Meeting at Camelot 2295 (Finished)

January 1st-------------

Camelot was busy as any other day. Ships arrived and departed by the hundreds each and every day, heading to the massive array of Gate stations to go to other parts of the empire. There was an eerie quietness today, brought on by the latest news of another civilian ship being attacked by strange and unknown creatures. Strangely, these beings only seemed to be interested in the generators or at least the fuel of ships, never really the valuables which these ships carry. Deep within Camelot, Multiple high ranking Imperial officers were in a large conference room seated around a round table, With the head being the emperor himself. Here, they met to discuss on a way to begin to not only counteract this rising piracy problem, but to also solve internal strife and terrorism within the empire...

Emperor Kyndon stands at the front, hands resting on the table. The silver-haired, amber-eyed legend clad in his usual business suit without tie. He looks to each and every member of the conference before he speaks.

"Ladies, gentlemen, I am sure all of us here are aware of the growing piracy and internal conflicts within the Empire of Avalon. I have called for a conference in light of new information I have received.

"For my first point, I would like to raise to the attention of all present today of a certain project that the head R&D Rifter Erichal has been pursuing here in Camelot; the Angel armor."

At the press of a button on the console in front of the emperor, a hologram of a suit of armor shows up.

"Externally, it seems like perhaps a next-gen suit of power armor that any of us would be developing; I assure you, with firsthand experience, that this is not the case. To compare a standard issue power armor to the Angel armor would be to compare a patrol vehicle to a main battle tank.

"Erichal can explain in greater detail about some of its proper capabilities of the Angel suits later; for now, I would like to speak of my second point. The need for an elite covert strike force in order to respond to some of the new threats that faces Avalon this day.

"As such, I propose the formation of a new unit, with its members drawn from the Imperial Knights. I feel this is necessary as the Imperial Knights, while an excellent force in and of itself, is far too large and publicly known to properly undertake covert operations. This new unit will take over in the field of covert ops, utilizing the greatest equipment that Avalon can field to ensure both the survival and success of these operatives on the field."

Kyndon looks to the people for a moment.

"Are there any questions, suggestions, or counter-proposals? If not, I will raise the next topic of discussion."

Vox Phayden, the military strategist representative from the Dathmiir Republic, folds his four hands pensively, calmly watching the Emperor. His questions pertained more to the suit and its origins but could wait for Erichal's explanation.

Nym Loya, however, raised a question. "How much is the maintenance of these elite teams expected to be?" Younger than Vox, Nym had achieved her position for her economic knowledge and skill, rather than military prowess. With the Dathmiir Republic suffering harshly from the economic downturn, this is hardly a surprising question.

"I can tell you that myself" someone said. Everyone looking, it would appear Imperial Knight Marshal Izula had spoken up. She was a half avilun, half rifter and as such had many human like features other avilun lacked and appeared softer than you're average Avilun. Her eyes were iron cold though and calculating as she continues, "The project, If i remember correctly, is only at the prototype stage so far. Their current estimate is to be around 4-5 times greater cost to maintain then the current sets of armor. Because of the costs of also just producing them, this will limit them to a small strike force."

"I see, thank you," Nym replied. "So then, let's assume that the ships they will use will come largely from the existing fleet. Which would mean that the actual size of this small force would be dependent upon the threat they're being asked to deal with."

Thror Bluebeard, a Durin Trade Corp representative speaks up. "Begging your pardon, but why even consider these suits that might end up being nothing but a waste of resources? Why not use existing militaries, or even the Knights themselves, to take care of these threats?"

Dwalin Whitebeard also speaks. "Perhaps we could consider it. I am interested in the material make up of these suits, and I'm guessing that Erichal will answer that. As for this covert force you mentioned, Sir, who will you be recruiting from, and how will candidates be accepted?"

Izula smiles and replies with, "I have and I have ran many, many simulations. All of them show there is a satisfactory increase in combat effectiveness for the increased cost for their cost for a small corps. And to address the earlier question, yes it will be ships from the imperial knights, as well as candidates only from the knights."

Vox was a man who didn't speak often and, when he did, he spoke softly. "So, Lord Emperor, how big is the threat, or rather, threats, that you intend for this new special operations group to handle? And, Izula, might I know how you intend to select from the knights?"

