All the guns of Earth

The path back to Earth was fraught for the crew of the Solar Ascent. Star-systems came and went as they flew, the fleet pushing their engines to the limits of what Rye deemed safe to try and get home even just a second earlier. The bunny girl spent all her time in one of the large hangers, overseeing the production of torpedo after torpedo; Dustin had pulled every engineer that wasn’t actively repairing battle-damage to assist her in rearming the fleet as swiftly as possible.

As they ghosted past a pale blue star, the first wave of shuttlecraft sped out to deploy the weapons across the gathered ships. They were low on some of the supplies needed by the engineer to build her tools of destruction, but that barely mattered. As they swept around an asteroid belt in a lazy arc, the smaller craft opened fire with pulsed laser blasts, carving a swath through the mineral-rich rock for the larger ships to scoop up.

Sola and the other craft only had a limited ability to process and refine metals, but a conversation during their first weave flight had revealed an alternative. Rye had been bemoaning the situation and how long it would take to purify incoming resources when Defia and Bleu had walked in, deep in discussion about something to do with endocrine systems that Dustin struggled to follow. After listening to the Rabyth’s woes for a moment, Defia had interrupted the medic with a raised hand.

“Statement. If purification of minerals is of use, why not take advantage of the nature of Fractal and Queri assembly.” The red-eyed woman paused, her face scrunching up in concentration (this was yet another emotional affectation; her thought processes were distributed, and so disconnected from her appearance normally) before nodding. “Addendum. I believe I could break down approximately three tonnes of material per hour into a series of mixed particulates fine enough for unit designate Bleu to filter further.”

The medic wasn’t exactly happy about the idea of being turned into a giant sieve, but Rye rapidly pointed out that it wouldn’t be needed. If Defia could turn chunks of space rock into partially sorted particulate, it wouldn’t take the bunny girl much effort to throw together a suitable set of tanks to filter the useful minerals out before pumping them into their respective refineries. Six and a half hours of work by Rye and her team had a row of the machines standing at the end of set of long tubes that lead to one of the hangar bays.

Now, mineral-rich asteroid chunks floated in from the void of space, Defia catching them deftly with one elongated arm before essentially swallowing them whole. Dustin watched on the vidscreen as the woman’s form expanded like a pufferfish briefly before she turned and covered the end of the tube array with one hand, the ground up remnants of the space rock pouring out into Rye’s machine.

Production of the new weapons was only part of the Solar Ascent’s preparations for the fight ahead. Dustin and captains of the fleet poured over every scrap of data about the Durathisians that their alliance had been able to gather. Ship designs were checked and rechecked, battle lines in prior engagements discussed, and the species itself considered through every possible analytical lens. Axworth’s infrequent calls interspersed those discussions, updating them about the latest position of the hostile ****, or to provide a summary of the mood on Earth.

The enemy fleet was still almost a day’s travel away when Sola dropped back into realspace in the warm light of Earth’s star. The instant they emerged, the scale of Earth’s defensive preparations became apparent. Despite knowing they were arriving and who they were, a dozen or more ships had acquired weapons-lock on Sola alone, from tiny passenger craft with weapons virtually duct-taped to their outside, through to the heavy mining rigs that normally operated out past Jupiter.

The space around the jump point was a hive of activity; one of Earth’s great orbital stations had been repositioned and was currently serving as a floating hospital and command center, tiny shuttles diving in and out of the massive structure. Dustin felt a bit of pride about that - those orbitals were home to people who were just like he had been before becoming ambassador, and they had according to Axworth not only given up their homes without any argument but in many cases also volunteered to assist the medical teams as runners to aid in defence of the homeworld.

Sola and the rest of the fleet fell into their designated places in the defensive line. Rye’s production of torpedoes came to a halt - despite the increased mineral reserves at hand, there was just no more time to risk on the volatile stages of the construction. She did pass on the assembly instructions to the crews in the shipyards of Titan, who immediately set to work - they wouldn’t have any ready by the time the Durathisians arrived, but if Earth’s defence survived this first wave then they would be armed enough to invade any hell you could mention.

All around the massed fleet of cobbled together vessels, the sleek forms of starfighters flitted. Axworth had been busy - despite sending the best pilots he could off with Dustin, he’d kept expanding the number of wings under his command. Now, the space near the jump point practically buzzed with the tiny ships, weapons charged and engines running hot. The suspense of those last few hours put Dustin in mind of waiting for the Fractals to arrive at the Lemth homeworld just days prior - the same mixture of tension and eagerness to get started, to see either victory or defeat, coupled with apprehension at the knowledge of just what defeat would mean.

Every member of the senior staff save for Bleu were on the bridge with him when the first sensors detected an incoming weave signal. Naera had joined Meli at her terminal to provide a second set of eyes, Yril’k stood tensely at the weapons station, Emely and Trea’k were working to handle all the incoming information from the vast and largely mercantile fleet, while Sammie gripped the flight controls so hard her knuckles were almost white.

