Talarin, 05J.

"I understand that natural selection has taken your humanity from you but it's becoming increasingly clear that it seems to have taken your hearing as well." he smiled at his own remark.

"Three thousand is the total number of crew and personnel on board the collective ships whereas the number to be landed is quite low, common sense would dictate that obviously none of these children are part of the research teams. I will continue my previous offer to pull back my fleet, I will even allow limited civilian craft to perform their duties at one time and their licensed personnel will check in with your network but there will be no inspections." he cut the broadcast.

He looked around, his crew were eerily silent and no doubt understood the potentially dire situation and it's future consequences. At this point the Admiral could offer little more in the way of concessions without damaging his nations prestige and tarnishing his family honor, his crew also understood and naturally accepted their potential deaths for the nation and for their families. All except one it appeared as a man approached the command chair, it was the ships captain himself a man named Hector Cantabria.

"Admiral, I must relay to you the concern of myself and certain members of the crew." the man gave a salute which wasn't returned. "You've already exceeded your directives by advancing towards the planet without prior negotiation and now you've put yourself in a situation where civilian lives may be at stake and I've come to request that you be more mindful of their safety."

Stepan waved him off.

"I'll consider it, Captain, now return to your post and find your courage."

The group continued on it's slow pace towards the planet.

Seemingly allowed passage by the present authorities, the flying square continues on its course towards orbit-- perhaps there'd be good heart in informing them of surface housing -and security opportunities for the duration of their stay?

Talarin Low Orbit
USS John Paul Jones (DDG-27)
Guided Missile Destroyer, Arleigh Burke Class
Mission: Orbital Patrol, 86 Days in Space


Like most of the Navy's remaining sub-capital ships, the USS John Paul Jones was a relic from a bygone era, an era where raw firepower wasn't the United Systems' focus; a more peaceful time. Originally designed to defend mining outposts in the Tefeull mining field and hunt down pirate fleets, the Arleigh Burke class was one of the Navy's smallest nuclear-capable craft. Spanning just three hundred and four meters in length and powered by a quad of General Atomics Mark 7 Hybrid Fission-Fusion Reactors, the John Paul Jones wasn't even fully stealth capable. All it could do was shut off its engines and store heat in an internal heatsink, all the while hoping the enemy wouldn't use active RADAR. Although its firepower was supreme for a ship of its size, as it housed several fighter and bomber squadrons along with a spinal tri-rail artillery cannon, its armor was somewhat lacking compared to that of its larger siblings.

All of those problems were solved, however, when the ships were limited to patrol duty. From low orbit they could perform regular scans of the area with their sophisticated sensors, detect enemy ships and pound them with a long-range barrage of missiles (the weapon most favoured by the ships' captains). The fighters were mostly used to intercept civilian craft or defend the destroyer itself from attack; and from nuclear missiles, of course. At their prime, almost a dozen of the destroyers patrolled the skies of Talarin, enforcing the USC-SRZ treaty with extreme prejudice. Now, only one of them was left as a token support force for the base on the planet below. If everything went south, the ship was supposed to provide cover for the escape craft from the surface to leave and then jump away while the fleet handled the situation.

Commander Edgar Angeli had been assigned to the craft in anticipation of his retirement. The 'seawolf' had served for many years on cruisers and 'sub hunters', and when these were phased out, the only three options were to re-train him to keep as a reserve captain for a battleship, give him a desk job or assign him to a relic. He picked the third option. The John Paul Jones was a quiet assignment, with most of the work being bureaucracy and hardly any action; perfect for a veteran waiting for retirement. Nowadays, the Commander spent most of his time painting in his quarters while the officers took care of day to day problems such as which movie to watch at movie night and surprise inspections in the galley.

At the moment, sixty-three year old Commander Angeli was finishing an oil painting of a destroyed landscape, a city devastated by war and buried in radioactive dust; ironic, perhaps, but there was plenty of inspiration on the planet below. He painted a thin layer of green over the picture to darken the mood of the painting, not that it was light to begin with, and had been about to add his signature to the bottom right corner when the klaxon sounded, causing him to ruin the painting as he flinched.

<"Action stations, action stations, set condition one throughout the ship. This is not a drill. Repeat: action stations, action stations. Set condition one throughout the ship. This is not a drill. Scramble all fighters, scramble all fighters. This is not a drill. Pass the word to Commander Angeli to contact CIC."> came the alarm through the klaxons and speakers, prompting the Commander to dress in a hurry; he didn't have time to change his pants, which had been covered in paint, but he took the moment to cover his equally as untidy undershirt with a BDU top. He really didn't know what the problem was again: last week it had been a shipping accident, perhaps this time the Zeleniyans had decided to just end it all. Yeah, right, fat chance.

