HaloTech

Chapter 1

HAFS Victory, Sol Transfer Point

Terra, Terran Hegemony

7 April 3199

T-06:07:43

Mei Yan Ren, Admiral of the Hegemony Armed Forces, walked down the corridors of her ship, looking through the latest intelligence from Fleet Command. So far there were no threat areas on the board but that could change quickly, especially since the Capellans were feeling belligerent. All around her the crew was preparing for the first leg of their journey to their patrol sector in the Deep Periphery.

She reached the bridge moments later as her yeoman appeared with additional reports from the ship's department heads. She scanned the documents once before adding them to ones already in her hand before setting them down at her station.

Around the main holotank that dominated the bridge several crewmembers were making final calibrations to the holographic display, fine tuning the device that allowed her to observe the battle space and everything in it. Right now it showed the 71st in formation while elements of the 1st Fleet ran interception exercises near the massive complex of space stations that greeted visiting ships to the Sol System. Mei Yan walked to the tank and looked up at the icons, then at the older man beside her.

"I understand congratulations are in order Chief." She spoke

"Ma'am?" The Chief of Boat replied.

"Your daughter earned a place in the 7th did she not?"

"Ah, yes ma'am," He beamed. "It is a great honor for the family."

The 7th represented the first ships that made contact with the Olympus Colony many years ago. Since then the 7th was a choice assignment for cadets right out of the academy along with the 1st Home Fleet based out of Terra and the 13th Dragoon Fleet based out of Outreach.

"You have some leave time accumulated," Mei Yan reached up and touched one of the icons in the tank. The icon enlarged to reveal the Victory and her current status. All system showed readiness for deployment. "I'll see about getting you to Dieron for the graduation."

"Thank you Admiral," He replied.

"Ma'am, incoming HPG COM from Eridani Command," a communication's tech spoke.

Mei Yan took a deep breath and linked her neural net into the ship's net and quickly connected with the feed.

::Mei Yan! Congratulations on your promotion:: The avatar of Admiral Tomas Reed, CINCERINAVCOM, spoke.

::Thanks Tom:: She replied. ::We're about six hours from deployment. Any word on my request?::

::You'll be getting the official traffic in an hour, but you are cleared for combat drops on Alama and live fire drills at sector four::

::Good. I've got the naval part of this fleet in shape, but I need to get the 49th Heavy Cavalry integrated with the 71st Marine and Aerospace forces:: Mei Yan grinned. ::We'll come in hot for a surprise attack::

::Even with the latest drive tech you're going to put a massive EM footprint out for at least sixty seconds:: Tomas replied. ::Or have those mad scientists at New Port city come up with something new?::

::You'll see:: Mei Yan replied. ::See you soon Tomas::

::If you can surprise the 8088th it will be good for them:: Tomas spoke of the Royal BattleMech Division that was assigned to Eridani. The Hegemony maintained a strong presence of Aerospace forces in the form of two fighter wings and a dozen pocket WarShips in addition to the WarShip wing that included Eridani in its patrol route.

Mei Yan laughed as she disconnected from the net. She quickly issued new orders for the tactical disposition of the fleet, and nodded approvingly as everyone quickly moved to complete those orders. Dummy rounds were replaced with live rounds with the exception of the Alamo IV ASMs, energy weapon capacitors began their charging sequences, and lastly, the gravitic shields were brought to standby mode for immediate activation upon emergence from hyperspace.

T-00:04:13

"Admiral, all ships are in formation and ready to jump."

Admiral Ren turned from the holotank and approached her command station. She didn't have to touch any of the command controls, her neural interface could handle most tasks unless the system in combat, where both mental and physical controls were used. Her interface seamlessly brought her into the virtual bridge where she floating in cyberspace surrounded by the icons of her fleet. Seventeen ship icons floated information with the HAFS Victory at the center. The massive 3km long WarShip was surrounded by her escorts, three Battlecruisers, four Cruisers, four Destroyers, and six Frigates completed the 71st Assault Wing, which was beginning its first patrol since the Wing was activated six months ago. The cruisers and frigates comprised the main assault element of the fleet, transporting a full Regimental Combat Team along with the Wing's already considerable assault division. The remaining ships served as the main wall of battle against hostile forces. A support wing of four WarShips was added at the last minute to be transferred to the 45th Explorer Wing when they arrived at their destination.

