Thread: Dawn
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Old March 4th, 2008, 07:43 PM

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Default Re: Dawn

2405.8...

Chazzwazzer Star System…
Onboard the CDS Harvester 004 in asteroid field #3…


James Cabrera watched as the supply transport undocked and departed from his ship. The completion of the supply base on the new gas giant colony in the system meant that his crew could finally go off of their rationing and get back to eating regular meals. Regular, as it were, for a crew whose lives would be spent mostly in space with chunks of destroyed planets and comets as company.

He was in command of a 600kt freighter configured as a radioactive resource harvester. The crew knew her by a less ostentatious title: “double-oh-four”. His ship’s size allowed four of the robotic miners to be carried and still have a decent engine compliment. Other Harvester configurations were available from the design bureau and could be built to make the most profitable use of a particular asteroid field. Asteroids that were high in mineral content would be mined by a “four-double-oh”, while asteroids rich in both radioactive resources and organics – Cabrera winced a bit at visualizing that particular combination – would be mined by a Harvester 022; known simply as a “twenty-two”. His Harvester was one of eight the empire operated, and they were producing over 80,000 units of resources a month.

Cabrera watched as his display console monitored the quantity and purity of the harvested material. Projections put this particular field at 283% of a standard mine output. The projection for this particular ship in this particular asteroid field was over 11000 units of radioactive resources each month. Both he and his crew would be handsomely compensated for their efforts. He did have one concern, and that was the fact that the corporation did not provide protection for the freighters. The standard response to such queries was that protection was unnecessary since no other known empires were in the Dawn systems.

Still, it wouldn’t hurt to explore the possibility enlisting a little “assistance”…

Samora Star System…
Onboard the space yard ship CDS Mexico City


The crew of the ungainly ship fired its engines and began the slow transit from Somora to Pantrissa. There, the ship would begin to upgrade the defenders of the two warp points into non-Dawn space with the latest in upgrades. This was the role she was designed for – allowing the defense ships to remain on post while the planetary space yards concentrated on producing colony ships as fast as possible…

Usphada Star System
Usphada Design and Combat Simulation Center


The rings of Usphada I were beautiful to the observer from space. Even more so that, only two sectors away, her sister Usphada II matched her brilliance with her own set of rings forever in orbit around her.

All of which meant absolutely nothing to the men and women in the darkened room of the design complex. Members of the Navy were also on hand with the researchers as all were about to witness the trial run of a point defense ship design. The classification was given the name Artemis, and she would join the England class frigates and Canada class light cruisers as active ships of the Navy.

Research had been progressing on an effective deterrent to a massed fighter attack by an enemy. The Navy had proven – albeit only three times – that its weapons could outrange anything opposing them, but the lack of an anti-fighter weapon always nagged the senior officers of the Navy. Artemis was to be that answer.

The simulation was set up with the Artemis facing off against a Dawn frigate with two missile launchers. The Artemis continually was able to engage the missiles at range (almost 100 km from the Artemis) and was able to get three shots off within that time needed for the missiles to close.

Then the fighters came in the next simulation. This time, the results were less spectacular. With two shield generators, almost 600kT of armor and a shield regenerator, Artemis was a tough nut to crack; but damage was taken. And this was against the enemy fighters that the Dawn scientists knew about. They were about to cancel the test and stop production when a Navy commander asked to try an idea. He paired the Artemis up with a Canada class light cruiser, but replaced one of the cruiser’s armor sections with a flak cannon. He also quadrupled the number of fighters. When the simulation started, he closed the two ships almost head on into the fighters, but stopped when they were within 200km of the fighters and then turned away from them. He then flew away from the fighters slowly until they came within the Artemis’ flak envelope. Artemis fired, and fighters took damage, but they kept coming. Artemis did not fire a second salvo, however, but leapfrogged in front of the cruiser, which fired her own flak cannon. This pattern repeated until the two ships had destroyed or disabled every fighter with the shields absorbing each hit and having time to regenerate as the ships leapt over each other.

Artemis had proved herself and production was approved…

(Question for the moderators: would screenshots be best posted as attachments?)
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