The base's location is far to the north of the solar plane where most planets orbit the sun. Its orbit is further then Mars and over the next millennia its orbit will take it to the solar south. The Great Country sent huge amounts of resources to hide the asteroid with a coating of dark and absorbing material making it almost impossible to find by most conventional methods. There was a large number of automated mining and transport stealth drones that brought materials from the Asteroid Belt to the station that gone on till they failed over time due to supplies and repairs after the collapse of the mighty nation. A few of these drones are docked in their eternal wait in a queue for repairs or refueling.

The old ships crew works tirelessly to get the station as operational as they need. It still has whole sections sealed due to damage or they just lack what is in the area.

Alexis gathers information on what is at the base but has to have physical checks much of it due to degradation over time or misplacement no one caught long ago. She is happy to find with the crew's work that the Fateful Hour is still mostly ready. She walks with Tirallo to its docking berth.

Tirallo looks to Alexis and the Fateful Hour. “What sort of ship is it.”

Alexis smiles, “Its a warship.”

Tirallo rolls her eyes and tries the question again. “What type of warship?”

“Our Great Country had some idea to make different designs and would likely have called such like the old water ship classifications but that never happened. We just have Warships and armed shuttles.”

Tirallo, “I have watched Earth and the various powers.” She offers Alexis a dataslate. “They have some minor armed craft that are more or less cargo vessels with just guns strapped on. No true armor or large caliber of weapons. The main issue is the sheer number they could deploy.”

“Our main guns will deal with their armed vessels and bases. The secondary weapons should be able to able to deal with smaller ships.” Alexis looks over. “What of the guns and ammunition we have, will they work?”

“Your informing me of worry of the propellants was spot on. The missiles in stock are useless in either propulsion or payload, and a many in both. We are having to scavenge them for materials to effectively make new ones. It is not all bad. We can see what the Capitalists designs are using and other more modern ideas to counter them.”

Alexis smiles as she rubs her ear with the metal hand. Her hair has been growing but still not able to curl it like she did before being shaved. She might even have a new habit when it does grow long enough. “What of the final weapons?”

Tirallo shivers, “We do not have the knowledge to repair them back but of the 90 we think 5 will work.”

“Think?”

“No one on the ship was given knowledge on how the working such advanced destructive devises.”

Alexis nods, “A girl can hope.”

Tirallo smirks, “Don't you mean a woman?”

Alexis rolls her eyes, “Age is not going in to this ok.”

“Agreed. Groerge has reported to have flushed the virus out of the computer system and put in code to make it useless against us. We are having AI unit 2 activated in the ship to assist us.”

Alexis thinks for a minute till the bits of information put in her head comes up. “I forgot this vessel has option for when its lacks enough crew.”

“You were planning to take everyone to crew it weren't you?”

Alexis winces and takes a pill before talking, “Most of them.”

“Another pain pill?”

The short woman gives a dry chuckle, “I have two hands but that doesn't mean its easy on me. I can understand why the Warborgs are so often offline. The animal parts, while needed for their senses and visage, are likely insane from the agony of what they are feeling with raw nerves.”

“Once you get to Earth they can fix you up.” Tirallo looks to her blinking dataslate, “We are getting a message. Lets get back to the core.”

The core is the central command station for the whole base. A number of crew are present working. One side of the room still has heavy gun fire damage from insurrection that killed all the Military on present. The other side has many controls being manned by personal.

Tirallo calls out to a new communication technician, “We got a communication that has proper countersigns. Bring it up on the center tank.”

Alexis looks at her smiling but saying nothing.

On the screen a man wearing a red uniform and high ranking insignia speaks. “This is High Security Commander Yedial 8542.4158.6587.7824.2584. The Military was disbanded due to Viktor's Insurrection a long time ago. You will return to Gaia and be transfer to State Security under my command. This is a direct command.”

Alexis frowns and looks to Tirallo. “We are Military and not State Security. This man is misplaced in his right to command us. We will continue as we are.”

Tirallo nods, “I expected as much from you.”

“State Security is not the Military. We follow the proper chain of command and once back to Earth the Premier will give us proper orders. Give no reply to the upstart security guard and ignore all other messages unless it is from the Premier.”

“Understood.”

It is a month later and the station opens a huge hatch. Electromagnetic discharges flare to push the large cigar-shaped black hulled vessel out of its berth and in to the inky blackness of space. Once it clears the station antennas and sensors extend from the vessel as it moves to rejoin the solar plane most are on. While this is increasing the length it will take to get to Earth black base Epsilon must be kept hidden as long as possible.

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There is another spark of energy on the far side as other rails like that propelled the massive vessel out of the Asteroid are engaged and the Classless Society comes out. Unlike its predecessor it has no need to deploy equipment after leaving the base. It looks only half the size of the warship and follows along behind it at a good distance.

A laser flickers to life from the the base to the two vessels. This is a very secure information link that is planned to keep established even with the increasing distance and time lag for messages it will incur.

Alexis is on the bridge of the brutish vessel. Its bridge is almost triple the size of the Classless. The holo tank shimmers with a view of two different people. Tirallo stands in her black uniform to one side then there is Groerge who looks almost lost in his.

“Launch of Fateful Hour has been successful Epsilon base.”

Groerge looks around for a moment and then talks, “This is Classless, Launch is successful Epsilon base.”

Tirallo smirks, “This is Epsilon base to both ships. Good voyage and do remember I am out here.”

Alexis, “Its not like I left you alone. I got four hundred and Groerge only has twenty. That leaves you with a good thousand under your command.”

“A thousand working on getting three hulls converted to bulk cargo carriers. We are lucky there are specs for a military transport already made or it would be impossible for us to do.”

