To Sail On Solar Storms

Volume One: The Star Raven Saga.

Chapter 1 GRACIE

Gracie was pissed.

Highly pissed. Even so , she laughed.

Better to be pissed off than to be pissed on. Gracie was the one about to do the pissing.

She wasn't going to be pissing vinegar. Oh no, she had moved right up to pissing fire.

Hell fire was about to rain down on this " transport " crew. These worthless goat whores were about to burn and beg.

Her assault team had rigged the breeching charge. Having made sure that the cargo was safely locked down in the cargo modules. Gracie had stationed the assault craft to secure the modules.

The Transport bridge and mess hall/rec hall were the target. Gracie gave the order to prepare for breech, " Make damn sure your sensor rigs  are recording. On 3, 2, Go!"

Breeching charges fired. The burned sections blew out, away from the breeching holes.  Near hurricane force flows of escaping atmosphere from three assaults sprayed out. The armored assault teams entered rapidly.

Normally, such operations were done with great care to minimize damage and loss of life. Not this time. This was a corporate employee transport. A slaver. None of the transportees were there voluntarily. The Raiders took great care to protect the transportees. The crew, not so much.

The breeching teams dropped in , the crew was scrambling for pressure suits or to evacuate the bridge. All were unceremoniously efficiently cut down. The First mate, was  stripped naked and shoved through the still  hot  breeching hole. Spaced Naked. Gracie made sure that a clear close up of the mates face was recorded as she shoved him through the hole. One of the team had secured the interior hatch, wedging it open.

They wanted to vent the atmosphere. The raiders were boarding to make sure none of the crew survived and each execution was recorded. There was no mercy for slavers. Fifteen raiders, eradicated the crew of Forty in very short order. All hatches were blown. The transport left open to space, exposed  to vacuum.

All of this was done in under ten minutes. All the cargo modules secured and ejected for retrieval. Six hundred men and women had been rescued.

Gracie personally reprogrammed the auto pilot. The transport was set for full sails, and maximum burn , to be used as a message. A message for Earth. If the   planers didn't  destroy the transport first, the transport should hit O'Neil station Five. Impacting at around seventy thousand KPH and still accelerating in a day and a half.

That should keep them distracted.

Next, would be the snatch and grab on Cruithne. Commander Carranza’s wife and daughter being the principles. Plus Any they could convince to join them in escaping the Blackhawk corporate shackles.

Cruithne is a small moonlet, Earths little known second moon. Currently trailing Earth, The Moonlet had become HQ for the Blackhawk Corporation.  Administration offices, communications, central command and control.  Also, central holding for employee families.

The Board, sat on Earth, in Santiago, old Chile.  Now a corporate free city.

  The O.C.S. Grainne, ( O'Malley Clann Ship. Grania) fell along the orbital plane . full stealth mode. Falling towards Cruithne.

Elsewhere in system, further up the orbital drift,  R.R.S, Heinlein, (Roberts Roughnecks  Ship) and the V .S

Thor,  (Vikingr Ship Thor) dropped from Above the orbital plane towards Luna  Station One.  They were headed for a singular Strafing  strike. After they swept past, the dumb bomblets they released in their wake would rain down onto Lunar transport and Cargo transfer station One.

The point of this raid was distraction, and damages.  The Heinlein and The Thor, would pull off the one pass , as they slingshot around Luna and unpowered, return along their attack vector a bit faster than their approach, to rendezvous with The Grainne after she had completed her mission.   Moving out, above the orbital plane, both ships fired long bursts from 150 mm rail guns and dispersed thousands of micro mines. All of which would burn up in Earths atmosphere with no harm to the planet residents.  Anything in orbit, was in for one hell of a shock soon.

Once the small fleet rendezvoused, then out would  fly the sails and full burn hell bent for leather for home.

They wanted Earth, the Star corps and their minions to know exactly who had hit them and where to find them.

A protracted war of attrition would be unwinnable by the pirates of Home. However if the Star corps could be provoked into a full frontal attack, the  Confederation Alliance had a few very nasty surprises. First, the C. A. needed to rattle the cage, stir up the hornets nest and fling some really stinky shit.

A psyops based upon suppressed facts had begun already. System data nets had been flooded with images from pirate raids.     Continual com broad casts of testimonials. Leaflet drops, rumors rooted in truth spread,  cargo modules of food and medical supplies dropped at remote locations , left for those in need.

Six months of preparation for this. The grand hooah, now fully underway.

                ‡★★★†††★★★‡

"Roll The Bones!"

Captain Grace, Gracie, O'Malley ordered.  The Grainne opened up, switching from stealth mode. Lidar swept space around the battle carrier. Assault raiders emerged, single seat strike craft launched. A Frigate dropped free of the large central hull.

All of this accompanied by a hurricane flood of Kinetic energy fire. Banks of 100MM rail guns. Maser bursts. High Energy lasers.   The hundreds of high performance missiles, were being reserved, saved In case the Star Corps or Earth managed any sort of ship response. striking predetermined targets on Cruithne. The Star Corps base was unprepared. Not to mention incapable of opposing such a strike.

"Gottem! Caught em cold! Goat whores never saw it coming! Hooooo-Fucken Hah"

Crew Chief Thompson cackled. Roberts Roughnecks Omega detachment, dropped towards Cruithne. The operational detachment would hit the surface twenty seconds after the last k.e.w. round impacted. Shock first and next  came Awe.

