Home to the former Grand Duchy of Farnin,the first 'Zodarrin' duchy established by the Old Imperium{The Second Imperium} was once one of the most prosperous market worlds in the entire Outer world sector,rivaling the more accessible Allui station once owned by the Clan Kyodain,the planet was ruled under a benevolent yet totalitarian duke that rebuilt the former duchy's economy after a backlash caused by rapid privatization of all industry sectors and the outsourcing of most labour jobs to machines causing a overwhelming unemployment rate.

After the Varanus helped integrate the duchy into the empire it seemed all would be well,the duchy had a large standing army and because their world was the only way to enter Imperial space legally it saw much trade from various merchants hoping to gain exotic Varanus goods....But then.....The Immortals released a biovirus...a parasite that caused a zombie outbreak...Following military action the empire contained it...But lost more then 62% of the population with a further 31% becoming a subspecies that was formed into the Imperial Hospitaliers as seen today.....

Then as the Duchy was licking it's wounds came the Helix crisis.....

The Duchy fell when New Serpentum was lost....Without the combined command of the Varanus commanders the defense forces faltered and fled with the rest of the Imperial remnants....Farnin was left to the dogs.

Until now.

Several Imperial battleships and transport frigates appeared in orbit....The operation was led by Grand Marshal Hendrick Steenbergen of the former Duchy Reserves,now leader of the Imperial Hospitaliers,he was clad in his furred coat and his gloves hid aged hands,he was one of the more respected humans in the empire a large scar ran across his face from wars long past.The recon reports made his face furrow as he reread them over and over...Farnin was seemingly abandoned..Helix did not establish a foundry nor did they embed themselves into the planet like a fungus....No Farnin was abandoned...Yet the ship scanning devices picked up weak energy signals from the ruined metropolis....

"All regiments report in" Called the Commanding Admiral across the Imperial channel.

Almost on cue a series of silver ships warped into orbit; one Phalanx-Class Heavy Cruiser and several Aurora-Class Frigates in formation around it. From the bridge of the main ship, the GSU Consecrator, General Dumont stood adorned in his full white and red Legionnaire armour with his helmet resting on the terminal beside him. The crew had a rare glimpse at his rugged, battle-scarred face where one eye seemed to be nearly pure white. There was no hair upon his head, but it was unclear whether that was by choice.

"Sir, we are hailing the Imperial channels." One of the Fleet Officers to his right called out, to which Dumont replied with a firm nod.
"Imperial Forces, this is General William Dumont of the GSU Consecrator. Us and our accompanying Frigates are at your disposal for operations on Farnin. Our marines are ready for insertion on your command to enter the atmosphere." He spoke clearly through the comms, turning away only when he had finished to speak to his Legionnaire squad.

"Assemble your gear, things could be messy down there."

The Cavalier was in its last 10 minutes of travel before they would arrive. This is where the most dangerous portion of the journey came into play. Everyone on board clenched their teeth and held on as the countdown began. "60..59..58..57" 
"Rear Admiral what are the odds we survive this massive braking maneuver?" Cameron asked as he strapped on his gravity belt. 
"Well according to the plans..37%," The Admiral said as he opened up the diagram from the holo-watch on his wrist. 
"Well, thats encouraging," Cameron said with little to no humor. 
"10..9..8...7..6..5...4..3..2..1..Now." As the ship said this the entire ship made an awful ripping sound louder than an artillery round going off in your eardrum. The people on the ship took a deep breath as their belts held them in place. They had survived miraculously. 

Cameron leaped out of his seat as he hit the comm button. The comm's scrambled and then grabbed ahold of the Imperial lines. "This is Cameron Fier of the Scelforian Oligarchy." His voice was back to authoritative and calm. "We are affiliates of the Drosden Fleet and we have come to aid you in the fight against the 'Helix' infection. Please inform us of where you would like us to aide you."  The Admiral was back up on his feet as were the rest of the bridge. They were on their own now and were steering the ship towards the planet surround by ships. The radar showed the ships going towards the planet and assumed that's where the battle was going on. The Mech pilots were finishing up on the Mechs and the fighters detached and flew in a battle V in front of the ship. The men in the cargo hold were waiting for the drop ships to detach. The estimated time of getting to the planet was 10 minutes so everything was in place.