The short jog to CIC found the Commander receiving several salutes from the crew, most of whom had barely ever seen him during the three months the ship had spent in patrol rotation: the USS George Washington was supposed to replace them in a few weeks while the Jones went into drydock for a three month Refueling and Overhaul. But with tensions mounting in Tefeull, it seemed more and more likely that their tour of duty would be extended.

Upon arriving at the cramped Combat Information Center, the Commander didn't even bother with formalities such as assuming command and 'acquiring the helm'; he simply looked at the executive officer expectantly, as if waiting for a status report. And he got it: several contacts were positioned around the blue sphere that represented the planet on the holographic display, and some of them seemed to have failed to register with both the SRZ and USC control centers on the surface and in orbit. Unusually, the Zeleniyan ships and stations were coloured in yellow, indicating neutral forces, whereas those that had just entered the system were orange. Unknowns.

The printed communications excerpt seemed to explain the presence of the large collection of ships approaching the planet, but none of it actually made sense. If they had licenses, they would have received precise instructions to notify the USC and SRZ regional command centers immediately on arrival and transmit their authentication codes; and why would they bring CHILDREN to a place like Tefeull?  The closest thing to children that the USC had on the planet were a few pregnant women whose husbands were stationed aboard the Jones, and they lived in orbit, far from the horrors of the surface.

But there was something else; another contact, one that had seemingly gone unnoticed by the Zeleniyans and was approaching from another direction. A small ship, slightly larger than the USC's dropships and gunships, transmitting a 'Familiar' ID. It had also made no attempt to contact them and seemed to be coming in for a landing. Not on his watch, at least not without the proper credentials.

"Alright, tell the CAG to intercept-"

"The CAG's not aboard." came the blunt reply from the XO, earning the younger officer a raised eyebrow from the Commander. "His wife is giving birth, they left on a medical transport to Talarin Outpost an hour ago."

...and the Commander didn't seem to like that reply either: "What the hell are they going to Talarin for? We've got a fully equipped infirmary onboard, why would they go to that shithole?

"...because the OB/GYN is on the surface for contraception shots. With all due respect, Commander, did you not read the memo?"

There was always a memo; but there was no time to argue. Especially when the Colonel was right. "Fine, tell the DCAG to send a Talon flight to intercept the lone contact, they are to NOT fire nor threaten it in any way. We just want to see their papers; see to it that we get them. As for the others, just... As much as I hate to say it, tell the Zeleniyans we have their back. We really don't need any more squatters down there."

---

A few moments after, a squadron of stealth fighters from the Destroyer's airwing rapidly changed its heading to intercept the Familiar craft while the rest of the spacecraft remained on a defensive formation to protect the destroyers; two separate messages were sent out, one to the Zeleniyan military base and one to the familiar craft.

<"Dvakok Station, Dvakok Station, this is the USS John Paul Jones. We have launched defence wings and are standing by to reinforce no-flight zone, but we'll let you take lead on this. One of our squadrons is moving to intercept unknown contact at bearing one one zero mark zero six seven, we will keep you appraised. John Paul Jones out.">

<"Unknown spacecraft, unknown spacecraft, this is the destroyer USS John Paul Jones, Talarin Defense Network, USM Regional Command. You are approaching a restricted flight zone, please transmit license, authentication and identification codes immediately. One of our fighter wings is en route, make no attempt to evade them.">

---

Surface of Talarin
Border of USC Defense Grid, Turret Station 82
Patrol Team 5

"What the fuck is going on here, Sarge?"

Something was very, very wrong: the General Dynamics Land Systems AT-18 anti-tank defence turret was a several dozen ton beast of armour and machinery housing a compact deuterium fusion reactor that powered the two 188mm anti-tank railguns, its electric-reactive armour plating and the powerful motors that allowed it to rotate 360 degrees left and right and sixty degrees up to attack any ground target at any range. A sophisticated artificial intelligence controlled both the turret itself and its support equipment, including the RADAR dish on a nearby destroyed building, the defensive sentry turrets and the SAM launcher. Even tanks had trouble taking down one of the beastly machines; and yet something had torn a hole through the rear access port, messed up all the cables, and chewed through the computer control panel.

Everything was offline: the RADAR dish, the SAM launcher, the sentries... The reactor was probably intact, since there was no coolant leak that the suits could pick up, but all the cables connecting it to the grid had been severed. The patrol team didn't have the time nor the equipment to repair it, but without the turrets, the entire safezone would be overrun during the night. But the Sergeant had other concerns for the moment: he had followed some strange tracks around the turret, and heard several strange noises with his amplification suite. Nothing solid, but he couldn't deny that he was about to piss himself.