Aricia and Defia were not present - after consideration, Dustin had ordered them both to go and assist Bleu - in the event of a medical emergency, the two could act as runners and free up some of her team to do actual medical work, potentially saving lives. The rest of the bridge crew - junior officers when they’d left Earth, now experienced staff that Dustin had promised himself he would give promotions to once this mess was over - stood ready, secondary stations active to feed information to their superiors or take over in the event of any damage.

The ripple in space grew as the Durathisian fleet punched a hole through from the weave, their flagship dropping out right in front of Sola. The craft was gray, with black lines running the entire length. Looking more like a giant claw than anything else, the glow from its engines illuminated the distortions in space as the rest of the fleet fell back into reality behind it. For a moment, nothing happened, then Dustin nodded to Emely. “Hail them.”

The fox girl tapped the console in front of her, tails twitching nervously. “No reply sir.” She said.

Dustin winced. “Hail them again, and play the pre-recorded message.” He’d spent some time on that during their flight - Emely coaching him in the complexities of Durathisian speech. The message was simple - “Welcome to Sol space, please state your reason for visiting Humanity.”

In answer to what was a rather polite message, all things considered, the Durathisian flagship fired it’s weapons, a beam of angry lightning crackling off Sola’s shields as the enemy fleet moved into an attack formation. “So much for ‘we come in peace’” Dustin muttered, then hit the button for fleet-wide comms. “All ships, they’re hostile. Light ‘em up!”

From every corner of humanity’s scraped together defensive line, weapons lanced out. Those of the science fleet were by far the strongest - but regardless of its source, the sheer weight of firepower mankind had brought to bear quickly overwhelmed the front line of the Durathisians, their leading ships sprouting massive hull breaches all along their prows.

For a moment, Dustin thought that maybe they’d overestimated their foe - so used was he and presumably Axworth to fighting or planning on fighting the Fractals that they’d forgotten that the rest of the galaxy was far less warlike. That hope lasted barely a few seconds before Meli cried out in alarm. “Husband! Their hulls are repairing!”

Indeed, as Dustin watched a Durathisian cruiser’s bow flowed back together from where a hit from Sola’s main gun had nearly cored the craft. “Fuck…” he said, before shaking his head. “Looks like Fractal tech, but we’ve beaten that before. And they don’t have shields. All ships - target their reactors and keep firing!”

The hostile aliens decided at that point that they weren’t going to merely sit there as target practice for the human fleet. Scattering into battle-groups, the black and gray craft whirled in space, striking out at the Terran lines with blasts of blue-green energy that arced over the shields of the science fleet - and burned holes straight through the hulls of the civilian vessels.

Fire erupted across the human lines, a wave of smaller vessels falling apart under the barrage. In some cases, the crew managed to reach escape pods - but not all of them. Dustin grimaced and gave another order. “Science fleet! Try and intercept those beams, use your shields to protect the other craft!”

The first Durathisian vessel exploded not long after that - a white-hot nova of destruction as a pair of mining ships burned a hole in its hull wide enough for a missile launched from a hastily bolted on addition to a tourist yacht to reach the reactor. Sola cored another ship a moment later, her mighty cannon aiming for the reactor and striking with frightening efficiency.

Despite all the firepower humanity had brought to this fight, they were still massively outgunned against a fleet that could repair damage seemingly at will. Kilometre by kilometre, mile by mile, they were being driven back. Behind them, the great orbital platform began to slowly retreat, it’s weaker engines throttling up drastically to keep it in range to resupply but out of the direct firefight. From the fleet, those escape pods that managed to flee from disintegrating mining and transport barges fell towards the station, their limited thrusters spinning wildly to keep them away from the destruction on both sides.

Earth was loosing. Dustin could see that; they were being pushed back, and according to their intel this was just the bridgehead ****. Indeed, Sola’s scanners picked up more of the enemy fleet arriving as he gave the order for the weave-torpedoes to be used, the destructive bubbles tearing through the front wave of Durathisian vessels and giving them a brief reprieve to allow the wounded to get to relative safety.

For every human ship, for every inch travelled, their foes were paying dearly - but the majority of the fleet was jury-rigged and not able to land more than lucky hits on the invaders. The science vessels had more luck, but they were still battered and bruised from the recent battle with the Fractals. “We’re approaching Jupiter!” Emely called out, the message followed a moment later by the defensive platforms on the shipyards coming into the fight, to little impact save for distracting a handful of the Durathisians’ weapons briefly.

Dustin’s eyes roved over the battlemap. There had to be something… anything… any way that he could turn this around. They’d been fighting for what felt like hours, inching ever closer to Earth. The human defensive line was holding, but barely; just those science ships with shields and the odd mining cruiser here or there. The rest of the fleet were drifting hulks - some destroyed, some used as missiles to try and strike a final blow against the Durathisians as their crews boarded escape craft. A handful were just crippled, displaying lifesigns that Dustin prayed they’d have a chance to recover. All seemed lost - and then Meli said something that made any remaining hope turn to ash. “Husband… more incoming weave signatures.”