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With her ship repaired and refuelled, a tiny ship slipped out of a space station hangar under maneuvering thrusters. The slightest kick from her main brought her up to speed into outgoing traffic as the broadcast started. Anticollision lights flared under the split nose and winglets set far apart. The exposed mechanics below lit by the angry blue of massive gravitational forces held back under fluorescing antigravity material. Her small pilot touched a microphone icon before strapping herself in.


"Eye in the Sky, hull number Juliet Romeo Two dash Alpha, Alpha, Fiver Two Delta, requesting jump permissions."

"Roger Juliet Romeo. Jump signature logged, please proceed to range 2.4 million kilometers out, lateral 600 thousand to port. Accelerate to 100 thousand kilometers per minute in three seconds."

"Roger Orion Actual. Clearing stream traffic and accelerating. Flight plan logged with mission status active." Another kiss of maneuvering thrusters and a bloom of fire to accelerate to the appropriate velocities, and Thorn started warming up her jump drive. A few taps on the screen in front of her and the computer pulled the stopper from her injector, a tiny bit of pressure being applied to start the fuel flow. Passing the shell of her reactor, the material fell into a steep orbit, dipping into the event horizon and back out. Gravitational forces breaking apart atoms and slamming the parts back together with increasing frequency as the high energy plasma was forced into a higher orbit. Then it would be drained into lines to be fed into spacetime rending coils as the radiation splashed and bloomed across her pods and their shielding.

Coolant would be run across the surface of her reactor to whisk the heat and radiation away as her engine bloomed again.

"Juliet Romeo Two, you are clear for jump."

"Roger. Jumping in three." The injector opened further, plasma and radiation spiked, flaring against her pod and scattering sensor data.

"Two." The coils read charged, and the rift began in the core. "Jump target locked."

"O--#n#" The rift spread, lensing spacetime scattering her transmission until she, for the barest instant, became infinite in mass and form as she ripped her way out of normal space. On her way to the point in space and time where Thorn's tiny ship would drop out, she gave the mission breif one last read.

An alarm drew her attention, and she pulled up the display, watching an AI module try to carefully modulate the FTL drive driving white and blue across her passively backlit window screen. She knew the effort was futile. The only reason her drive worked the way it did was because she took a brute force approach. Where most human built ships and even others that used the same technology carefully adjusted themselves to use the least energy possible, the Eye solved the jump space stability problem quite literally by punching it harder. Half of her reactor's maximum power output was routed as high energy plasma fuelling a completely unshielded jump drive designed for a ship thousands of times her mass. This, in turn, produced an unstable jump field with the center being just stable enough to keep her ship in one piece.

A bang and a rumble reverberated through Thorn's cockpit as she reached up to slip into her EVA suit, just in case. The core stability of her jump didn't mean she didn't get turbulence, after all. And when she dropped out, it would produce a rift. A hole in space time that literally lensed reality upon itself in a damaging flare of exotic particles moving faster than light, crushing the laws of physics into submission as she slipped through the relativistic zit with the force of a billion ruined prom nights. She would feel it collapse behind her in another flash of heat and light, and much more tame radioactive matter, sparkles of antimatter ripped through her reactor sheath in transit would flash and spark across her exhaust plume as the drive vented coolant in its spool down cycle, providing a radioactive backscatter to begin her scans. The flare of energy would almost, to some sensors, look as though several million tons of warship had just performed a much more delicate folding of space and time, shielding her own mere twelve tons from immediate detection.

Though she did notice she was in orbit around a moderately sized world's night side.  "Let's see, oxygen atmosphere, K-class star, looks like the right place.  If anybody's on the ground, they probably saw that."  Having a jump visible from within the atmosphere had its advantages and disadvantages, as Thorn would soon find out.  Still, she touched the comm icon again to broadcast to anyone listening.  "Mercenary ship Eye in the Sky, reporting in.  Taking up polar orbit for scans and communications."

