Battlestar Invictus

Ch III. Trial by Fire

"Lieutenant, can you identify the classes?" Lahain asked while the young lieutenant franticly tried to keep a clear picture with the damaged systems he had.

"One Hellbringer light cruiser, two Idolators, and three infidels."

"Very well, focus your efforts on the closest ship. Lets try to thin their numbers before they get to close. Bring the ship about! We'll give them the best broadside we have left!"

"Admiral" Number two called "We can't keep those ships at bay forever"

"I know Damnit, but we sure as hell are gonna do it or die trying, now open fire!"

The massive ship began to launch its strike craft while the space-superiority fighters raced out the hangar bays to take up defensive position while the ship's massive lance batteries reached out and blasted at the incoming chaos ships. At about the same time the chaos fleet assumed a solid attack formation, the Idolators opening up with their prow lances, the infidels blasting away with their weapons batteries and launching torpedoes while the Hellbringer launched her attack-craft and fired her main guns.

"Emperor help us now..." The admiral said to himself.

"Admiral, New contact coming out of the debris field!"

Lahian turned around sharply to face the Auspex console: "What, more Chaos usurpers?"

"I don't know sir" the young man called, "I've never seen this configuration before, the Cogitators don't recognize its silhouette either. We're receiving a signal from them!"

"Show me!"

++++Transmission incoming++++

++++Language unknown++++

-> translating<-

++++Complete+++

++++Compiling message++++

++++Message reads:++++

Battlestar Invictus to Imperial Vessel:

Do not, Repeat, Do not fire on us!

We intend to aid in fending off the red Dagger ships.

Please acknowledge on same frequency.

++++Message ends++++

++++Transmission ended++++

It took him a few seconds to realize what he was reading. An unknown vessel just popping up here and claiming to help them... This was almost too good to be true. But then again, with the state his vessel was in currently... He didn't really have a choice. It was either risk losing the ship by taking an unknown in his ranks, or risking it alone with even lower odds.

"Get a passive weapons lock on that ship, if it tries anything we'll blow it to dust!" He barked at his staff before turning to his comms-officer: "Connect the transla-cogitator with the vox and hail that vessel, lets see what their claims are worth."

=====

It was barely thirty seconds after he had sent the message that the commander of the Invictus was alerted by his Comms-specialist. "Sir, the imperial ship is answering. The captain demands to speak with you."

"Put him on the horn. This is Invictus Actual, go ahead Imperial vessel." Price called out in his horn.

A stern mechanical voice sounded from the other side: "This is admiral Lahain of the Battleship SkyWatcher, I don't know how you got into our space and for the moment I don't care. You claim to help us correct?"

"Indeed Admiral. Let us close formation and take some of this fire away from you."

"Do as you must, but try anything funny and we'll blow you to dust like the others!"