Battle near Skantos Passage
| Battle near Skantos Passage | |||
|---|---|---|---|
 | |||
| Date | 261 CE | ||
| Location | Grid N19 | ||
| Outcome | Inconclusive | ||
| Combatants | |||
| Commanders | |||
Polsk intercepted and translated a strange transmission in a language resembling Hindi 6 lightyears away from Yata relatively near where Skantos was, with the translation of the message revealing that this faction had been following 'Earth Survivors' to the Skantos System where they now planned to make a covert base to research its significance, with this message being seemingly directed towards the dwarf planet Ceres which was responsible for sending reinforcements. A Polskan stealth ship named 'PFS Admiral Krolizec' arrived to investigate, coming across a strange triangular shipwreck in the region the signal came from as whoever sent it seemed to have attacked and destroyed this other vessel. Files onboard this destroyed vessel revealed that they were attacked by the Human vessel seemingly affiliated with the 'Empire of Yata' based on said files' details, with this Empire likely being the one which sent the initial transmission and fought this unidentified alien ship, seemingly themselves also having been damaged as debris was drifting in space towards Skantos. The Polskan ship collected all the data it could and set up a beacon at the destroyed triangular ship before heading over to Skantos, dropping off its samples to a Polskan spacestation nearby before cloaking and approaching two unidentified crafts orbiting Skantos, scanning them to be armed and populated with 5 thousand crew each as the Krolizec intercepted another transmission bound for Ceres warning the previously summoned reinforcements to proceed with caution as they had been attacked by 'triangular ships' which may still be around despite one being defeated. The Krolizec was much larger than these two ships so it powered its weapons in order to generate a magnetic signature big enough for the two ships to detect, prompting them to demand that the Krolizec identify itself, which it responded to by explaining it was from a colony of Nova Polska called Polsk which had tracked their poorly encrypted transmissions. The ships asked if Polsk was affiliated with the Human ships they had seen heading towards Skantos in 202 CE, which Polsk denied as they claimed to have been descended from a failed colony ship that left Yata some time before the start of The Great Sleep that ended up settling on Theia, which the ships were unaware of the specifics about and regarded the more accurate dates Polsk was able to give them as useful. Polsk inquired why they had destroyed that triangular ship, prompting the ships to explain that they were attacked by the ship unprovoked and were simply defending themselves, leading to Polsk offering to repair them which the ships accepted despite being ordered not to affiliate with other powers, prompting the two to identify themselves as Polsk and the 'Yatan Empire Navy', marking first contact between the two polities. Once the Empire ships were repaired, the two exchanged goodbyes as Polsk jumped away while the Empire stayed to build an observation post.
As Polsk was heading back to Alpha Sol it detected a massive object approaching them on their radars, prompting them to call for reinforcements, prepare their fighters, and charge their weapons. They fired onto the pyramid-shaped ship with their Yamato Cannon, only for it to appear to be undamaged, prompting them to fire everything they had against the ship which also caused little damage, with even Polsk's 3 reinforcing ships failing to cause significant damage. The approaching ship didn't attack and didn't have any openings to be boarded, though a strange transmission in an unknown guttural clicking language sounded out, which Polsk's AI Systems managed to translate to mean 'Annihilate.' A cloud was emitted from the pyramid vessel which ended up in the path of Polsk trying to send boarding crafts towards the featureless ship, leading to the boarding crafts being caught in the cloud being ripped to shreds by a swarm of Nanodrones, prompting Polsk to fire out a volley of EMPs which still didn't do much as the ship appeared to be considerably more advanced, thus its unshielded fighters were withdrawn. More broadcasts emerged from the ship which were translated to mean; "Analyzing, Analysis Complete, Strike Calculated, Initiating", prompting the Pyramid's tips to begin glowing as a sphere of bright light formed just outside of their range as Polsk's ships fired onto the vessel from all angles, blasting towards 2 additional Polskan reinforcement ships and significantly damaging them, prompting Polsk to fire a 'Quantum Torpedo' which managed