Testing of Pride

[Taeli Raaf]

Standing on the bridge of the Star Destroyer designated currently Project Pride, Taeli smiled as she, the bridge crew, her special guest Circe Savan surveyed the testing site for the prototype ship. The Bilbringi system, a stronghold now for Krayt Industries that Taeli intended to fortify beyond belief, was a mass of asteroids.

Conveniently, those asteroids were chalk full of resources and would provide perfect target practice for the ship's weapon systems. She had also ordered some fighter craft and smaller vessels to hide among the test run area so they could test the shields of the vessel. It was going to be an absolute test for the ship, no skimping on anything. Technicians and engineers were on board, and also observing from ships scattered through the asteroids and in small shuttle craft that would track along the vessel.

"This should be fun, a full test of this ship is called for, wouldn't you agree Circe?" she asked. "Commander, begin on my mark."

"Yes, Lady Arcanix," he said, snapping a salute and the bridge crew instantly straightened in their chairs. This was the make or break phase of things, and it would pay dividends for the company if the ship hit full production.

[member="Enigma"]

 

[Onrai]

[member="Darth Arcanix"]

Circe stood on board the bridge next to Taeli, otherwise known as Darth Arcanix. Now was the time to see how things were going to end up with the Exalt-class Star Destroyer, a completely next-generation warship, designed between Emeritus Industries and Krayt Industries in order to protect against the potential extragalactic invaders during the situation best known as the Netherworld Rifting. And yet the threat had seemed to somewhat pass - for now, at least. It was time to put the ship through its paces.

"Ready?"

 

[Taeli Raaf]

[member="Enigma"]

"Of course," she answered the woman, smiling brightly. She was glad for the assistance that Circe had provided her already in helping design this ship. Her suggestions had certainly made the ship more unique, not tethered to the old style of using turbolasers. The mass drivers would have the added benefit of hitting right through shields into enemy hulls. "Mark."

"All forward, weapons primed and shields up," the commander ordered. The Star destroyer began the lumbering task of advancing towards the first area of the test zone, it's engines not as strong as hoped for, but still easily workable. The first small asteroids began to drift past, and then . . . the gun batteries opened fire. Streaks of super-accelerated mass slugs began slamming into asteroids, shattering them and leaving their pieces drifting in space. They hadn't even reached the first designated large asteroid that would be Target One, and already she could see the power the ship could provide.

 

[Onrai]

[member="Darth Arcanix"]

The rubble the asteroids were being reduced to made Circe smile - she recollected over the entirety of the situation before considering what she had done. This warship would give the One Sith an edge against whatever faction the Sith were going to go against next. Then again, Circe had the specifications for the ship - any weaknesses in the design could easily be checked out with a team of skilled individuals. But right now, such was hardly the concern, after all.

"You know, we're going to need to have a celebration once this ship is officially integrated into the One Sith navy."

 

[Taeli Raaf]

[member="Enigma"]

"Oh I agree, a celebration will be needed," Taeli laughed as they finally started to near Target One. It had been outfitted with shields to simulate what it would be like to fire upon a ship of equal size, in this case a cruiser. Mass slugs and ion cannons streaked towards the target, and she couldn't stop a wider smile forming as she watched the asteroid get torn apart.

"Status of weapon batteries?" she asked, looking down into one of the command pits.

"100% efficiency right now, my Lady," the firing officer said from his console and she received a message supporting that from the teams observing the weapons themselves.

"Excellent, continue bombardment on Target One, reduce it to shards," she said, watching the destruction of it as the ion cannons wore out the shields of the asteroid quickly as the mass driver slugs started to break holes through it.

 

[Onrai]

[member="Darth Arcanix"]

"Continue firing... Wait." She paused, looking over a sensor console. "We've got an incoming ship. Sith Empire IFF reading. Strange..." Very strange indeed seeing as the Sith Empire no longer existed. "It's a Subjugator-class warship... They're launching... Feth. Taeli, order red alert across all systems. That corvette's launching a swarm of TIE Detonators, and we haven't even got a shuttle to fight back with." She gave a sly grin, however.

"I suppose that now's the best time to see if this ship can weather a real attack."