"You heard the Marshal, get us into the atmosphere." Dumont pointed his giant-like finger out of the viewport towards the planet, receiving a chorus of 'Yes Sir's from the bridge officers. "Lieutenant Conrad, assume the Captain's console as I prepare for ground insertion. Keep those weapons hot."
"Of course, sir." Conrad replying, promptly swapping places with the General upon the center of the bridge and immediately typing along the consoles. Dumont meanwhile headed out of the bridge, his thundering steps going out of earshot eventually.

Moment later the hangar bay's inhabitants fastened their armour and stood to attention, taking notice of the General's appearance.
"At ease soldiers, finish your preparations." Dumont passed the crowds of marines and joined up with his fellow Legionnaires. Once by their station he scooped up his helmet, placing it over his head firmly and allowing it to seal into his suit mechanisms. With comms now active inside, he spoke to the bridge.

"Relay with our allies, get us a close drop point so we can group up or split. I don't intend to step on the toes of our friends today, so make sure you show them how co-operative us Humans can be."
"Of course, sir." Conrad replied from the bridge, thinking it best not to mention how he himself was an Elf.

Cameron Fier looked to the bridge crew and nodded as the ship began to change course. The ion engines blasted at full power as the ship turned its large guns towards the planet. The entire ship was shuddering as all the men ran towards their battle stations. The fighters were firing up their engines as they sat in formation in the hangars. The guns were primed as they locked onto the other friendly ships involuntarily. As they locked on the gunners moved the guns away quickly as to not set off the alarms. The ship from the outside was completely quiet, t not a single sound bouncing off of the massive ship. The bridge was busy as they filtered the new information flying in from the radars. The planet was being scanned over and over breaking down layers of the planet trying to find anything on the planet surface. The comms were quiet all over the ship as well as the system. Nothing was quiet on the ship as the bustling and echoes of footsteps richocheted around the small hallways.

"Inspection?!" Thorn was flabberghasted that they would ask her to submit her ship for an inspection, but rolled her eyes, not realizing her face was in her camera's line of sight and that she was still broadcasting when she rolled her eyes and started the maneuver.  "Roger, coming in to dock, now.  Please have arm clamps ready for transmitted attachment points."

Her main engine bloomed to life, Thorn's cockpit shuddering under the load as she guided the tiny plumes of gas acting as her reaction control system towards an Imperial cruiser.  "Pilot identifies, Lisa Alice Ironhart, Mercenary ID number 18-157-0715, registered in Orion Station.  I believe you will find everything on my ship in perfect working order for her class.  Also, I would like to speak to your directors, at least those in control of the communications uplinks for the area and probing scans."

What she didn't say was that her scanners were already recording, soaking up every detail of the ships she was nearest to, and even watching the electromagnetic shield of a GSU gunship for the tiniest variences, extrapolating and scanning to detect the movement of individual electrons through her circuits.  The subsequent 3D image would be massive, but would provide insight not only to the power systems, but to the logic systems and computer programming itself, similar to an FMRI on a human.  Though this particular piece of equipment was an electrospectographic imager, normally used to detect lightning strikes on neighboring celestial bodies.

Eventually, it could prove quite valuable, or simply sate her own curiosity.  For now, it would be recorded to a misc data file, near other mission specific data behind three layers of high grade encryption and two guardian programs.

The Imperial fleet was about to breach the atmosphere when a strange signal was detected,a powerful energy spike already familiar to the empire's scanners.The ensign responsible for monitoring such energy emissions fell from his seat.

It was already too late,the resulting heatup from the atmosphere hindered the ensign's ability to provide a early warning.The Impact-shielding most Imperial ships used had one considerable flaw only the Imperial engineers knew of.....The shield strength was significantly reduced when entering planetary atmosphere's.This flaw allowed the 200 meter kinetic round to slice it's path through the chassis of the Imperial frigate..The INS 'Radiant Fury' that collided with the ship reactor causing a explosion that tore the ship in half.

