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At the controls of the corvette was a war tattered crew led by a Thymion wolf that looked like he tried to make love with a cheese grater. The captain was Damian William Wolfen. Scar tissue polka-dot danced across his exposed, naked body. His right eye was gone, replaced by a cybernetic optic unit, but rather than surgically installed properly, it was simply held in place with medical staples. Two of the fingers on his right hand were replaced in a similar manner. He looked violent, his good eye gleaming cruelly as he thumbed over his console, trying to study all targets at once and fend off the hidden sensor corvette's relentless interference with trying to drive the alien task force away. On top of all those frustrations, he had detected the psychic energy of a woman he cared deeply about, someone he had thought long dead.

Aunt Rosemary was alive and on the Caliban. He had to protect her and his crew were in total agreement, willing to die to protect her.

And that was when his cannons began to open fire on the Temlasarian escape pods as they fled. His guns were small, not as powerful as the massive dreadnaught's. But they were extremely accurate, even enough that his ship passed a gauss round between two elf ships to strike a fleeing freighter through its central engine, stalling it in space. Rosemary didn't even notice the small ship, nor would she have cared as a hundred years of pent up rage exploded in the heat of battle. And the true depth of a Thymion wolf's rage was revealed for all. As peaceful as they were, when pushed to the brink, they became as vicious as every other species could be. And now, mingling with Rosemary's screams of rage were sobs of agony for her actions. She was screaming and pleading at the same time as she emptied the magazines of her guns until they ran dry. As the battle came to an end, her ship deployed repair drones, both inside and out. She began to sob into her paws as she sat in her chair. The ship was repairing and reloading itself at an alarming rate, the drones even grabbing spilled ammunition from ships she and Undervilde had destroyed.

In the quiet, the corvette moved between the elves and the Caliban. It took a defensive posture and continued its attempt to jam signals and blast any nearby ship with a disruptive radiation beam. The ship maintained silence, but now it's name was known. Written on the side of the ship in Thymion script, faded by time and guerrilla attacks, was written Wolfen Fang. With a shock, Rosemary realized what was happening after a moment and hurriedly reached out, trying to soothe the fear and rage of the crew aboard the Wolfen Fang and assure Venomspite that she was in control of the situation. Inside the Caliban, her powers were amplified significantly, allowing her to feel every Thymion and every void elf around her. She could even feel the sickening war-like stance of Jorst's mind and the blank spot just off to his left. She gently prodded Jorst, asking him to silence the Deymarii, sending him a burst of second-hand emotions of hostility gleaned from the newcomer. Jorst was displeased, uttering a few curses at her. He didn't like being the first to lay down arms, especially when there was a potential threat present. But the Tenglaari had a thin, yet solid, line of understanding bisecting his thoughts. Five minutes passed and the Deymarii fell silent once again at Venomspite's grudging command.

The Wolfen Fang was advanced, more so than even the Empress Hand_had been. It's suites came with countermeasures for countermeasures of countermeasures. She was built to terrorize other ships from the shadows, driving the crew mad before moving in for the kill. She was Thymion's finest sensors corvette and their only one, too. After a moment, they ceased their broadcasts too and cooled their weapons. But they remained between the elves and Rosemary in the best defensive stance they could muster as they sat silently, ignoring any hails. It was tense, as the small ship sat in a silent stand-off against Undervilde. Finally, it hailed the _Opal.

Venomspite was not pleased, especially given that his own ship was now only able to see the damned thing by line of sight now the Deymarii_had gone silent. Now, their sensors only picked up faint echoes of a ship at best. It was like a ghost in the black. Or it would have been, had the Undervilde dreadnought _Lernara Bo not been transmitting images of the small ship that sat, silhouetted against the Caliban's golden hull to all the other Undervilde ships. Venomspite opened the channel, accepting the hail and studied the other captain with a carefully neutral expression, his thoughts perfectly schooled so as not to give his annoyance away. The corvette had delayed the task force by forty minutes now and there was still much to be done. On the screen, in all their evil looking glory sat Damian and his bridge crew.

They were haggard, half crazed with starvation and all of them looked like they were bloody. One was crudely holding the stump of a severed arm closed with a flight jacket. Another had a tube running into his chest, pumping air into his lungs, because his throat was slashed and burned. Another still wore a bloody blindfold, only controlling her station via psychic link. It was easy to tell she was straining to maintain the connection as she worked. A couple of droids could be seen ambling about in the background, looking more like glued together children's toys than A.I driven machines.