The Victory was the second ship of the Trafalgar class, a heavy battleship carrier that was the replacement for the aging Intrepid class Fleet Carrier, which sacrificed only one hundred fighters in exchange for more armor and heavier weapons. The Battlecruisers were a mix of old and new, with the lead ship being a million plus ton Revolution class backed up by a pair of Hood-C class Battlecruisers. The cruisers were all of the Vigilance-C class, with the Destroyers being of the newer Gaia class. The Frigates, almost massing as much as the Vigilance-C class, were of the Amazon class, and they were specifically designed for planetary assaults. Each and every ship was fully armed and ready for any encounter, despite the fact that the Hegemony had been at peace for almost one hundred years. The support wing had three Asimov heavy WarShip Transports and one Revenant class YardShip. The WarShip Transport sacrificed much of a WarShip's armaments in exchange for cargo and passenger capacity, but they were by no means unarmed, and could function in a pinch as a point defense frigate. The YardShip was nearly as large as the Victory, and was equipped with an unpressurized bay that could repair and build WarShips up to two million tons. Such vessels were a much needed asset to any long range Exploration Wing because it could fabricate any new part in the event of a breakdown far from Hegemony territory. As a result, such ships were always accompanied with heavy escort.

::All ships, initiate level one interface….prepare for jump:: Mei Yan send across the TACNET.

Every ship initiated the link that would synchronize the jump to Epsilon Eridani. Advances since the return of House Cameron to Terra was a renaissance of scientific research, allowing for the creation of advanced jump drives and artificial gravity. It also caused the creation of the first, true, interstellar Liners that carried passengers and cargo to the major ports across the Inner Sphere. The advancement in WarShips also tempered many who enjoyed 'rattling their sabers', because it made waging war so much more dangerous since the advances allowed for JumpShip equipped with gravitic technology to make the jump directly into a planet's orbit, bypassing the Zenith and Nadir jump points that dominated interstellar travel for millennia. There were still skirmishes along the borders, but the days of massive armies invading were receding into the past, but there were always those who would bring back those dark days, and it was the mission of the HAF to see that those days would not come again.

She nodded as all ships linked and signaled their readiness to jump, and then dropped out of the TACNET and took her seat.

"Begin the countdown."

Her command station flashed the countdown timer starting at two minutes. This would be the first test of the new K-F Drive systems that had just been approved for use, and the ship's compliment was augmented with twenty system engineers and scientists to observe the drive's performance.

"Sound General Quarters," She ordered. Standard orders were for all naval vessels to go to battle stations before a jump, which many crew thought was a useless gesture. There was always a chance that an 'OP Force' was lying in wait when a wing made a jump.

General Mei Fang climbed into the cockpit of her Atlas IIIC as the general quarters alarm sounded throughout the fleet. He quickly linked into the ship's TACNET to observe the jump and keep an eye on his RCT as they prepared for the jump. Battle Armor points climbed into their suits and moved to their combat stations. From her command DropShip linked to the Frigate Aventine, he took pride in his unit's performance. A momentary flicker caused him to blink as the ship's gravitic shields powered up. It was another of the advances in technology that kept the Hegemony ahead of the rest of the Inner Sphere. Gravitic shields were now standard on all Hegemony WarShips which provided some protection against energy and ballistic attacks, and the rest of the Inner sphere was slowly catching up as lesser shielding systems were showing up in their WarShips and JumpShips.

::49th Heavy Cavalry RCT at standby:: She sent over the TACNET.

Colonel Rosaline Dubois gave her deck chief a thumb up as the canopy closed on her 55 ton Hornet Mk II. She briefly linked into the TACNET to assure herself that the Victory's aerospace wing was ready for a combat launch. She closed her eyes and relaxed as the wing's status flew across her inner eye, each and every icon flashing green in response to her unspoken query.

::Raven Lead, 382nd Aerospace Wing ready:: She reported.

The countdown time slowly wound down to zero.

"All hands, brace for jump." Mei Yan spoke. "Sound Jump alarm."

