Persei-Aries War Resumes
Japanese Assault on "Bleeding Edge" (Ragnarssonland - Gliese 649 Sigma-19)
FROM: ADVISORY OFFICE, UN HERCULES SCS REGIONAL COLONIAL CENTER
06:05 SOL GMT, 10 APRIL 2522
BREAKAUTH: 181072.18J
CLEARANCE: NATIONAL COMMAND AUTHORITY
SUBJ: JAPANESE ASSAULT ON “BLEEDING EDGE” (Ragnarssonland – Gliese 649 Sigma-19)
In response to the recent American raid at Katajima, the Imperial Japanese Navy has mounted a major counterstrike at the base from which the Americans launched the Katajima incursion. These are the corporate “Ragnarssonland” colonies (Gliese 649 star system) formerly held by Imperial Prussia until forfeited at the end of the Second Hercules War in 2513-14.
As is often their habit, the Corporate Consortium has to date played a quiet role in the Third Hercules War. Although technically part of the Coalition of Eagles, they have not taken significant action against their hostile “Renkei Alliance” Japanese neighbors in Zeta Hercules for some time. This didn’t stop them from allowing the US Navy’s “Battlegroup Collingsworth” access to their Ragnarssonland holdings for the Katajima raid, of course. Unfortunately, that raid was an abject failure, and now the Japanese are coming for payback.
But the Japanese aren’t coming for a simple punitive raid. This is a powerful assault spearheaded by Task Force Naginata under the flag of Commodore Hiromi Ozawa. With a combat record extending over ten years back to the 19 Draconis War of 2512, and commanding some of the most experienced, prestigious, and decorated crews in the Imperial Japanese Navy, this potent “Tenonoken” (Sword of the Emperor) formation includes the heavy cruiser Naginata (practically a pocket battleship), the bristling light fleet carrier Nagashima (carrying the double-elite “Kotukai Donryu” – Naval Air Group “Storm Dragon”), the prestigious and venerable “legacy ship” light cruiser Takakawa, and the sleek, swift, high-tech destroyer Kikasa.
Even more ominously, behind this task force are three Shimada class light carriers converted to troop ships, their aerospace fighters and bombers replaced with tanks, APCs, and elite Naval Landing Force infantry. This isn’t a raid, this is an invasion and assault. Not only are the Japanese looking for punitive retribution for the Katajima raid, but also to win a staging point for a possible joint Anglo-Japanese invasion of 72 Hercules (Krasnaya Nadhezda), Lord Commodore Edward Cavendish’s proposed war-winning assault and invasion of the Holy Russian Empire’s regional capital.
Arrayed against this assault is the bulk of Carrier Task Force Liberty under the flag of Captain Zachary Thomas Irons. Comprised of the Endeavor class light fleet carrier USS Liberty, the new light cruiser USS Northampton, the destroyer Cowpens and frigate John Young, it is supplemented by warships from Task Force Oriskany, including the veteran destroyer USS Valley Forge and the USMC light strike carrier USS Tarawa.
The two fleets meet at the nineteenth moon of the eighteenth planet of the Gleise 419 system, a sphere of economically-rich silicon about 80% the size of Venus. Playfully named “Bleeding Edge” by its Cignis Corporation owners, the world is orbited by two mining, shipping, and administrative installations named for the locally-famous “company TGIF” bars on them: The Nimble Toad and Space Chili’s. Such quirky names belie the gravity of the battle about to be waged over their possession.
Such gravity is not lost upon the two battlefleets, however. Many of the men and women on these converging warships have known each other for the better part of ten years, having fought against each other as blood-enemies in the 19 Draconis and Andromeda Arc Wars, then fighting as blood-brothers in the Xi Scorpio and Scorpion’s Tail Wars (where many of them became personal lifelong friends). Yet here they meet again as foes, subject to the cruel ironies of duty, fate, and 26th Century colonial politics.
Leaving such sentiments for poets and historians, we are left with the business of the day. Ozawa’s flagship has just dropped out of her Darkstar wave, and the Battle for Bleeding Edge is about to begin.
ASSAULT VICTORY CONDITIONS (583 points)
The general situation of the Third Hercules War in April, 2522. As the British strive to assemble a “coalitional” invasion of 72 Hercules, Japanese involvement in such an invasion is perhaps dependent on subduing any American / Corporate threat from their “left flank” in Gliese 649. Given the abortive American “Katajima Raid” against Zeta Hercules last month, the Japanese have resolved to silence this nuisance once and for all. 
