commander," Azcuaga ordered, "shut down unnecessary systems, exceed heat thresholds, whatever it takes. We only have a narrow window before more Tavs show up at the depot".
Zheng did as he was commanded. Requital's radiators burned a brilliant gold as the ship's reactor surpassed safe operating temperatures, and the bridge turned dark despite the colossal amount of power flowing through the vessel. Such measures risked more than a reactor overload, as the excessive heat would attract the attention of any Tavastian sensors. Zheng hoped to be gone before anything came of it.
Only half an hour passed before Zheng received another message from the Hongwu. "Commander, the situation has evolved." The Captain's words filled Zheng with dread. "We just picked up a general distress call from a column of civilian vessels under attack by forward Tavastian units. Refugee ships from half a dozen habitats, with nearly fifty thousand on board." Zheng was immediately reminded of the callousness with which that lone ship had slaughtered those under his command. He replied with a terse question.
"How many targets do we have?"