 

[Taeli Raaf]

[member="Enigma"]

"You didn't need to dust off some relic you found in a museum to do that," Taeli said, catching the sly grin and giving back a tiny bit of good-natured snark. "All hands, battle stations! Commander, lock batteries and open fire. Flak guns at maximum across the board, I don't want of those TIE's getting close."

"Yes, Lady Arcanix!" the commander stated, and mass driver and ion cannon battery fire began opening up on the corvette that Circe had arranged to appear. Flak fire filled the space around the Star Destroyer, catching several forward TIE Detonators. Taeli was a bit disappointed they didn't have any starfighters loaded into the bay below, but that test was going to be for later.

"Enemy ship trying to use the asteroids as cover, but we've scored a few hits, my Lady," the commander stated, then the ship rocked as one TIE Detonator got through and crashed against the ship's superstructure.

"Intensify forward firepower, I don't want anything getting through again," she said, a scolding tone in her voice.

 

[Onrai]

"Um... I didn't." She paused. "If I did, the ship would have a New Order IFF tag, seeing as that's where most of these things went." Another TIE hit the ship, whose shields seemed to be holding steady so far. They appeared to be doing a decent enough job of protecting against the old kamikaze drones, but the integrity was admittedly failing.

"Keep firing... And engage that Subjugator with our mass drivers before it gets away." She reached out to see what was on there - and there was nothing. "Droid ship..."

[member="Darth Arcanix"]

 

[Taeli Raaf]

[member="Enigma"]

"Huh, then I wonder where it came from, we scanned the entire system when we took it," Taeli mumbled, watching several of the kamikaze drones explode from the shell of flak fire forming around the Star Destroyer. "Hmm, note to self, increase armor plating a bit more on the ship for such a thing. All batteries, wipe that corvette out!"

"A droid ship you say? Hmm, now that's interesting," Taeli said, her eyes narrowing. "Someone is either trying to sabotage the project or the yards, unacceptable."

She watched a mass drive shot tear a chunk away from the corvette, but ti was slowly moving away from the engagement as it saw its cargo of drones were no longer getting through after the second.

"Oh no you don't," the commander said. "Batteries five and six, target their engines and disable it."

 

[Onrai]

[member="Darth Arcanix"]

The ion cannons began to pummel the damaged corvette, now depleted of Detonators. A Tyderium hyperspace tug would haul the damaged vessel back to the shipyards in order to figure out what the hell they were doing here. Circe did have a hypothesis, however - "It's more than likely that this vessel's crewed entirely by droids. When the Sith Empire began to fracture, we were running low on naval crew personnel. Some of our more automated ships were run solely by a single captain, with a crew of droids under him. It's likely that this is one of those ships - the captain's probably dead and the ship's gone into a patrol mode of some sort in order for the droids to comprehend what's going on."

Hopefully that was the case. The last thing Circe needed was a ghost ship story.

Or OMNI.

 

[Taeli Raaf]

[member="Enigma"]

"Well we will get to bottom of that mystery soon enough," Taeli replied, while a damage report was thrust into her hand as the remaining TIE Detonators were destroyed. "At least we suffered minor damage, all things considered. Easily fixable stuff to the superstructure, although we will be adding another layer of armor after this. Continue on course, Commander."

"Yes, my Lady," came the reply and the Star Destroyer started to move away from the area of Target One and headed towards Target Two, firing on asteroids that close again while also the engineers began a test to boost the shields further.

 

[Onrai]

[member="Darth Arcanix"]

She paused, eying over the readings. Shields were at twenty-seven percent and rising, while the hull integrity of the vessel was at ninety-two percent and holding steady. "Well, that was a lot of fun. We could simply call this a wrap - it engaged an older Imperial corvette and survived a full scale attack by kamikaze drones. In the field it likely would be engaged by more than just that - but that it was able to survive a type of attack that certainly would've overwhelmed earlier SDs is quite excellent indeed."

What else was to be expected, after all?

 

[Taeli Raaf]

[member="Enigma"]

"We just have one more thing to do," Taeli said, as the ship arrived at Target Two. "My engineers detected a vast amount of metals within this asteroid here, enough to kick start production and mining in the system again. We're going to crack this asteroid open, then we take the ship back to dock to get that damage taken care of. Open fire, Commander."