The ship was in shambles, her crew on the verge of collapse, but still they soldiered on.

Damian himself looked absolutely batshit crazy, drooling and foaming at the mouth as he gripped his chair in a half terror, half feral berserk rage. He was half wolf, half husky. His black hair was tipped at the end with an emerald green and his heterochromatic eyes were blue and green. He was twitching spastically, likely in pain from the number of metal implants grafted into his body. It was obvious these wolves had been fighting with everything to make an offensive when their people were too terrified to lift a weapon. All of them looked like they were running on their last nerves. But finally Damian found his voice. It was cracked, harsh sounding like a five pack a day smoker.

''I...denti...fy...please,'' he said hoarsely. His good eye darted crazily from his console to the screen and back.

He was on edge, even as Rosemary tried to soothe his addled mind. One could see the cybernetics roughly attached to him. Mismatching his body size and likely installed without anesthetic, leaving him in agony and quite mad. And then he turned his head as a droid finally collapsed. It broke after the years of abuse and overuse without proper maintenance. The entire left side of his upper head was covered in stitches, sealing closed a nasty, jagged wound. He had taken head trauma at some point and it showed.

''I am Captain Arguso Vulwen Venomspite, Prince of the star kingdom Undervilde. This is His Majesty's Warship, Opal. I am an ally of convenience to the Thymion people as the Temlesarians have seen fit to encroach and harass territories not of their own beyond your Empire. They have attempted to incite war with people that could very easily wipe your empire from history and I have arranged to put a stop to that for everyone's sake.'' He said, enunciating his words carefully, slowly, so that the wolf hybrid could keep up with him. It seemed the calm tone, honest words, and Rosemary's psychic nursemaiding were able to calm the being down. He slowly relaxed and as he did, so too did his crew.

''D...Damian William... Wolfen. Prince of Th.. Thymion. Captain of t..the Wolfen's Fang. At your service... c..could you spare some rations and gauze?'' He asked.

Venomspite didn't know what to make of this. This ship was the single most advanced Thymion ship anyone had ever seen. It was capable of wreaking havoc on a battlefield and had even forced some of his own ships to retreat a short distance to avoid collision as he had forced his way through the sphere of ships. As well, Trillian was reporting that while he could counter the garbage that Damian was throwing around, there was no way he could handle it all forever with just the two of them at the controls. The _Wolfen Fang_was fully crewed and shielded. It was also using some frequency too high to detect to communicate, meaning that it was likely to be able to talk through its own weaponized stereo system on the same bandwidth. Surely they had at least one fabricator that fed off a rad plate or the like? That kind of fabricator set-up was universal to most of the more seasoned space faring species. They had to have some means of producing more ammo and supplies.

Rosemary's voice cut in suddenly. The soft tones of her weepy words seemed to have a physical effect on Damian and his crew.

''Shhhh. Damian... shhhh. Relax. We will help. The Caliban is still fully stocked and the emergency medical ward is still sealed behind a blast wall. They never found it. We have three wolves alive on board. You can rest sweet child.'' she said softly.

Venomspite silently studied the smaller screen that displayed Rosemary's image as her eyes danced across her holographic displays. She was calm and quiet, her gentle words masking the sorrow on her face. He got a ping from his comms officer, with a read-out. The Caliban was almost ready to go again and there were indeed Thymion lifesigns aboard. They were faint, masked by a stealth wall around the medical bay. But they were present.

New wolves, that were likely still expecting Rosemary to be their captain. They would fall in line quickly if they were properly trained. But given Thymion's undisciplined style, likely not. It also seemed that Damian was finally coming to his senses. He did not look like a raving lunatic anymore. That didn't mean that the Opal's guns would be put into a stand down posture.

''S..sorry sir...w..war makes...fools of...us all." He muttered as he tried to punch something into a console. Venomspite could tell the crew was exhausted, mentally and physically. They were likely going to die soon, even with medical help. But that was when Damian sent a tight beam to the Opal. It was a compressed data file of less than three megabytes.

''C..coordinates of... breeding facilities... sir. W..we can't penetrate the.. their anti ship defenses... it's too much for even a destroyer. But you have a... f...f...fleet. you could.'' He stammered as he began to slump in his seat.

"I thank you, Captain Wolfen. But I must ask you to relinquish your command. Your crew are exhausted, you are starving and if you don't rest you will die. Think of your crew, please and of those you are trying to help.'' He said. He knew it was a risky thing to say, especially given the state of Damian's mind.