Groerge interrupt the talk, “We will be four months till Earth. Once we get there you will hear if they are needed or if you have to launch the Enlightenment.

Tirallo nods, “We also have AI unit 14 active and going through all information we can glean from the system so an updated history will be available once you arrive.”

Alexis sighs, “That took so long. The damage to the information network really was bad.”

“Yes and its still ongoing. Epsilon base out.”

The Fateful Hour's stealthiness allows it to get closer to the Moon with Classless days behind it. Broadcasts from the Moon begin to threaten Classless Society if it does not pay the tariff. Groerge sends a number of messages back reiterating the ancient treaty his country had for free and unopposed allowance to go to and from the Earth.

Alexis watches as a few gunships have launched from the Moon to intercept the other vessel. She waits a day before she makes her presence know activating targeting sensors and radar. She smirks as many sensors seem to be swung at the Fateful Hour trying to get a read on it. The hull's absorbing materials will make it hard to get a detail scan. A crewman reports they are not only getting scan waves from the moon but also a number of other stations and satellites.

A message comes as the combat vessels shift to deal with her. This is a broadcast from from the popinjay. The man might even have more medals on his chest then the last time he messaged them. “This is Fredrick Vonnerberg, second Emperor of Luna to unknown vessel. You will cut speed and prepare to be boarded. Resistance and breaking of my rules will be met with lethal force.”

Alexis nods to her new communications technician. “This is MIN Alexis of the Great Country aboard the warship Fateful Hour. I will give you three days before I get in orbit of the Moon for you to surrender yourself and your pirates for justice. Failure to do so or any action to engage in combat will be met with a terminal response.”

The man rants on how this is not how it is done and for her to do as told. There are other messages from various sources also threatening retaliation if she goes through with it. It seems the moon base is not the only group who demands tribute to travel to Earth.

Two days out from the Moon the 4 gunships decide to finally give a reaction to her ignoring all the rules they have lived with. A rocket flies ahead of the lead combat vessel into space.

Sirens sound and the crew rushes to their post with Alexis going to her seat on the bridge. Most of the crew are in light spacesuits with the helmets off while she is just in her uniform. This is not bravo on her part but because her arm prevents her from being able to use such. They never did get the machines to be able to make a space suit that could accommodate her mechanical limb.

“Cut that off and tell me what we see.”

“Sir, one launch that is going wide of us. I think its a warning shot.”

“Broadcast we have been shot at and now consider them enemies of the Great Country. Tactical lock on all assets they have and give me firing solutions.”

The crew around her works as she sits in the chair the eye of the storm. She leans back listening to the chaos as the crew have to look up some of what they have to do still not yet true military in skill. Finally she is given word that they have locks on the 4 space vessels and the base along with options to deal with such.

“I want two missiles at each of the ships and the base they launched from... One of the five.”

“One of the five...” The gunner almost questions but changes tone at the end. “On it. We will launch on all targets in 5 seconds.”

The hull of the ship opens eight meter-thick plated hatches for the missiles to first be electromagnetically flung from the ship before their first stage rocket motors ignite sending them at high speed towards the gunships. There is one final launch from further back where shuttles would come from and it is nearly double the size at nearly ten meters long to the other missiles.

The eight missiles motors cut out after 90 seconds of rapid burn to get them up to hyper-sonic speeds. The five meter long missiles disconnect the back meter of missile with those going off course slightly to act as decoys. The front sections keep flying mostly on target towards the enemy on a ballistic course using minimal information broadcasted by the Fateful Hour's targeting computers so that they are highly stealthy in their approach towards the enemy. The rear sections of the missiles keep traveling with loud scanners in a cone of what the enemy might shift courses to avoid the weapons.

Radio transmissions spike as the gunships seem confused by the launches. Alexis looks to the communications technician who shrugs unable right off to break the encryption.

One of the gunship looks to have panicked more then the other three and a number of ordinance was launched towards the Fateful Hour.

Tactical looks over, “Six missiles fired. One has failed to lock. The other five are coming at us. Suggest we alter course half a degree after main motor cuts out and launch counter-missiles while they coast at us ballisticly.”

Alexis motions with her metal hand, “Do it.”

The Fateful Hour again has small openings in its armored hull and smaller three meter long missiles fire out. The Capitalist weapons are not stealthy unlike the ordinance fired from the Fateful Hour. This combat has started at very distant ranges of a thousand kilometers away. The missiles flying have multistage rockets allowing the missiles to get near the targets before another rocket would ignite to go in to the terminal attack phase.

Once the attack phase happens the four gunships immediately panic. A few ballistic chemical weapons fire off to intercept the weapons. It is too late as seconds later the missiles fly in with two of the eight failing but the other six impact on the gunships overwhelm the last ditched fire seeing all four blown to pieces.

There is a cheer in the bridge.

Alexis smiles then ask, “How is the defensive operation?”

There is silence as one man keeps working. He finally turned around, “Successful.”

“We can go off alert status.”

“Sir what about the one of five?”

Alexis smirks, “How long till target?”

The man looks and checks. “It will be another hour.”

“I do not see us having to worry about it till then. We will need information after it hits but it shouldn't be about the damage but what the other Capitalist nations moan over.”

A hour later Luna dome, the underground tunnels, and 50 kilometers surrounding go up in a strange green fireball. Fredrick Vonnerberg, second Emperor of Luna and his military forces are believed eradicated.

There is almost a pause in communication and then around Earth massive amounts of communications happen dwarfing what would happen on a normal day.

The Fateful Hour's display has stunned the Capitalists and they fear it.