Chapter twenty eight

It’s unfair! They’re the newcomers! Why do they get all the cool stuff? I want one of those guns that can shoot through shields and stuff. But I can’t even steal from them! I value my life, and they arm their traders with enough weaponry to destroy a planet. How are we pirates meant to make a living? – A pirate lord complaining at the Pirate Council.

Angered by the Grent Empire performing illegal experiments on their citizens, the Terran Confederation declared war on the Grent empire. Nearly everyone thought that the war would be over in days. They were right, just not in the way they expected.

They had expected the Grent to crush the upstart Terrans into submission; what really happened was the Grent got curb stomped. All established forms of modern warfare were thrown out of the window by the Terrans.

The Terrans had previously been widely regarded as primitive due to their projectile small-arms, but that didn’t decrease their effectiveness at all. Sure, plasma weapons never ran out of ammo, but Terran weapons punched straight through shields like they weren’t there.

Even the smallest Terran weapons fired bullets the size of pencils. A single Terran trooper could take down a Grent tank with nothing but his rifle. A Terran sniper rifle could go through several hills, a tank, the wall of a bunker and still kill a Grent officer. Every power wanted Terran shield-piercing weaponry, but the Terrans weren’t giving. Any Terran weapon that was salvaged or stole self-destructed when used, with some warship-grade weaponry wiping out entire planets upon detonation.

And while the rest of the galaxy focused on shields, the Terrans made armour. Lots of it. Their frigates could survive several shots from a dreadnought’s main gun and still limp away, while it would take a full Grent fleet minutes to break through a Terran dreadnought’s armour. Of course, their shields were also as good, if not better, than everyone else’s.

And this made it more intimidating when the Terrans assembled a full warfleet at the Grent border. Ships and soldiers were drawn from all over the Confederation, shipyards went into overdrive and the public gave lots of money to the war effort. Composed of over 3000 ships and led by Grand-Admiral Michael, the warfleet was meant to send a message. They succeeded.

As they attacked, the warfleet split into three wargroups. Each wargroup had 350 cruisers, 150 battleships, 50 carriers, 10 dreadnoughts and a super-dreadnought. Each wargroup plunged deep into Grent territory, crushing the fleets sent to deal with them. Any static defences were bypassed and were soon crushed by the torrent of troopships following behind.

Experimental and Exotic weapons were used to deal with particularly tough holdouts. A heavily fortified factory world was destroyed using a sunspark bomb – a weapon that caused a supernova. A military shipyard was destroyed when the gas giant it was in orbit around was turned into a short-lived star. A major military base had just disappeared. Rumours spread that it had been dumped into subspace.

Within weeks, they were halfway to the capital. The Grent Empire panicked and collected all of its forces at its capital while the three Terran wargroups merged back together into a warfleet. They dove straight at the Grent Capital, seeking to end the war quickly. The final battle was here.