513th Aggressive Recon Fleet
Commander: Briareos Gilliam Race: Human, Khe'er, Chratian Capital/homeworld: Dnalnif Flagship of the fleet: Valkyrie-class heavy frigate ”Heavenly Sword”
Briareos Gilliam: The Admiral-General leading the 513th AggRec Fleet Briareos Gilliam is a man of honour and integrity. A brilliant strategic mind, Gilliam believes strongly that the Union's cause is just and will not tolerate anyone to stand against it. Loyal to the death to the Union and their allies and fierce beyond description to their enemies, Briareos Gilliam is a legend amongst the populace of the Morning Star Union.
History of the Aggressive Recon Fleets: The Morning Star Union fleet is divided into many sub-fleets and each of these has a specific task: the Orbital Fleets for defencive purpouses, the Stellar Fleets for large offencives, the Scout Fleets for searching for new worlds to colonie, exploit or conquer. This sometimes meant that the Union was slow to react to new situations or the response was severely over the top. The Aggressive Recon Fleets were created to counter this problem. Not as heavy as the Stellar Fleets but much more powerful than the Scout Fleets, the Aggressive Recon Fleets, or AggRecs for short, soon proved to be successful. Capable of conquering single planets or facing hostile fleets in combat, their task was to make contact with new civilizations and to act as Scout Fleets where the area was too dangerous for the light and relatively vulnerable scout vessels.
History of the 513th AggRec: The 513th AggRec fleet was formed to scout the eastern frontier of the Morning Star Union. As it passed through the MSU borders towards the unknown, the fleet ran into its first mishappening: the fleets commander fell to an unknown sickness. The fleet was issued a new commander, a veteran soldier by the name of Briareos Gilliam, but some parts of the fleet saw this as an omen of ill to come. These were from the newer species in the Union and as his first official act, the admiral-general ordered all those who he felt might affect the overall morale of the MSU forces to return to MSU controlled space for extensive re-training. There was no room in the MSU military for inexperienced troops. This left the fleet unmanned, but still capable of fulfilling its appointed mission.
For the first few years the 513th saw little to no action, some remnants of civilizations that had been assimilated to the MSU or the odd space pirate, nothing the fleet could really test its strenght against. That was until they ran into the Yuerl.
The Yuerl had been a species of exceptionally advanced beings. Unfortunately for them however, their bodies had been frail and weak, their lives usually not lasting for more than 40-50 years (MSU standard, by best estimates and calculations). To circumvent this problem, they had long ago built themselves artificial bodies to house their intellect and personalities, some would say souls. Their entire populace went through with this transformation from flesh into metal, billions of lives changed forever, they thought for the better.
However, something had gone awry and the machines that should've copied the intelligences, leaving the bodies alive and in control of their artificial surrogates, transferred the intelligences, thus killing the bodies. This effectively killed the Yuerl people for without their original bodies, they could no longer reproduce and thus their population wouldn't grow. When the Yuerl became aware of this, it was too late to do anything about it. The machine that was supposed to be their savior had failed them.
As the 513th AggRec entered Yuerlith orbit, the Yuerl, bitter and hostile, lashed out at them. The Yuerl fleet, made from advaced vessels and supported by orbital defences, launched an attack, The 513th, though caught off-guard, managed to fight them off and launch a counter-offencive. The battle for Yuerliths orbit lasted a day, but in the end it was under MSU's control. As per their standard operating procedure, the 513th scanned the planet for military targets and government installation and launched an orbital strike. Thousands upon thousands of soldiers soon shot through space and athmosphere and finally made landfall, securing beachheads for reinforcements. That was when the MSU forces realized that they were not facing a normal enemy.
The entire populace of Yuerlith, every single Yuerl, rose up against them. Even though the MSU soldiers outfought their enemies, the sheer numbers of the Yuerl were so great that the original orbital drops were overrun, not a single soldier left alive. The fleet command was dedicated not to leave the bodies of their dead in the hands of the enemy, the ships were soon filled with action as the entirety of the MSU army and the fleet forces were mobilized. Soon, hundreds of thousands of drop pods were streaming to the planet's surface.
What followed was a glorious battle. Faced with someone to strike at for their condition the Yuerl fought with almost reckless abandon and the MSU forces, outnumbered by a skilled enemy, fought with all the determination and skill of warriors born and bred. Eventually, the Yuerl began to give ground and the MSU forces started to advance. Through the ruins of cities and in the searing heat of deserts the battles went on, but after every victory the MSU forces pushed the Yuerl further, using their superior mobility to rapidly redeploy to cut off their supply lines and to engage their reinforcements before they ever could reach the battle they were moving to. The war took a heavy toll on the MSU, but it became clear that they would be victorious.
Faced with destruction, the Yuerl activated every weaponsystem they had. The planet was scarred by nuclear fire and entire continents were swept clear of life, turned to lifeless desert by viral weapons of uncaring death. At first the MSU were forced to retreat back to their ships in the orbit, but one after another the nuclear silos were captured and destroyed and the viral stockpiles located and destroyed from orbit. With their final weapons failing them, the remaining Yuerl fled, leaving their now lifeless homeworld to the MSU.
In the aftermath of the war with the Yuerl, the 513th explored the planet and the Yuerl installations and discovered a small datasphere of the Messiah-device. Apparently the Yuerl had used its instructions to advance themselves and build the machine to transfer them to their artificial bodies. After the war, the 513th was seriously crippled, the army forces depleted. Sending word to the council, the 513th received reinforcements within hours of the transmission. Two entire stellar fleets arrived to take the datasphere back into Union space for study and to reinforce the 513th to their original strenght. Yuerl was a dead world, it was of no interest to the Union, its mineral riches so small that it wasn't even worth cracking open so it was left for dead. The 513th returned to its mission, scouting the eastern frontier.
After Yuerlith the 513th ran into a few inhabited planets and several with significant economical value before arriving in the system. Battle-hardened and ready for friends and foes alike, the 513th stands to uphold the honour and ideals of the Morning Star Union.
Description of the 513th: the 513th AggRec is composed of mostly humans, Khe'er and Chratians. An aggressive but fair force, the 513th seeks to advance the well-being of other civilizations and the Morning Star Union. In some cases this means making allies. In others, forced submission.
_________________ Prince Deral Lionbane, head of the House of Lionbane, Lord of Lionstone and Warden of Tor Charta
Luna, try not to beat them too hard. They are proud about their pseudo-glorious past and their present nothingness, you know. -Elmoth, about Caledorians
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