The wing jumped in a staggered pattern. In order for the wing to arrive on target in one cohesive group, the larger, heavier WarShips initiated their jump drives first, followed by the lighter WarShips. Targeting computers entered standby as weapons were cycled to arm status. Everything turned a brilliant white as the drive systems tore open a hole in space to allow the ships to pass through instantaneously to their destination, but fate would deal them a different hand all together.

In just that moment as the bridge between two points was formed, something happened. A cosmic string occupied the phase space at the fulcrum of the hyperspace bridge, creating a massive distortion effect that in an instant opened not just a bridge to Epsilon Eridani, but all Epsilon Eridanis in the multiverse. Perhaps it was fate that would catapult them not to where they wanted to go, but where they needed to be.

A brief history of House Cameron

House Cameron ascended to command of the Terran Hegemony in 2340 with the election of Michael Cameron to Director General. This would continue until the assassination of Richard Cameron by Stefan Amaris in 2766. Many believed the line of Cameron was extinct, but they were wrong.

In 2599, Director General initiates Project Olympus, research colony located in the deep periphery. The project would be comprised of 500,000 colonists to be placed on a distant world with close to a full Hegemony Armed Forces Army Corp as a defense. The project was hidden amongst the reorganization in the aftermath of the Unification War, with millions of tons of equipment being listed as scrap, then transferred to a staging area in one of the secure system of the Hegemony. The massive amounts of refugees served as the basis for the colonial population, as well volunteers from the best and brightest of the Hegemony. A member of House Cameron is installed as Colonial Governor.

The truth of the colony became apparent as they were stranded on Olympus. A cold, but habitable world in a star system six thousand light years from Terra, far beyond explored space and beyond any hope of rescue. The WarShips, JumpShips, BattleMechs, and other military hardware as well as manufacturing facilities were placed in a stable orbit amongst the planet's many moons. Thousands of colonist died before they were able to reach the cache in orbit and there they discovered another surprise. None of the JumpShips or WarShips had the navigational data to return to Terra. They were truly alone.

For the next four hundred years, the colony experienced an explosion of scientific and technological advancement, but there was always an underlying bitterness towards those that abandoned them. Even with a Cameron in command, the anger was always present. Hyper Fusion engines, Advanced K-F Drives, Neural Interfaces, Bio-synthetic armor, nanotechnology. These were all areas of advancement among the colony. Military technology advanced as well, but not as much other disciplines. Plasma weaponry was introduced, and the colony reactivated its military forces for the possibility of searching for a way back home.

In 3065, Home found them. A fleet from the New Star League stumbled across an old beacon that led them to Olympus, where they found that not only did House Cameron live, they thrived. The fleet commander met with the leader of the House and outlined the past four hundred plus years of their exile. Plans were made as the fleet swore allegiance to House Cameron, and the plans for their return their old seat of power. By 3072, they were ready to invade. The Jihad was well underway, and the confusion would only allow for the complete surprise against the Blakist forces. No one in the Inner Sphere expected a massive force of nearly one hundred WarShips to hit Terra, and no one expected House Cameron to have survived. In a six month whirlwind offensive, the Blakists and the Great Houses were driven out of the former Hegemony worlds. All were warned against violating the Hegemony's borders. The advanced technology of the Hegemony was light years beyond those of the Inner Sphere as well as the Clans, many of which returned to the Hegemony fold.

For the next one hundred years, House Cameron led a second golden age in both science and technology. Artificial gravity became standard on all WarShips, JumpShips, and DropShips. Acceleration Compensators allowed for greater speeds in aerospace craft. Nanotechnology was highly regulated in the Hegemony, but was used for everything from environmental reclamation to virus and disease eradication. Gravitic shields were introduced to WarShips, along with advances in weapons such as the Hellbore series Naval Plasma Cannon, the Penetrator series Neutron Naval Pulse Laser, the Blackout series Disruptor Cannon, and the Armageddon series Spinal Mount Gauss Cannon.

Towards the end of 32nd Century, the Hegemony Fleet was a force to be reckoned with, more than capable of defending it borders as well as projecting the Hegemony presence to any trouble spot in the Inner Sphere.

A/N

This is the start of the revised HaloTech. A majority of the changes will be additions from Halo: Reach as well as minor tweaks to the plot to make things move more smoothly. As always, questions, comments, and complaints welcome, flames are not.