The tracks lead him to the entrance of a half collapsed building and the darkness that it contained in the most literal sense. His sonic imaging system couldn't pick up any movement on his field of vision, but there was so much inexplicable interference in his sonic imaging vision that he couldn't tell what was inside the dark tunnel. He could swear he had heard a growl of some kind, but before he could call out to the Corporal to take a look, he heard another noise, one that made him forget his fear.

Wheels.

An M51A2 'Superbadger' IFV with a Humvee escort strolled through the deserted streets while its cannon turret scanned the area, rapidly approaching the turret site; and with them came instant relief. The USC was so overstretched on Talarin that it couldn't afford to send APCs to support all of its patrol teams, but the destruction of a turret site was a serious threat to the whole expedition; hence why 'Rapid Reaction Repair Teams' had been established, vehicle groups with at least one combat engineer aboard that could perform rapid repairs on any damaged turrets while having the firepower necessary to defend them.

The IFV stopped next to the anti-tank gun while the Humvee made a quick patrol around the square to secure the area, but by the time it returned, the Superbadger's airlock was already cycling. The two patrolsmen approached the door to greet the relief party, and as soon as the door opened, several power-armoured soldiers stepped out and begun to establish a defensive perimeter; the combat engineer followed right behind them, but rushed to the turret with no regard for the patrol team.

He too seemed completely spooked, despite the fact that his helmet concealed his expression. "What the fuck happened here?" he asked as he inspected the damaged weapon, once a marvel of engineering. "Is this a practical joke? How the hell did anything do that?" he questioned, surveying the site; there were spent ferro-magnetic casings all around the sentry guns, indicating that they had fired quite a few shots, but there were no bodies. Still, mission priorities came first: the engineer quickly deployed his maintenance kit and begun patching up the power conduits.

The Captain in charge of the RRRT seemed more interested in what had happened though: he too had followed the tracks around the machine and to the tunnel, using his flashlight to illuminate the entrance. The tracks continued inside, unsurprisingly, but the tunnel was too dark and the weather too dusty to be able to tell anything apart from a distance. "Sergeant, I will have to agree with the Tech here; what happened?" he exclaimed over the radio, and the Sergeant approached him from behind.

"I don't know sir. Command told us to check out a disabled turret, that's what we found. I too followed the tracks up to his point, but then you arrived. Not a moment too soon either, I was getting paranoid." he replied on the same frequency, holding his rifle at the ready in front of the tunnel entrance. "I really don't want to go in there, sir. Dark, scary tunnels were never my expertise."

The Captain scoffed, shaking his armoured head in disappointment and acknowledgement at the same time. "I know that feel, Sergeant. Alright, get a sniper on that RADAR dish, I'll take two men and check out the tunnel. Lieutenant's in charge until we get back. If we are not back in an hour, contact HQ for backup and button up inside the Badger. Oh, and that gun better be online when I return." he stated before he signalled two of the new arrivals to follow him inside the tunnel.

Planet Surface of Talarin;
Catacombs beneath a city in the Eastern Hemisphere


"This isn't Alarei tech is it Cairo?"

"No, it isn't. In fact, the origins of this technologies is very similar to what we found in our own system, Agent."

Delta squad was far below the surface of the city, almost a kilometer towards the center of the planet. They had followed the cave system and taken an ancient looking elevator down all the way into a large, and completely abandoned complex. It looked as if the Alarei had set up a laboratory inside of the facility. It was long forgotten, but it had seemingly been untouched by the war above. The Praetorian soldiers began clearing the facility to make sure nothing remained inside, but Agent 014 began to examine the inside of the facility.

"Any guesses as to what this was Cairo?" Agent 014, or Agent Ebanks, plugged his suit into one of the old disabled computers and allowed the AI to scan the complex's datanet looking for an answer.

"It was a weapons lab. For biological weapons, but anything usable by us has been wiped clean. There are some systems I need you to access by hand." The AI linked up to the suit of Ebanks was capable of processing huge amounts of data within miliseconds, but several terminals held blocks that could only be accessed by direct contact with the machinery. Agent 014 made his way through the narrow corridors of the facility. The whole compound seemed to be coated in a thick layer of dirt and grime, however for the most part everything was left mostly where it was. Many of the Alarei's research tools still remained as if they left the facility in a hurry.

"This is Delta 5, we are at one of the terminals. Cairo is telling me we it is needed to activate the rest, like a power switch. Want me to turn it on?"

"Yes, do it."