But it was necessary. He was in no fit state to command and his crew in no fit state to fight. They were a danger to themselves and a danger to those around them. A look of anger flitted across Damian's face, his single good eye sparkling with fury. Venomspite stared him down, his expression cool. He was in no mood for arguments, especially whilst sitting in the middle of a war zone riddled with anomalies and hostiles. But then something flashed across Damian's face. A thought, or something like it forced tears to his eye.

Finally, Damian nodded, a slight dip of his chin, the tatters of his ears drooping, ''We will stay with the Caliban,'' He sighed, almost sounding grateful that he had been relieved of duty, even if it was by an alien commander, ''What do you intend on doing?''

''If you were that ship that was trailing us for our last hit, then you've seen the kind of damage we can do.'' Venomspite replied simply. He looked to Rosemary, ''You have the data crystal still?''

''I do, Sir.'' She replied.

''If you wish to rejoin the task force, let us know so that we can update you properly and work out a position that will best suit the Caliban and the Wolfen Fang. This may be your home, but this is our operation and I will not tolerate the inexperienced getting in the way. Is that clear?''

Damian visibly bristled by the way Venomspite was speaking to her, but his angry words fell flat on his tongue when she acquiesced.

Rosemary spoke to Damian through the psychic link she had established with him, Their guns will tear us apart if we get in the way. Trust them. The Temlesarians don't stand a chance against them. They... they have weapons that can eat through our hulls like a hot knife through soft butter. She added, her voice subdued, frightened of the aliens that surrounded them, yet in awe of the power they wielded at the same time.

Do we really need them? We can do this ourselves now that you're back-

Rosemary laughed without mirth, Don't be so foolish, dear nephew. I only have the Caliban because of Captain Venomspite and his weapons. I still live because of him and that ship in his hold.

What ship?

Never mind, we need to find somewhere quiet for a while.

What ship, Aunt Rosemary?! He demanded more forcefully.

I said Never mind.

He went quiet. Rosemary tapped out a message and sent it to the Opal, silently hating herself for her irritated tone of voice. Her nerves were singing with the high of an adreneline rush and her nephew had gone batshit during her absence. She didn't know what he would do if she told him that there was a fully stocked sensors corvette in the Undervilde task force and the idea of explaining the Deymarii's captain to him made her blood run cold.

Aunt, what's wrong? He asked softly.

Lots of things. Here. This asteroid looks like a good place to hide out for a while. It's uninhabited and is near Undervilde's first hit, so there'll be plenty of debris to pick over if needed. Come on. I'll take you there and you can fill me in on what's been happening since I left. She said and opened the doors to the Caliban's auxiliary hangar.

There was a moments pause on Damian's part. He eyeballed the Opal. The cruiser was close and dominated the window, its deep purple hull crackling with violet arcs of energy. It was sleek and beautiful and she had the Wolfen Fang locked in her targeting sensors.

''Take us inside.'' He grunted and watched the Opal slide from view as his ship pivoted and glided into the waiting embrace of the Caliban. Once the corvette was secured, and the crew were sliding out of the ship slowly, Rosemary sent a final message across space. A notification to all surviving Thymions that hope was restored.

After that she left her seat, programming the autopilot psychically before moving to the medical bay. It's back wall was a solid alloy of black metal. Pressing her hand against it, she let the ship touch her mind, before the wall began to split apart and open. Inside was a secondary medical bay. And at the center were three cryo pods. She stood silently as Damian shuffled up behind her. They could feel the wolves in those pods, reaching out, asking those around them if it was safe to step out.

~~~~~~

''Orders, Captain?'' Furromoore asked.

The same question came in from Istasha who was down in CIC, seeing to the Opal's operation and that Venomspite's orders were relayed to the rest of the crew while he delt with the rest of the task force. Venomspite studied his screens, running through the list of targets and re-prioritizing.

''Drop us back into voidspace then put us on a course for this space station here. It's lying on the main route to one of these breeding facilities. Let's cripple their supply chain some more.'' He finally said.

''Aye Captain, route laid in.'' Faestar announced.

''Task force and Caliban have been notified.'' Katlan said.