Both fleets detect each other on the daylight side of the Ragnarssonland Sigma gas giant and pivot towards its largest moon, Sigma 19 “Bleeding Edge.” Both sides set a relatively fast and “close shave” approach trajectory, skimming the moon’s atmosphere and threading toward gaps between industrial debris fields and the “Nimble Toad” and “Space Chili’s” orbital installations. Captains Irons and Jack Morrison (USS Northampton) see what Commodore Ozawa (IJN Naginata) is up to and tap the brakes just a little, allowing their cruiser, destroyers, and frigate to pivot to present a broadside. Full frontal Japanese guns, however cripple the destroyer USS Cowpens outright, the worst damage by far inflicted by the horrific forward 18-teravolt EPCs of the Naginata, scoring four out of six hits, plus a gigantic 12-magakelvin laser. These beam weapons slash through USS Cowpens’ bridge and forward magazines, torpedo racks, port and starboard bow mass drivers. Captain Rachel Collingsworth escapes serious injury, but the ship loses power and slews out of the battle. The rest of the American task force returns fire broadside, the Northampton tearing open the Kikasa’s bow at 1800 kilometers. The destroyer Valley Forge and frigate John Young follow up, their lasers, rail guns, and EPCs smashing through sensors, bow mass drivers, and collapsing the forward shields. Captain Hashida Kamanaga is forced to break off the action, his sleek destroyer suffering a chain reaction of decompressions. The carriers, cruisers, and destroyers of both sides also launch massive torpedo spreads and aerospace strike wings, including the elite US Navy VSF-221 (The Dead Rabbits) fighter squadron, VSA-193 (The Eight Ball Express) bomber squadron, US Marine Corps’ VMF/A-319 (The Tigersharks) squadron and the elite Japanese Kotukai Donryu (Naval Air Group “Storm Dragon”).
American and Japanese aerospace wings immediately set into each other, with two American and four Japanese bombers shot down by each others’ scouts as they angle for torpedo runs on warship targets. Again, the Americans largely outguess the Japanese approach, setting up USS Liberty so her vulnerable engines and reactors are at least partially screened by debris fields. The Japanese are also coming on just a shade too fast, and can’t turn fast enough to make quite the maneuvers they want. The light cruiser Takakawa makes a port turn to present a broadside against the American approach, but the Valley Forge and John Young avoid this and cross Takakawa’s stern point-blank. The huge Naginata crosses both their sterns, only to be crossed in turn by Northampton. The carriers try to hide out of the way while also avoiding debris fields and keeping Bleeding Edge’s gravity field in mind. It’s an absolute nightmare of high-speed, hairpin turns in a deadly obstacle course, the moon’s gravity bending everyone’s course, huge point-blank broadsides threatening from around every corner. Nevertheless, the Americans have largely won the maneuver match here. But the sheer size, accuracy, and hitting power of the Japanese batteries (especially Naginata and Takakawa), especially at these ranges, may render this a moot point.
YOU MAY WANT TO EXPAND THIS IMAGE FOR BEST RESULTS - This image is the same as above, on an expanded hex grid so we can see just what the hell is going on in this prison riot of starships. First up, the Japanese flagship IJN Naginata is hit by four Mark 48 torpedoes astern. The hapless Takakawa, victor at Katajima, is hit by no less than FIFTEEN torpedoes from the Eight Ball Express and the Tigersharks, then six missiles from the Dead Rabbits. USS Northampton hit astern by two torpedoes and five missiles from Stormdragon Naval Air Group. Naginata fires her gigantic forward guns, all six of her huge 18-teravolt EPCs hitting the Tarawa on her port quarter, instantly leaving her spinning crippled through space. Naginata’s aft guns burn savage gashes through the USS Northampton that has just cut right behind her. The Northampton fires her full point-blank broadside into the stern of the Naginata, already weakened by aforementioned torpedoes, Northampton’s EPCs and 8-megakelvin lasers slashing into Naginata’s fantail, detonating reactors and engines. Naginata is more than crippled, her whole aft third tearing apart in a ripple of internal explosions. In fact, Captain Jack Morrison orders his last guns to switch to the Takakawa before Northampton EXPLODES the huge Japanese heavy cruiser. An instant later the Takakawa cuts lose with her forward 6-gigwatt rail guns and 15-teravolt EPCs into the Northampton, along with long-ranged EPCs of the fleeing Kikasa. At last the Northampton shudders and goes dark, spiraling through space in a hail of molten metal and twisted debris, just barely clearing the northern terminator of the Bleeding Edge moon before the gravity slingshot hurls her out into interplanetary space. Valley Forge and valiant little John Young fire broadsides point-blank into the stern of the Takakawa, devastating her powerplant and engineering sections, leaving Takakawa a derelict wreck as well, just before John Young takes two long-ranged hits on the starboard bow from Kikasa’s long-ranged syglex emitters. Four warships, 390,000 tons of shipping, have been left ravaged hulks inside of sixty seconds, in addition to the fifth ship crippled and sixth ship forced to retire just one minute before.