Izula says, "I have a special selection program underway as we speak, spearheaded by The Oracle."

Thror shakes his head a little. "Letting a computer program instead of an actual council decide who would pilot these expensive suits? I don't think that wise, no matter how advanced the program is."

Dwalin glares at Thror. "And i suppose you have time to go through all the candidates, that's all imperial knights you know? Better to leave it to one more capable." Thror glares back and folds his arms with a grunt.

Izula looks over at Thror annoyingly and says, "I approve them in the end. This is not some thing for a political body to impose an agenda on either.."

Aside her, a holoprojection materializes to life. A fiery red avilun stands at Izula's side in the next second, smiling a little with her hands behind her back. "I heard my name spoken a few times, have I been summoned?"

Dwalin smiles a little. "Ah, yes, Thror can perhaps repeat what he said earlier."

Thror clears his throat awkwardly and says nothing.

Vox nods at Izula, indicating his satisfaction at the reply.

Emperor Kyndon nods to himself as he speaks once more. "If there are no more speakers, I would like to move onto our second topic; the new piracy issue. Theoretically, piracy should be at a minimum, with every nation more-or-less keeping a watchful eye over their own produced craft. However, as recent holovids have captured, these 'pirates' are clearly not of Avalon origin."

Kyndon presses another button on his control pad, and a holovid of some of the pirates intruding on a civilian vessel in the outer rim of Empire space. Three creatures move along the corridor, two humanoid creatures sporting various outfits and makeshift armor, as well as a third, floating robotic drone.

"Make no mistake, the floating one is not a drone. It, like the other creatures in various holovids you have witnessed before this conference, can be called perhaps the same species, as they have common traits; they do not bleed, they can heal from seemingly fatal wounds in seconds, and amputations in mere moments. They carry weaponry from sources undisclosed, but certainly not from within the Empire. Despite confirmed kills by some security forces, there has never been a body to perform an autopsy on. Even their ships display these phenomena.

"My proposal to this issue is to immediately deploy the newly-created Angel units to capture as many of these creatures as possible. We cannot fight them until we learn of what they are, and we cannot learn enough of what they are by mere video."

Vox nods and then asks, "are there any images of their ships? And, in the case of their destroyed ships, there were no pieces of scrap left whatsoever?"

Izula looks to the oracle before saying, "there are, I'll have the oracle pull them up. Unfortunately, no ship that has encountered these creatures had any real armaments"

A strange ship is put onto the holoprojector, a long, segregated, metallic beast, a single glowing eye at its front. No armaments appear to be visible on it.

Vox simply stares at it pensively.

Nym, on the other hand, asks, "is it alive?"

The oracle says, "Scans of these creatures come back muddled with the data suggesting them to be partially matter, partially energy beings. They are indeed alive, but not in the same sense that we are alive."

"Origins?" asks Vox.

The oracle says, "unknown, they appear to be able to amplify and cross keyholes by themselves, circumnavigating gates"

He nods, simply accepting this.

Nym looks somewhat surprised and even more interested.

Dwalin looks at the image. "Fascinating. But that's an issue. If they can use keyholes without the use of gates, they can get anywhere if they have the technology to detect them. It's a huge risk to the empire."

"Indeed," Kyndon speaks. "We do not know who they are, what they are, and they've befuddled the best scientists I can call onto this matter. Logic dictates that they should not exist, yet, here they are, raiding our vessels. We are very fortunate that, thus far, these xeno pirates have dealt relatively little harm to the crew on the raided ships.

"However, we cannot rely on this piecemeal honor of theirs. The situation will escalate. And before it happens, we must know exactly who--or what--we are dealing with. If they are from some civilization we are unaware of, or if there are people these creatures are loyal to, we must find them and neutralize this threat as soon as possible.

"For now, I recommend that all nations step up their patrols. Even if we cannot take the fight to this new threat, at the very least we may safeguard our people."

Izula Says, "Give me Three weeks sir and I'll have one of these creatures that you can interrogate yourself." She thought though she could probably do it in two weeks, but it was always best never to rush through processes if you didn't have to.