OOC: There's method to my madness Skimmer
Guess what you forgot to put a stop to...
Federation Territory:
Prisoner transport 01, 02, 03 finally reached their intended destination. The Federation border world home to a swift justice system, several population centres and is in close promxitiy to a nearby prison world. The Scythian colonial magestrate was somewhat concerned that the Hive had managed to round up enough criminals in Federation territory to fill three transports but that wasn't his concern, his superriors agreed to take prisoners from the Hive, and he had not received any instruction otherwise.
"Mayday, mayday! This is prisoner transport 02, we've got a critical engine failure! We're going down! Launching pods!"
About 40 pods, each carrying 20 convicts were jetisoned as transport 02 crashed into the main settlement. Colonists gasped as a massive fireball shook the foundations of the Scythian colony leaving a wake of destruction in its path. There was immediate power failure leaving a lot of Scythians in the dark, the massive initial destruction was soon to be the least of their problems.
The pods touched down without incident at random locations throughout the settlement, as did the other two transports at the spaceport.
"Get emergency crews down to the crashsite now!" Someone in charge yelled.
"There are bodies everywhere, they're all dead." A Scythian woman cried as she looked over the burnt bodies of her scythian brethren killed in the blast.
Suddenly, the pod doors opened and the convicts emerged, freed from the shackles and armed. A transmission came from the still intact transport 01. "Alert, weapon locker breach in transport 02. Prisoners may be armed."
"Oh shit!"
In the space of one minute nearly 800 convicts with plasma rifle in hand a burning hatred for everything that wasn't them and an unquenchable thirst for freedom were set loose upon the nearby settlements.
The streets raged with the sound of angry men as a torrent of rioting convicts proceeded to engage everything in their path. Before another two minute passed vehicles were turned over, buildings were set alight and shops were blasted apart. The bodies of colonists began to litter the streets as the people began to flee in panic. The Scythian colonial militia showed up but a full scale riot was hardly expected on a Federation border world, they were ill equiped to handle the situation.
Suddenly a salvo of missiles escaped from 01 and 02, raining death upon what little colonial millitia had been mustered to defend the city and drawing the entire colony into total anarchy.
The crew of the spaceport tower watched in horror as everything was burned down around them. The sound of gunfire and screaming came from below. The door to the control cab burst open. It was human, at least it used to be. One of its eyes had become completely white and what was left of the skin was a shade of blue. Metallic framing protruded from the creature at odd places. A few sensors mounted on the shoulders and around the cranial area and various forms of machinery filled the gaps in between the remains of this creature's body. The sound of heavy breathing came from its chest cavity.
With no hesitation the creature aimed its weapon at the tower crew and reduced then all to a bloody smouldering pulp under a hail of automatic plasma fire.
Meanwhile, downstairs, one of the solders that had piled out of transport 01 was busy patching into the colonial mainframe.
"Transmission received. We have the alogrythms. We have the keys. We have the standards, the AI is calculating the code pattern now."
"How long?"
"30 seconds."
The sound of gunfire rang throughout the facility as the Hive Elite and Hive Recycleds continued to mop up all remaining resistance.
"Got it, uplinking with Federation command matrix."
With the touch of a few keys, the soldiers had what they came for.
"It's all here...Space ports, factories, population centres, census data, planetary defenses, state assets, military capacity, star charts."
"I want a broad spectrum transmission, all frequencies, maximum output. I want this information available to every single terminal in the sector. That includes ours."
The soldier tapped one last key and the mission was a complete success. With access to the Federation's coding standards they were able to use their own repeaters to propagate a hyperspace transmission to every foreign power, every criminal element, every mercenary, every sentient being in the entire sector with access to a data terminal.
Through the careless actions of one starship captain, through the neglegence of Federation officials simply
forgetting about the prisoner transports, through the Caliphate's own rediculous attachment to the Sol system and finally through the Nexus' careful exploitation of all of the above the Federation of the Shadow found itself torn from the fog of war and thrust into the light for all to see. It would take months to rehide all the infrastructure that had just been exposed to the entire sector and this was time that the Federation did not have, its enemies would make sure of it.
Now that a mortal wound had been cast it was time to let the poison spread.
A single soldier raised his weapon to the air and let off a few rounds to catch the attention of the convicts below.
"People! Your freedom is now! This spaceport is loaded with transports. Leave this place and start your lives anew! Let this region be your new Eden! Let it be your promised land! For freedom!"
The crowds roared as they tore through the gates and packed into the waiting craft. Soon, the soldiers and the convicts had scattered, leaving nothng but death and destruction in their wake.
An hour passed before the first Federation ship entered the system to survey the damage. The perpetraitors were already long gone, left in stolen transports. the prisoner transports were also gone, the colony was in ruins.
Between the transports over 1200 convicts had been unleashed upon the Federation cluster, but that was not the only problem. Leaders from at least eight criminal syndicates were already eying up the supply line data flooding in from that transmission. The soldiers were scattered over a dozen different captured transports. It would be impossible to track and capture them all before they reached Hive space. Besides, the Federation had more important things to worry about.