"WHAT HAPPENED!" The Marshal screamed,his teeth clenched as his crew scurries to make sense of what just happened.

"Sir.....Orbital cannon just wiped out the Fury...." One of the crewmen said.

"Damn...The reports where incorrect....Helix does have forces on the planet....." 

"No sir....The scanner recognizes the energy trail....This is a Imperial cannon.....Higra-X Class..Kinetic Round."

"What!" 

"ANOTHER ROUND HAS BEEN FIRED" 

"RAISE SHIELDS"

The shot impacted hard and the flagship shook,the impact shield had absorbed the kinetic energy and crushed the round to pieces.The Marshal then issued all hands to battlestations and the fleet was put on the offensive.

Before the fall of the Old Empire,Imperial remnants disabled the then occupied Farnin to prevent Helix's use of Imperial defenses against anyone who would try to attack the planet,the Marshal couldn't understand how these defenses where reactivated as following standard protocol only the spies that sabotaged it and the original gunner had the means and knowledge to override the disable-command.

But if so that means.......

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"Direct hit sir!" Spoke a ruffled human clad in the armour of the former Farnin Duchy Military.

"Good" Spoke a scarred and elderly man. "Maintain fire while we prepare the ambush.....Force them to deploy their infantry...."

"Yessir" 

The elderly man turned and walked from the gunnery platform of the orbital cannon overlooking a plaza district in the city. "And so the hound...Loyal and fearless...Bites the hand that fed him."

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The Marshal ordered all forces to engage with the following orders.

• Ground forces deploy and secure the main city block.
  
• Seek and destroy of any hostile forces
  
• Eliminate or disable the Lone Higra Cannon.
  

Elizabeth stormed down the Halls of the Cavalier. Apparently, someone had neglected to tell her that they had arrived. Having donned her Knight armor, the insignia on its left chest, Elizabeth forced her way into the ground troops. Her regular coat was around her shoulders. However, she was currently wearing a helmet. As such, with her entire form covered, it was hard to tell what her gender was.

Bolts of lightning crackled between the plates of her conductive armor as she stood at attention.

"Ready to be deployed, Sir. I will work as a single unit. I do not want to damage any of your other units." Elizabeth's voice was commanding, she knew what she wanted, and she would get what she wanted.

"Attention Fleet," A broadcast came through GSU comms. "Our Imperium allies have been hit by a surface cannon, confirming there are hostile forces on the ground. Brace for entry to the atmosphere with full shields." 
"We're gonna drop as soon as we enter, our orders are coming in clear." Dumont outstretched his large gauntlet arm, allowing hologram to display the Imperium's commands. "Relay this back to the Imperium command; our ships will cover the airspace over the main block, then spread out to provide air support against all hostile forces they can find. Our troops, including us, will root out any resistance in the block and provide a meaningful distraction for the Imperium to handle the cannon." His arm dropped finally, reaching for his rifle as they began to board the dropships.

By this time the GSU fleet had begun entering the atmosphere, their defenses primed in anticipation of a similar attack to their allies. Thanks to this forewarning they could enter the atmosphere with unscathed hulls, allowing them to create a formation towards the main city block.
"On my mark," Dumont called through comms, with a chorus of dropship engines starting around him. "Three, Two, One. Insertion." At his word dozens of dropships swooped out from the hangars above the city, delivering the preliminary GSU ground force down to the city...

