[CLOSED] Contact

[The Governor]

In one of the far frontiers of Confederate space, a single cruiser was on patrol. It was the DCS Galahad, a newer warship that had been designed at the end of the Confederacy's most recent war, when they'd fought the HCA. The Galahad had a short service history, an experienced crew, and a long list of the most state of the art systems. It was a capital ship on one of the Confederacy's busiest border zones, and every day, they stopped hundreds of ships before allowing them through.

Suddenly, a ship appeared on sensors. "Lieutenant Allante! Contact on sensors! Not like the others. This vessel is unidentified."

"All hands, prepare for detainment procedures. Primary power to weapons, secondary to shields. Forget about the engines unless the unidentified ships run." For a moment, nothing happened. And then Allante added, "Let's move! The last time a strange ship popped up on the border, an entire L'Etiole Marine ship vanished."

The lieutenant smiled as the ship became suddenly active. Glancing in a reflective screen, she brushed a lock of dark brown hair out of her eyes, and prepared to send a message. Once the comm channel was ready, she said in an even tone, "Unidentified vessel, you have entered the territory of the Dothvalian Confederacy. I am Lieutenant Calista Allante of the L'Etiole Marine, the Confederate Star Navy, and this is the cruiser DCS Galahad. Please state your origin and your purpose in Confederate space."

 

[RIPSaidCone]

A lone UNESC Carrier Strike Group had been on its usual duties of patrolling and expansion fulfillment, guard the borders to ensure the Kakk or any other hostile factions did not enter Alliance space and continue with their duties of passive exploration, which simply meant to keep an eye out for anything of interest to the Alliance during their extended patrol patterns, often when they patrolled further than their borders would normally permit. Though when dealing with the Kakk such things were necessary, they'd been in a stalemate for over 200 years and the Alliance wasn't about to allow the Kakk to break that stalemate in their favor with a surprise attack, they had tried it before.

It consisted of a single Freedom-class Spacecraft Carrier, the Kerry M. Hullum, named after one of the Alliance's former Presidents, four Liberty II class destroyers, three Rockmore-class cruisers and two Gulf-class frigates. The Carrier Group was headed by one Vice-Admiral Matthew Warmer and things had been going as they normally did for the Group prior to an unknown vessel being picked up on scanners.

From what they could tell the ship was large and armed. Military then, though it didn't have the same readings that a Kakk ship would bring up. Despite this the Group went into battlestations in the event of a hostile encounter, the Alliance had only really been used to hostile encounters after all.

They soon recieved a transmission from the unknown vessel. The Vice-Admiral listening to it closely as the voice of a woman came through the speakers, she sounded human at least. But his brows furrowed as the name Confederacy was spoken. He had only heard rumors of what had happened to those that the Alliance had seperated from so many centuries ago during the impromptu 'civil war' which had occured. Apparently they had formed their own nation, yet he was just a Vice-Admiral, those kinds of things weren't told to him. But rumors did spread, and he could put two and two together, the Confederacy were them.

"This is the USS Kerry M. Hullum, flagship of the 42nd Carrier Strike Group of the United New Earth Navy. I am Vice-Admiral Matthew Warmer, captain of the Kerry M. Hullum and commander of the 42nd CSG. We are conducting standard patrols to ensure security along our nation's borders. We were unaware that this space was claimed by another nation."

 

[The Governor]

Allante took note of the readings on her sensors. The Galahad was seriously outnumbered, even if it could match some of the foreign ships for firepower. She decided that diplomacy would be the best path until further notice. She could call for assistance from the L'Etoile Marine, but that risked starting a war, and the forces of the Confederate Star Navy were overworked without being involved in minor border disputes.

"It's new space," Callista began. "A new frontier for the Confederacy, as well as a waypoint between hyperspace trade routes. We had believed it to be uninhabited. Now I see that isn't the case. If you'd like to send someone aboard, we'd be glad to receive them, Admiral. Or if you prefer, I'm willing to board an Alliance ship as well."

 

[RIPSaidCone]

The Vice-Admiral listened to what the other ship's captain had to say. A new frontier? So this was territory that the Confederacy had only just decided to begin exploiting? That would be interesting news for his superiors, news that they would then relay to the civilian government for the decision to be made on what to do with this information. Whether to act on it and begin development of this territory before the Confederacy or leave it be and establish tighter defenses along the already-existing Alliance borders near here. It didn't much matter to him, he was a military man, political manouvering and diplomacy never much interested him.

But as fate would have it, he was now in-charge of a first contact between two large powers. A first official contact at least, it wouldn't surprise him in the slightest of those spooks in Military Intelligence had already been spying on them, there was a lot that was kept hidden from the military by those intelligence-types needless to say. Responding to the woman now. "We will prepare a party to meet you at our docking area. Send a shuttle to the Kerry M. Hullum with your chosen representatives."