Needing no second urging, the ship's mass driver cannons opened fire again, tearing away large chunks of the asteroid as it was pulverized and broken apart for the waiting mining ships to get at. Taeli could only smile as she watched the firepower this thing could bring into play. Oh yes, she was rather happy with how it turned out indeed.

"I really must thank you for your help, Circe," she said, looking at the woman next to her.

 

[Onrai]

[member="Darth Arcanix"]

"The metals in that asteroid can probably be used to construct at least half a dozen of these ships." She smiled, watching as with a tremendous crack, the continual firepower of the warship split the asteroid in half - easy pickings for any miner willing to come along. With that situation dealt with, and the Exalt prototype returning to drydock for the addition of more armor and repair to the damage that was caused by the TIE Detonators, Circe could finally eye the woman in question and give her a soft smile.

"So... Any ideas as to how we can celebrate the first-fruits of our partnership?"

 

[Taeli Raaf]

[member="Enigma"]

"None particularly, but perhaps we can discuss such things away from the crew?" Taeli said, smiling back at the woman. Turning to address her crew first though, she said, "I want to thank you all for your efficiency, dedication, and time in the construction and testing of this first prototype of a new line of Star Destroyer. This ship, I hope, will eventually become the pride of many task forces and fleets the Sith will deploy in peace-keeping operations around the galaxy."

A small smattering of laughter rose as everyone knew that peace-keeping didn't necessarily mean peace-keeping all the time. So many Republic worlds, so little time after all.

"This ship, the first of the Exalt-class of Star Destroyer, will be the beginning of a new era for both the Sith and Krayt Industries. Thank you again, and let's finish this work up so we can start the next project eh?"

As she turned and left with Circe to go into the makeshift quarters established for on board, she smiled and hummed to herself a bit.

"I always enjoy when something comes together so well, don't you?"

 

[Onrai]

[member="Darth Arcanix"]

"Tell me about it. There's never quite a feeling like what comes up when a project's said and done." She smiled, sitting down on a bed in the makeshift quarters. "But there's always that urge, that desire to start something brand new immediately after - to never stop working and progressing on whatever it is you find to be best..." She turned, a seductive smirk having grown on her face as she eyed the Sith Lord.

"Not to mention never leave anything unfinished."

 

[Taeli Raaf]

[member="Enigma"]

"I've always got another goal or project in mind," Taeli replied with a grin as the ship docked with the yards again. Repairs would be done immediately, as well as the off-loading of all data on the cruise to observe and make final tweaks to the ship's systems. But that didn't seem to be on Circe's mind as her smile turned seductive.

Taeli could feel her cheeks turning a little red as she noticed the smirk.

"No, leaving things unfinished something I don't like to do either," she replied, her smile turning coy.

 

[Onrai]

[member="Darth Arcanix"]

"Anything in particular you're thinking of?" She smiled. There were so many cooperative technological advancements that could be made with the combined power of their work together. "I believe I may already have the idea for something capable of curing individuals of mental illness..." But that was to be discussed another time.

"I'm not sure whether this is the best place to talk... What about on my ship?"

 

[Taeli Raaf]

[member="Enigma"]

"I was thinking of something of the . . . opposite side of the spectrum," Taeli replied. "Take the concept of Sith poison and . . . tweak it a little bit. Say, cause madness but intense healing properties from one's very blood. Harden to seal up the wound, madness and the dark side in the compound to draw additional power from, but only if one can temper the madness and not let it control you."

Shrugging, she continued saying, "Perhaps this isn't the best place to talk about such things. As long as you don't plan to kidnap me."

The last part was added as a joke, well half of a joke. Circe was still such an unknown to her, but she had a feeling this would change given time. The Exalt-class Star Destroyer had been completed, and would soon be moved into production. It just made her all giddy inside.

 

[Onrai]

[member="Darth Arcanix"]

"That's... a possibility. There are plenty of different varieties of Sith Poison. Ashin Varanin was one who educated me regarding that sort of thing." Assumedly the Sith Lady would know who the woman in question was - she had been Empress of the Sith Empire, after all. "Specific effects would require copious amounts of testing."

She smiled. "We do need a break, after all - if not from work, then from the everlasting conflict."