Com net  was filled with "Hooaah!", and "Mobile Infantry", And "Roughnecks! " Crew Chief Thompson cut into the net babble. " Aight you apes, pipe down. Sticks form up."   Six man teams, Sticks, maneuvered, arranging themselves, targeting pre planned objectives.

Their powered armor , was equipped with reaction jets,  mini rail guns, grenade launchers and they carried  sun blade boarding axes. The detachment had been dropped  into orbit around Cruithne.  Now the detachment was descending towards the Moonlet. Their mission, to secure landing zones for the follow on force. A Standard Twenty Second century Ranger task. 

One smart ass, with an ancient "Buzz Light-year" painted on his helmet, cut in to the com net with "To infinity and beyond".

Corporal Timothy Taylor happened to be obsessed with Twentieth Century animated entertainment.  His personalized  deep space rig, was decorated with a Marvin the Martian and Duck Rogers.

The Roughnecks were a bit, individualistic. Though, highly skilled and professional.

The surface of Cruithne now  held a sort of atmosphere of fine dust from the bombardment. This concealed the  Roughnecks. Surface objectives were rapidly achieved with no resistance or observation. Low power Maser beacons were set up.  All was prepped for the main force.

Assault transports homed in on the master beacons. The Roughnecks had been unopposed on the surface. Taking up positions over looking the primary hold exterior loading dock hatches. Hacking teams were busily working on hacking into the systems to gain control and cycle open the hatches.

“ Hooaah Target Accessed” called out over the closed com net. The crew Chief relayed the control access to the grounded assault carrier modules.

Assault teams from the Grainne dismounted, seizing the initiative and began the sweep and clear phase of the operation. The cargo holds were secured in short order. All of the assault teams were now data linked into the facility net.

The first surprise was that there was no resistance. No security response whatsoever. The second surprise was that, there were only a hundred corporate managers on all of Cruithne. The third surprise, the remainder of personnel on the station were primarily women and children. The families of corporate “employees” held hostage, to ensure the employees obeyed the managers.

It was quickly determined how these guarantees were carried out.

When an employee refused orders or failed to meet scheduled requirements, their family would be placed into an airlock, then, the airlock would be depressurized. The process recorded, then shown to all corporate employees via corporate net.

Captain Gracie personally oversaw the corporate managers stripped naked, forced to run a gauntlet of detained family members, and thrown out of the main cargo hold onto the surface of Cruithne. This process was recorded, then broadcast system wide.

The Raid on Cruithne had originally been a snatch and grab for the family of Commander Carranza.

That mission was partially successful. The commanders family had been safely secured. However, funny how there is always an however.

The raiders now had full control of Cruithne, and over one hundred thousand former corporate hostages. A hundred thousand now totally dependent upon the raiders.

There was not enough room or supplies to transport the people aboard the Grainne. In fact, there wasn't enough space on Home itself. In one action, the total population of the Confederate Alliance, had more than doubled.

This was certainly not going according to plan. Over several hours, new, hastily laid plans emerged. Hashing those plans out with communication lag times was an annoying process. A process complicated because during initial staging, the raid itself had been broadcast live system wide.

The results of that were Blackhawk employees rebelling as soon as they became aware of the Confederate Alliance actions. Transport ships crews mutinied. Station crews, mine facilities rebelled. Within a few days the Only Black Hawk facilities not in open rebellion were on Earth itself. On Earth, corporate employees , went on strike.

Panic ensued. No other Star Corp was prepared for this previously unfathomable happening.

The Nation States of Earth were divided. Long kept weak via corporate treaties, none of the Earth nations could field a force that could threaten the Confederate Alliance. Only the combined assets of the Star corps could do so.

The problem for the Star Corps was, they were not a united force. They had all been actively competing among themselves. Openly hostile, fiercely protective of their markets and assets. None of their equipment was standardized. Each Star Corp had deliberately built their systems so that they were incompatible with the other star Corp equipment.

As the news and Shockwaves of the Cruithne raid resounded across the system. The O'Malley clan dispatched the principle remnant of their fleet to assist and support the Grainne. The Confederate Alliance itself had not been prepared for the current circumstances.

Two months later the Confederate Alliance was still debating. The Star Corps were wrangling amongst themselves and the O’Malley clan found themselves in defacto sole possession of Cruithne.

Across the system, Blackhawk facilities that had not come under direct C.A. protection were taken by various Star Corp forces.

Virtually the entire Blackhawk fleet of transport and patrol craft had joined the C.A. a coalition of European, and American interests had seized half the Blackhawk orbital and Lunar assets. The Asian Alliance seized the remainder of Blackhawks former near Earth facilities.

The Solar system found itself in a whole new state of affairs. Completely by accident, The Clann O'Malley, now commanded the largest, most extensive fleet in the system along with Cruithne and two Lagrange stations. A handful of Belt mines and manufacturing facilities had pledged themselves to the Clann O'Malley as well.

Roberts Roughnecks now held two Lagrange stations along with an additional twenty transports.

Ragnars Raiders gained One Lagrange station, twenty transports them selves.

Belt alliance holders, were wheeling and dealing amongst themselves.

For the moment, the System was not at complete and open war.

It was an interesting time to live.

A system wide war had begun. Problem was no one was really sure who was on who’s side. They all bickered, postured and looked at each other funny. Only the Confederate Alliance had any sort of coherent situation.

The problem for the C.A. was that things had gone too well for them. They were completely unprepared for their overwhelming success.

Too much of a good thing created completely unpredictable problems.

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