For a second nothing happened. Suddenly, there was a loud boom and an orange light seemed to sweep through the system quickly. Then the ground shook violently for another second and another boom was heard and all went quiet. Suddenly every single monitor in the facility lit up, and holographic images of different systems quickly flashed before Agent 014's visor. He quickly moved towards the terminal and he began searching through it, with the assistance of Cairo.

"Cairo, tell me what is going on."

"When we activated the facility, it activated a beacon as well. I wasn't aware it was going to happen but the whole system is going to be alerted to our presence. I've hailed the Medusa and they should be here by the time we get to the surface."

"Agent, this is Delta lead, if Cairo is right, we are leaving now." Ebanks knew that they had to leave, and he began to see the blue blips on his local radar move towards the entrance of the facility.

"I've got everything I could from here Agent, we should go."

That's all the intelligence officer needed to hear, and he was sprinting towards the entrance alongside the rest of Delta Squad.

The entire system was sure to know that someone was there due to the huge energy spike that was activated when the Imperials activated the facility. They were sprinting towards the surface of the planet now, and eventually the landing zone. When they got to the entrance of the cave network, leading into the catacombs, the Phantom's helmet lit up with audio from the stealth ship.

"This is the Medusa. We got your call, and are sending the dropship down now. You better hurry Delta, I don't know how long we have."

The frigate sat stealthed in orbit, with its Raven deployed ready to pick Delta Squad up.

Planet Surface of Talarin;
Catacombs beneath a city in the Eastern Hemisphere

"Two large contacts are coming towards you, Delta Team," The AI's voice rang through Delta One's ears. In the corner of his eye he got a brief glimpse of how large the contacts were. Too big to be mutants. Must be military hardware, and with withdrawal of Zeleniy forces, it was likely USC. The team exited the catacombs and carefully made their way towards a nearby skyscraper. The team moved fluidly with very little verbal communication.

The Ares armor worn by the Praetorian squad was the best the Imperium had to offer. With top of the line stealth modifications added, they would likely not be spotted easily by the two large Coalition walkers. Chameleon camouflage would make them almost completely naked to the human eye, and infrared sensors would have no chance of detecting the Praetorians. This was because the power armor worn by the Praetorians was equipped with heat changing plates that allowed the suit to match the environment around it. The armor also had automated radio wave blockers, in order to distort any sort of RADAR from detecting it. Hell, it was even equipped with insulated sound plates to prevent SONAR from picking up the suit too easily. All this had to be managed by the on-board virtual intelligence installed on every Ares suit of armor. This VI constantly processed and made automated decisions regarding many of the suit's features.

"ETA on dropship, 30 Seconds"Cairo was plugged into every suit in Delta Squad, so Delta One, or Captain Gulej, didn't have to worry about informing the rest of the team. The Raven Dropship was also one of the Imperium's most expensive pieces of hardware they had to offer. It was equipped similarly to the Ares suits in terms of stealth equipment. The dropship, attempting to stay out of sight, kept all of its stealth systems online. It positioned itself out of sight on the opposite end of the skyscraper, almost ten floors up.

Delta Squad quickly piled onto the dropship and it would attempt to pull away from the skyscraper while avoiding combat with the two USC walkers.

Low Orbit Over Talarin;
Imperium Hermes-Class Stealth Frigate, Medusa, Command Bridge



The ship was completely dark. Even the bridge was completely silent as they sat waiting above the planet's surface. This ship was completely cloaked, and it was one of the most expensive ships the RSI had commissioned, filled with incredibly complex stealth technology. The cost of making one was more expensive than commissioning a fully armed and fully crewed dreadnought. The ship had one small hangar, which contained two unmanned SWORD Interceptors. The ship had a very small crew, consisting of only about three to five men at most. The other crew members were either AI techs, engineers, or the executive officer. Most of the ship was maintained and piloted by the massive Artificial Intelligence on board the ship. It was the most complex ship the Imperium had to offer.

And yet, the slightest detection by the Kennedy could warrant a larger investigation by a fighter wing, which would surely give them away. Even the best stealth technology could be detected, and it was hard to make a frigate, albiet a small one completely disappear. For now they were hoping their technology held up against the USC's for the time being.

Captain Argan bit his knuckles in a stressed anxiousness waiting for the green light that the stealth dropship had boarded the Medusa and the frigate could warp out of this god-forsaken system. The captain wore the standard Imperial Navy Officer Uniform with a pistol strapped to his leg. He had been specifically selected by the Office of Military intelligence to command this frigate for both Delta Team, and the Phantom Agent that was apart of it. He wasn't allowed to know why he was selected over the wide variety of other candidates, but it was not the Captain's place to question his orders.

The ship was at a complete halt and with the stealth fields up, and continued in low orbit above the planet, waiting, and praying to not get detected.