~~~~~~

Rosemary watched from her holopad as the Undervilde ships drifted further away from the Caliban, their energy signatures dropping. To her own ship's knowledge, such things precluded a total systems shutdown and she instinctively wanted to reach out to Venomspite to warn him even as she searched for the culprits responsible for shutting down every ship in the task force. But they were the only ships in the area, save for a handful of disabled freighters with empty cargo holds. There was no sign of EM, either, so she looked back up, her mouth hanging open as the purple hull that dominated the Caliban's windows faded into the darkness. It was wasn't cloaking. Nothing so simple. There was a rush of exotic particles, compliant to FTL patterns and a dull, deep bass thud echoed on her passives. Every ship in the task force had vanished from realspace, the exotic particles left reeling in their wake dissipating within seconds. The Caliban was left alone with a near-crippled sensors corvette in her belly and panic gripped Rosemary.

She was alone and unable to reach Venomspite by any means. The data crystal flashed up on her tactical readouts. There were two cruisers, 2 destroyers and a pair of carriers heading in their direction at full speed.

''Damian, this is Rosemary. I'm opening a Rift.'' She said over the comm.

''Is there a problem?'' He asked, sounding bewildered as to why she wasn't communicating with him psychically.

Checking the comms still work. She replied, ''We have company.''

''What h-happened to your f-friends?''

''Off on another adventure. We're on our own.'' She replied, her hands flying across her drives holopad console.

There was a deep, barely perceptible hum in the depths of the ship and a dark portal twisted open before the dreadnought. Rosemary pushed the Caliban into the Rift, embracing the safety of the starless darkness within.

~~~~~~

The station they had hit next hadn't stood a chance. Several Thymion ships had been in a loose orbit around the station at the time of Undervilde's appearance, unsure about how safe it was to dock after what had happened at the other space station. They had been picked off in quick succession, the remainder being consumed by the station's death.

It had been a resupply facility, loaded to its pressure doors with ordnance and other, much lighter ammunition for the smaller warships that cruised around under control of the Temlesarians. A single dreadnought had been enough to light the place up. The Sergona Fel tore into the station's hide with a full broadside of vortex cannons and arcane missiles, the ship's PDCs swatting away as much return fire as possible. The _Sergona Fel_had suffered one hull breach, a ragged hole to her midsection just above where her CIC was. No one was injured, blessedly, but the shields would need time to recharge and more missiles created in the ship's arcane forge.

The station, however, was unrecognisable now. Where once it had been a large cylinder with a trio of rings radiating out from its core, it was now just half a cylinder, a blackened, twisted ruin of its former glory. The surface of the small moon it orbited glowed faintly with the remains of the heavy shells that had been aboard and fragments of slagged hull. What was left of the station would no doubt be dismantled for scrap, but the moon would forever be scarred by the shrapnel thrown by the explosion that had consumed the resupply depot and its crew. After that, they had swiftly moved on to the breeding facility. It was located on the surface of a bleak planetoid further in-system and a large force of freighters sat clustered around numerous warships; a trio of cruisers, a dozen carriers and a squadron of gun corvettes cruising between them on a defensive patrol.

Venomspite had ordered the Deymarii_to start broadcasting the moment they surfaced and watched with a measure of satisfaction as the gathered ships started breaking formation and colliding with one another. The _Deymarii was broadcasting false ID beacons, course corrections, orders and other, more general sensor-blinding noise, luring the enemy ships into one another's paths. Venomspite wondered just how much information on Thymion ships and Temlesarian habits Trillian and Jorst had gleaned since they had first entered Thymion space as he watched the mass confusion do most of his work for him. He waited half an hour for the chaos to subside, allowing himself a moment of amusement, then ordered those ships that had resurfaced with him to open fire. The confused local Temlesarian population dropped dramatically, mostly by their own, blinded hand, leaving the area thick with debris and twisted hulks venting gasses, bodies and sparks. The Undervilde guns had simply helped them off themselves. The path to the planetoid was now as clear as it would ever get and so he ordered one of the dreadnoughts that remained safely ensconced within voidspace to surface in a near orbit for bombardment at the captain's convenience.

They all watched from a distance as antimatter mines were dispatched inside the gravity well. The dreadnought accelerated hard, pulling back and vanishing again into voidspace. The mines hammered the surface of the planetoid striking one mile off target. It was enough. The breeding facility, the Temlesarian's largest in the entire Empire, had been utterly destroyed, all data, medical equipment and unborn clones obliterated in an antimatter inferno. All that remained, once the thin atmosphere had fully burned away was a crater that dominated half the planetoid's surface and left a hole so deep that a line of shimmering red could be seen at its deepest point where the mantle had cracked. The Yujaan Isten had obliterated an estimated 450,000 Temlesarians with a trio of anti-matter mines that weighed no more than 15lbs each and wiped the facility from existence. Venomspite ordered his ships back into voidspace for repair, replenishment and rest.

Everything in the Thymion Empire had gotten wind of what had happened and Venomspite and his captains had an estimated eight hours before the first of the Temlesarians would be on them baying for blood.

