SENDER:LtCdr. Alastair Stedman RECIPIENT:5th Fleet High Command LOCATION:West Point Military Academy, New York System ENCRYPTION:Gamma SUBJECT:Patrol and Incident Report 22/05/834 PRIORITY:High
Beginning Video Feed
*Falls into chair, pours a glass of Liberty Ale and then proceeds to scratch at a freshly bandaged wound on his head*
LtCdr. Alastair Stedman Patrol log for the 22nd of May 834. As you can see *points to the bandages* it was an interesting day out there today. My previous video log was interrupted as we were scrambled to intercept some hostiles. But I will get to that in due course. I'll just start from the beginning.
*takes a sip from the glass*
As my Executioner was still in for repairs I took off in my Guardian or Defender, whatever we are calling the ol' bird these days and started my patrol by heading towards the Texas system. No sooner had I arrived in orbit of Planet Houston when a large fleet of Corsair ships, all broadcasting DTR transponder codes, came pouring into the system from Hudson. The fleet consisted of a large number of cruisers and transports with a handful of fighter escorts. I prepared myself for one hell of a fight as I was the only navy ship in the vicinity and I knew that even with me broadcasting to emergency channels it would take some time for help to arrive. However said fight never arrived. The corsairs were not a raiding party, In fact it seemed to be a very brazen smuggling convoy. I had scanned one of their cargo holds and they were filled with artifacts. They simply ignored me, either because I was a single ship and probably not worth the time engaging, or they were simply hurrying on their way through the system before our reinforcements could arrive. Either way not a single shot was fired. I kind of sat there in shock at the sheer audacity I had just witnessed, before coming to my senses and pursuing them. They routed through New York to Pennsylvania then to California and then out of Liberty boarders through the Magellan system.
I am not sure if this needs to be pushed to the LSF or if we need to reinstate the fleet, but either way it is extremely troubling to see how easy it was for fleet of Corsairs to come through our system and smuggle their goods through Liberty with no one to intercept them. If it were to become public knowledge to Liberty's enemies just how easy it was to gain access to our space, well suffice to say it wouldn't be a good thing that's for sure.
*takes another long draught from his glass*
I then concluded my patrol and started to fill out the reports from my previous patrols and record my video log when we were scrambled to deal with a group of Technocracy ships making their way into California.
We managed to scramble five navy snubs and an additional B'unter joined us as well. Our small group consisted of Bounty Hunter: Aegis|Laelaps, 46th|Alpha-42, Navy South-8, Jack.Lancer and Allen Jones. I was vaguely aware of other ships joining us after combat started but I couldn't tell you who it was as the combat was rather intense. Anyways it was 6 of us against 9 or 10 of them. Including a gunship. Suffice to say with our number disadvantage it wasn't a fight we stood a good chance of winning. We engaged hoping that reinforcements would arrive quickly. Laelaps was the first of our number to fall, but shortly after that IR)G-AV-Spiteful's transponder went dark, taken out by 46th|TFA-LNS-Kennedy. After that we managed to get TFP)-Emilia.Osorio taken out courtesy of 46th|Alpha-42. But after that it all seemed to go downhill from there. We focused fire on TFP)-Omega but his ship was just too maneuverable. He was able to easily evade our weapons fire, and while we were trying to focus him, the the rest of the Technocracy ships took us out one by one. 46th|Alpha-42 went down then [LN]-Alan.Jones then finally Jack.Lancer. I suddenly found myself alone surrounded by all these hostile ships. I continued the fight as best I could, outnumbered and outgunned I managed to destroy the ship of TFP)-Gabi.Hawthorne. However the fight was lost for me. Still surrounded by 6 other ships, my guardian's engines and reactor loosing power due to a coolant leak, and my hull heavily damaged. I knew the chances of making it out in one piece were slim to none.
*Grabs a file off his desk and pages through*
The, ahem, Auxasians? Am I getting it right? Well the ships that seemed to be from the Technocracy did not immediately destroy my ship at this point. Instead they wanted me to come with them. To join their cause. They would not attack if I surrendered and left with them. They went on about some bombing of civilians and other such war crimes. I denied their offer of mercy. I don't know about the incidents they were referring to, I probably have more catching up that has to be done. But frankly what great nation or civilization is not without its skeletons hiding in the closet? Every great nation has them. And every uprising claims that THEY will be the ones to rebuild it better when the old regimes fall. But it never truly ends up that way does it? The 5th fleet and by extension the rest of the Liberty Navy has been good to me ever since I signed up. They even continued to pay out my salary to the wife while I was incapacitated. So, as long as it seems to me that High Command and the government are making just and right decisions, I will continue to defend liberty.
Anyway I digress, during this exchange the Rogue Gunboat Birdie from yesterday appeared again and demanded the pilot in my cargo hold. I apparently tractored in an escape pod during the conflict and the rogues were demanding I hand it over. The Technocracy pilots seemed openly hostile to the Rogue Gunboat. I don't know if it was their open hostility to the Rogues or something about them, but they didn't seem like petty criminals or fanatical terrorist's. They came across to me as decent albeit maybe misguided individuals. With my ships power core failing I struck a bargain with the Auxaxians, man I really don't know if I'm saying it right, but anyway it seemed to me this escape pod stood a better chance of survival in their hands rather than being handed over to the rogues or sitting in the hold of my dying ship. They agreed to take the pilot and get them to safety. The Birdie realizing that they had had lost the pilot, and outnumbered against the TFP/auxo ships decided to leave the area.
After that as, I suppose a gesture of good will if you want to call it that, the TFP pilots decided to send one of their number, TFP)-Full.Send against me in a one on one duel. It didn't last long. The reactor of my ship went into emergency shut down as it overheated due to the severity of the coolant leak. I ejected and disabled my emergency transponder. Hoping that my pod would avoid detection and prevent me from being captured by these Auxaxians. I was later rescued by a S&R Navy Rhino that was picking up escape pods once the TFP ships had moved away.
This concludes my report for the 22nd. I heard that they towed my guardian back to Norfolk where they will assess it and check if it's salvageable. I've been told though that my executioner should be ready to fly by the end of day today. A new reactor core and some new hull panels and she is space worthy again. I only have still images from my sensor logs. Apparently the failure of my reactor core caused a power surge in the main computer and fried some of the memory circuits.
Anyways. That's all.
LtCdr. Alastair Stedman signing off.