Cameron Fier stood watching over the main hangar watching the dropships load up and the mechs finish charging. His customised glasses swiped over every member, the glasses identifying each and every one. His comm went wild with noise as the surface gun went off hitting the Imperium ship. His head stopped moving for a split second before he turned around and began to sprint to the bridge. He spoke to the gunners to ready themselves and the hangar doors to be opened and ready to deploy. As he entered the bridge and looked around he saw that they were about to enter the atmosphere. He heard Elizabeths' voice over his shoulder but could only focus on the fireball that was able to be seen. His face turned into a snarl of anger and as he turned on Elizabeth his rage was evident. 
"You will be deployed with others and then you will detach from the main unit to go on your own." His voice gave no room for discussion and he clearly wasn't in the mood for her superior attitude. 
"Report to the main hangar now and get ready to drop with the mechs." He turned back to the window of the bridge as they just entered the atmosphere. 
"The rest of you get ready to wage our first war on an alien planet!" This voice was more determined and hopeful as he decided he needed to move on from the amount of destruction that was committed before even making landfall. The ship's thrusters were on full as it slowed down its descent. As they came down from behind the clouds the entire bridge got the view of the city and the GSU ships hovering over it. The Cavalier fit in snugly right on the edge of the city. The engines were at full blast as the ship came to a hover. The ship seemed to settle into its new position as his Cameron's voice came over the speaker. 
"This is a moment in which the day is either won, or all is lost. Our allies are powerful empires over the galaxy so have no fear and fight valiantly. If Death Strikes Me Before I Prove My Blood, Then I Swear I'll Kill Death!" The last part echoed with everyone in the hangar and the dropships shot out like bullets from a barrel. The Mechs followed as they dropped from high up landing with little to no structural damage.

"Cancelling last docking order."  Thorn broadcasted, her ship spinning around and burning back into an orbital trajectoy that would take her alongside the cannon's line of fire.  Sensors flared to life as her hard probing scans of the area began.  "I have eyes on the weapon, manned by fourteen, estimated time to next firing is thirty seconds.  Sending coordinates and placements for orbital bombardment."

Her scans continued as the SNU Cavalier passed below her and a massive electrical anomaly came to her attention.  "SNU Cavalier, you have an electrical anomaly on your third deck, port side.  Neighborhood of five terajoules raw electric, moving.  You may need to check your systems for a ball lightning failure before atmospheric insertion."  The small, gravelly voice was confident, strong, and the green eyed figure wreathed in blue light was furiously tapping at her screen, routing comm channels through her far more powerful transciever for non-line of sight broadcast. 

"Imperium cruiser Serpentis IV, if you need me for inspection, scan me.  You'll find all systems working nominally with no Helix infestation.  You will also find a three layer encrypted firewall with two hostile target guardian programs and a probe AI.  You'll also find sensor modules that will put your science vessels to shame.  Eyes on two more cannons, sending you shot placement and analysis data, now.  Drosden Fleet units, pop off a databurst to the Queen.  Tell her that her thorn says hi."

With the greetings taken care of and her powerful scanners bombarding the surface to feed the Fleets information, she took a breath and started deploying her very few stealth systems to hide the power signature, including a set of solar panels to make her look like a normal probe satellite.  "Proceeding to geosynchronous orbit over the AO, now.  Deploying secondary sensor web."

The top half of her cargo pod kicked away, and several heavily modified PAM rockets fell into orbit alongside her, each one with a simple high resolution camera of one of three wavelengths and a transciever powered by a thorium radiothermal generator.  These pushed away to give her almost four hundred miles of spread, and the ability to see in X-ray, UV, and normal color, down to a single brick sitting on the road "I have eyes on a firefight already in progress down there.  Please identify.

"New directives incoming General," Dumont's teammate handed over a holopad, allowing him to download the new orders to his HUD. "What's the plan?"
"We will handle the nests," He spoke, looking out of the dropship viewports to spot the enemy on the ground. Indeed they were no Helix creations. "Attention all units," Dumont raised his hand to his helmet, now speaking through comms to the GSU forces. "Infantry will sweep and secure the plaza to allow our allies their heavy armour." Comms then cut as he turned to his team. "Open the hatch."

The rear landing ramp of the dropship opened up, revealing a city that had seen better days now beginning to light up with gun fire.
"They've spotted us, we're taking some hits!" The pilot called through to the back. With a nod the five Omega Legionnaires dropped out from the rear of the ship, hurtling towards the ground un-phased.  A loud clash of metal and earth sounded their arrival, as they raised their rifles and assumed a V formation.

"Stay frosty." Dumont said, before moving forward through the alleyways of the city...