~~~~~~

Venomspite studied his tactical readouts and held conference with his other captains and their executive officers. An hour and a half had been used up discussing the best ways in which to deal with the Temlesarian vanguard now that they had come to the conclusion that they needed to present a united front.

''You know, they're calling you guys Wraiths.'' Trillian said with some amusement. He was sat in the wardroom alongside Venomspite and Itasha.

''Are they really?'' Venomspite said, an eyebrow arched.

''They've also been calling you some less savoury names, too.'' The tiger added.

Itasha chuckled and laced his fingers on the table before him, ''So far, they've yet to come up with an insult I haven't heard before.''

''They don't seem to be very creative, do they? It's always heretic this, heathen that.'' Ashenvilde said. He sounded a little disappointed.

''The religious zealot circles aren't what you'd call creative.'' Venomspite said. He held up a finger when his comms panel bleeped, ''Venomspite here.''

''Captain, I've got a message sitting in the comms array buffer. It's from the Caliban and was recieved four seconds before we went back into voidspace. I've cleared it up best as I can, but it seems our last strike emmitted more interference than anticipated. We also seem to have taken some minor damage to our comms relays. I've got some people on replacing the damaged whiskers right now.'' Katlan replied.

''Understood, Mister Katlan. Put it through to the wardroom.''

''Aye, Captain. Message is yours.''

The message was in video format and was short. Venomspite opened it up and played it through on the wardroom's main viewscreen, patching his other captains into the feed, too.

''Caliban to Opal, I have come into contact with a group of Temlesarians that are not allied with the main force. I repeat, I have come into contact with a group of Temlesarians who are not allied with the main force. Their leader wants peace for his people not war. I urge you to be careful about any Temlesarians surrendering to you. They may be friendly, they may not. I'm sorry, that's all I can give you right now. I have already read their thoughts to the core. They are open and honest. I've decided to investigate the Temlesarian activity on my side of the Empire now you seem to have drawn the attention of the main occupying force. And before you ask, yes this group is genuine. I can feel it in my core. They want nothing more than a peaceful life away from enforced religion. Good Luck Captain Venomspite. Caliban out.''

The picture had been fuzzy, the audio grainy and near unintelligible in some places, but Rosemary's message had been heard by every void elf listening in. A dense silence fell across them all as they processed this new information.

''She's very trusting, isn't she?'' Someone said.

''I thought taking a Tem surrender at face value is what lost them their black navy in the first place.'' Another commented.

''If she wants to try and get herself killed, then so be it,'' Venomspite said, ''She's well aware of how things happened in the first place, so if risking a repeat performance is what she wants, then let her do it. We have bigger problems to be dealing with right now and very little in our magazines left to be dealing with them.''

Everyone redirected their attention back to their tactical feeds. The Temlesarians had Rifted to a point 20,000 kilometers outside the planetoid's borders. They were consolidating their forces and rearranging themselves in their own version of an offensive line. It was shaping up to be two ships in height and three deep with the remaining cruisers up front to lead the charge and the remaining carriers bringing up the rear. Sandwiched between them was what was left of the corvettes, frigates and armed freighters with a band of starfighter drones nestled within.

''So, we going with the mine plan?'' Itasha asked.

Venomspite rubbed his chin, doing some mental calculations. The only ship that had spent any mines thus far was the Yujaan Isten, dropping a trio of mines on the heads of a bunch of dug-in Tems. A cruiser carried 80 mines, a dreadnought four times that. Destroyers had 30 of them and their carrier held 1,000 mines. Every single mine could be switched from an arcane core to a far more destructive antimatter core. And each ship had the capacity to make more of everything, given the time. If he ordered his ships to drop every single one of their mines, the Temlesarians would sail into a wall of over 2,840 high explosives. The idea was appealing, so he nodded.

''Yes we are. Have all of your mine's cores replaced with anti-matter.'' He started tapping away at his computer, rearranging things until he got a mine field pattern he liked. He shared it around, the pattern was modified four more times then everyone went to work with a fresh set of orders.