to noticeably damage the Pyramid Ship's targeting capabilities. The pyramid called for reinforcements which Polsk tried to jam while one of the more damaged Polskan ships released all escape pods and rammed the enemy vessel, tearing a hole onto one of its sides, forcing the Pyramid to raise its shields in the region as Polskan missiles bombarded the ship. The two sides released hundreds of fighter-ships each while Polsk fired a masssive laser blast intense enough to disable the enemy shield, allowing them to cause more damage. A enemy fighter crashed into Polsk's hangar bay during the battle, with the strange insectoid pilot within it seemingly warping away just as security footage managed to capture an image of it, with this starfighter thus being cleared off deck and captured. Polsk focused its fire on the hole, prompting the firing of another plasma beam which damaged 2 Polskan ships. A Gorgon Class ship jumped in to support Polsk, prompting the top corner of the pyramid to spin around and release a Nanodrone cloud heading towards the Gorgon, forcing it to warp further away after causing noticeably damage to the top of the ship with a plasma blast. The Pyramid ship gained contact with 'Q-X3-43' and 'Q-X3-28', two other ships with the 'Q' seemingly referring to their civilization, 'X3' referring to the region they were in, and '43/28' referring to the individual ship. Polsk fired a 'Gigaton Hydrogen-Quantum Bomb', blowing a hole near one of the 'beam generators' which caused strange cranking sounds to be detected in the region as the first major holes were sealed shut, prompting Polsk to contact the Empire of Yata for intel on how they managed to destroy one of the pyramids, prompting them to real that they had damaged the original pyramid's engine section and disabled all protections. Polsk's old flagship the 'Spear of Adun' arrived, prompting the Pyramid to fire onto it with its corner beams, though the one that was damaged by the GHQB stalled, prompting the Adun to fire back with a focus on the engine situated somewhere in the 'lower' section of the pyramid and its primary weapons, prompting the Pyramid to release another Nanodrone cloud. A circular opening appeared on one of the sides of the ship, blasting out a supercharged attack which caused significant damage at the cost of draining much of the Pyramid's power which gave Polsk a chance to keep firing, prompting the Pyramid to charge up another massive blast which blew a hole into the Adun, which deployed thousands of shielded fighters, forcing the Nanodrones to swarm and slow them rather than destroy them. Having sustained significant damage, the pyramid ship raised its shields and began retreating as 4 more pyramid-shaped ships arrived to reinforce it, starting to retreat together. The Spear of Adun warped a army of Protoss onto the damaged pyramid in order to download its data, only to get swarmed by the creatures onboard and sent back deformed yet alive to the Spear of Adun. The pyramid ships warped way after warning them that the 'X1 will be notified of Polsk's actions and return with vengeance'.
Some enemy starfighters were left behind when the Pyramids retreated, which were thus promptly captured by Polskan forces. The beings onboard fled into secret compartments as they seemingly were no longer able to warp away, seemingly deciding to slice a circular hole thru the bottom of the ship as they stowed away onboard while evading ship security forces and the crew taking apart their fighters to hunt them down, managing to evade sight. Polsk warned the Martian Empire of the threat that the species they named 'The Qu' after the 'Q' insignia their ships were using in communications while also organizing the Karina Dynasty to mass-produce ships to the best of their ability to combat the new extrasolar threat. The ships with stowaways landed on a Polskan outpost on Skantos, where scans showed that 15 non-human lifeforms were still onboard. While Polsk developed accurate 3d scans of the ships they had fought, they tried to hunt down the stowaways to no avail as later scans revealed that they had slipped onto Skantos' surface, forcing Polsk to send out scouting parties consisting of Ghost Soldiers (Soldiers with cloaking devices) to patrol northern Skantos, where scans deemed they likely were present, in order to hunt them down. Later scans proved they had completely left the area where the outpost was, prompting Polsk to run a series of planetary scans to narrow down their location, managing to narrow them down to the continent of Senkher until their scanners began jamming repeatedly without a logical explanation due to their machinery having been slashed, requiring repairs before they could make another attempt.