Wrecked ships careen out of the battle area, helplessly plunging at their last speed and trajectories, subject to the pull and slingshot of Bleeding Edge’s gravity. What few ships are left try to shake off the shock, recover and win the battle. The destroyer USS Valley Forge and frigate USS John Young come hard about and cross the bow of the badly-damaged destroyer IJN Kikasa, her fo’c’sle largely gutted in the opening American broadside. Remember that Kikasa has been forced to break off the engagement, she has to leave but still has power and long-ranged weapons, and so still poses a threat. Kikasa’s forward 60 eHz syglex emitter is blown out of the hull, and crew casualties continue to mount, but Kikasa’s forward guns slam into the Valley Forge in turn. Meanwhile, two Ki-45 torpedoes from IJN Nagashima slam into the damaged starboard quarter of the Valley Forge (from the opposite direction). The internal blast cavitates through the starboard engineering compartments, and the Valley Forge is left burning, adrift, and without power. American torpedoes and fighters swarm against the carrier Nagashima, but eighteen A9M “Kataka” (Fire Hawk) fighters of the Stormdragon aerospace group return to defend her. Two Mark 48s hit Nagashima’s heavily-shielded stern, combined with a strafing run by fourteen FS/A-44 “Star Corsair” fighters the Dead Rabbits while Marine “Tigershark” Corsairs turn to fight off the Japanese fighters defending the carrier. Five Fire Hawks and seven Corsairs go down in a furious dogfight (remember all three of these squadrons are double-elite), but the Nagashima does not falter, and neither does the Kikasa (despite a frantic attack by American scouts planes against her unshielded bow). Despite the dreadful damage they’ve taken in the opening minutes of the engagement, the remaining Japanese warships are not giving up Bleeding Edge without a fight. 
As the Valley Forge corkscrews helplessly off the table and Kikasa is force to reluctantly open the range, the frigate USS John Young comes hard about again and races to rejoin the Liberty, hoping the two remaining American ships can defend each other from swarms of Japanese Ki-45 “Toryu” (Dragon Slayer) torpedoes and vengeful fighters of the Storm Dragon strike group. It doesn’t work. Although one A9M is shot down by John Young’s squad 40mm mass drivers, the rest tear into her with a cannon strafe attack that collapses her starboard bow shields and sets off her forward magazine (remember her starboard bow was damaged earlier by Kikasa’s syglex emitters). The John Young is left burning and dead in space, but seven more Fire Hawks are shot down by Corsair fighters of the Dead Rabbits and Tigersharks. Spreads of Ki-45 and Mark 48 gravitic torpedoes both fail against the USS Liberty and IJN Nagashima, respectively (the last Japanese warhead BARELY misses against the Liberty’s double-enhanced shielded and electronic warfare suite), but it can’t be denied that the Japanese are still chipping away at the early American lead. With Valley Forge and John Young now down, the USS Liberty stands alone! Can the Japanese steal this one back? 
Her whole forward superstructure burning or open to space, the destroyer Kikasa must finally leave the battle, now leaving the carrier Nagashima to stand alone against the last American warship, the carrier USS Liberty. Nagashima and Liberty maneuver around the asteroids and Nimble Toad station, both carriers also re-launching bombers (B7N “Tenrai” Heavenly Thunders and FS/A-81 Avengers, respectively) that were previously recovered and rearmed for second torpedo strikes. Three of the American bombers go immediately to Japanese fighters and scouts, but the Nagashima is hit by a stunning FIFTEEN ASM-56 Harpoon torpedoes launched from these bombers. Nagashima’s starboard quarter is reduced to a twisted semi-molten mass, but she’s still operational . . . at least until seventeen Navy and Marine Corps Corsairs and eleven scouts begin a mass, point-blank gunnery attack on her previously damaged stern. It’s just enough, and the Nagashima is crippled. Meanwhile, the handful of eight Ki-86 “Ryusei” (Shooting Star) torpedoes launched by the Storm Dragon bombers were shot down by the Liberty’s mass drivers. The Battle of Bleeding Edge is over.
As the wreck of the Nagashima careens out of the moon’s orbit, the surviving Japanese aerospace craft gather around her and begin sending distress calls. Captain Zachary Irons immediate stands down, recovering his bombers again preparing his fighters and scouts for orbital sweeps, charting drift trajectories of wrecked ships, ejected pilots, and escape boats. The Liberty also launches a full spread of URBs (universal rescue beacons), declaring the area a cease-fire zone and broadcasting telemetry on wrecks for rescue and recovery efforts. While such is common practice for most battles in Darkstar, here the efforts are even more earnest as again, these men and women all KNOW each other. Even the three invasion ships are allowed into the system to help tow wrecks, recover pilots, send damage control parties, and evacuate wounded. There some protest from the corporate vice-presidents at Ragnarssonland colony, but such squawks are cold ignored by Captain Morrison . . . while Captain Irons blatantly threatens them with a “visit from the Eight Ball Express.” When the corporations go over their head to Read-Admiral Virginia Saunders (CNO, US Navy Lyra/Hercules SCS), she offers a few platitudes while quietly promising her commanders that while US-Japanese hostilities will doubtlessly continue, she will do her level best not to put Task Force Liberty or Oriskany specifically against Task Force Naginata. 
The updated state of the Third Hercules War. As you can see, the Americans are about to leave this war for good, having won leases and concessions from both the UK in the Treaty of Zubrin and the Corporate Consortium after their defense of Ragnarssonland / Gliese 649. As for the Japanese and British, a powerful combined cruiser group of Task Forces Agamemnon and Kama have been prepared for a strike against the Russians or the New Roman Alliance (perhaps both). This will be another big one (live game with Rasmus and Damon), perhaps what the British and Japanese need to reverse recent fortunes and put 72 Hercules back in the crosshairs . . . 
I used to think I had some bad-ass pilots, but these guys are crazy!