This was where thinking of what to do in battle became a weakness. In firefights, there was no true thinking as you did what must be done. The five mech smashed into the buildings destroying them. Along with the mechs, three dropships of men landed behind that. Another three dropships came dropping off two tanks. Cameron Fier landed on the last dropship his armour the same as those around him. He stood with them as he relayed orders sending out a secure channel to Thorn up in the sky as well as to the Marshall. 

"I believe we'll take out the Orbital Cannon with all due respect sir."
 He looked around at the tall mechs blocking out in front. He motioned his hand and the three units of soldiers began to spread out as the tanks and mechs took the front absorbing the bullets. They didn't have amazing shields but it was the best that the Scelforians had. The tanks were firing into buildings destroying some outlying enemy positions. Cameron was in the middle right in between the tanks and the mechs his assault rifle blasting as they took block by block trying to get closer to the orbital cannon. 

Meanwhile, the Cavalier had just managed to stop an overloading reactor. The ship was trying to maneuver itself so it could be of some ground support to the Imperium. The dropships were flying above the city their loud and powerful guns blasting into buildings. The three tri-wing starfighters were doing bombing runs on some dug in positions. 

Cameron's voice came over the radio. "Unless you need us elsewhere Marshal?" 

"All comms linked and on line."  Thorn spoke into her communications array, her small, scratchy voice filtering down to the battlefield below.  "Good morning, boys, my name's Thorn and I'm gonna be your operator today.  Comm channels are notoriously tricky to link, especially different peoples' and through a jamming field."

A push of a few controls and the plaza team was sent higher resolution orbital images showing where the nests were by thermal and muzzle flare.

To the Scelforans, she sent rapid fire images showing entrenched positions so that the mecha could start actually firing.  She didn't offer any commentary, with them, simply having her computer mark the images with arrows for the mechas' movement and little red circles for detected muzzle flares on their path.

"Eye recommends air strike on path between scelforan troops and weapon emplacement.  Also recommend that whoever has a target lock on me not even fuckin' think about it."

To the beeping, she broadcasted an image, of the angry blue at her ship's heart, distinctly the containment shell for a black hole in reactor form.  Presently, she saw the lock indicator blink off and a fighter jet for the surface.

The deserter army had established several machinegun nests in key chokepoints that halted infantry approach,the orbital cannon forced the capital ships to divert energy to shielding rather then to aid the troops on the ground.Various deserter troops would scurry across the ruins to shoot down dropships carrying reinforcements and armour,using Imperial military tactics and protocol against the very military it served.

The Marshal and his officers realized this but they where already forced between a rock and a hard place when the deserters lured the command core into range of the cannon,it was dangerous to consider retreat as it would take time to exit the atmosphere which means also they would have to reduce their shielding,they couldn't jump whilst locked in the planet's sky as gravity would tear the ship apart.The Deserters had the Marshal right where they wanted.The Marshal was furious about being outplayed by his own and he ordered the attack on the Cannon.

Thorn's voice entered the ears of all comms channels used by the allied forces.

"Scelforian Command you are cleared to assault the Orbital Cannon......Continue air strikes on the positions provided by Thorn.." The command ship was hit by another shell from the orbital cannon.

"Marshal,shields are down to 31% capacity we can take only 1 or 2 hits at most.....Should we evacuate the command vessel" The First Deckhand asked.

"Evacuate non-essential personnel to the the ground and have them help establish a foothold." The Marshal spat as he turned back to the holomap.

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The Deserter force opened fire on the GSU dropship that flew overhead one of ruined malls that led to the trade bloc.It dissapeared from their view only to render a crushing sound that signalled the arrival of a force the deserters had not seen yet.The path to the mall was littered with alleyways and an open street that the deserters had covered with several sniper nests.The alleyways had little coverage save the few patrols of troopers armed with assorted ballistic weaponry of the former Duchy,weapons they would find ill-suited against the GSU Omegas.

One squad found them and without hesitation took cover against the littered rubble in the alleyways and opened fire.The Deserter squad leader noticed that these troops seemed different carrying power armour which he knew was usually reserved for Serpentum Legion....These where not Imperial troops but his realization came too late as the GSU Legionnaires retaliated.

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