First Empire War

The First Empire War is the first of the Empire Wars, between the Celestine Ascendancy and the Song Dominion.

It began in 74 A.E. when the planet Song was devastated in the final battle of the First War of the Ishvana by the Bushraki and Vendal fighting for the Ishvana.

As a refugee fleet was fleeing, Tamiko Lane Khan, the leader of the Free Fleet made a move.

She had acquired a cast-off Ascendancy cruiser and, while broadcasting Ascendancy transponder codes, had it blow up a portion of the refugee fleet, killing 2 million souls. The Song, outraged, blamed the Ascendancy, who vehemently denied any knowledge of the attack.

The Song-Celestine alliance thereby fractured, and the Song ransomed themselves even further to pay the Fleet to fight for them against the Ascendancy in what became known as the First Empire War.

In 75 A.E. Tamiko threw away two entire attack groups of mixed Song and Free Fleet forces against the Ascendancy, doing so in a way as to make it look like the Song commanders under here were at fault for their stunning defeat.

Desperate, the civilian Song council gave Tamiko what she asked for: Direct control of the Song military, so that she can integrate them completely with the Free Fleet and thereby maximize their power vs. the Ascendancy. Tamiko hoped to use this power to establish an Empire of her own.

In 76 A.E. Tamiko, now having control over the Song military as well as the Fleet, promptly overthrew the civilian Song government, commandeered a military space station orbiting the ruined planet Song, and established a new military order for the Dominion, with herself as Empress.

Exactly 12 days later, Maddox and Akari came out of retirement and defected with a substantial portion of the Free Fleet to the Celestine Ascendancy, to offer them assistance in defeating their power-mad daughter.

For four years they fought, and then in 81 A.E. Tamiko had her mother Akari assassinated by introducing a fatal toxin into the mix of chemicals injected into Akari during a planetside rejuv treatment.

Enraged, Maddox threw caution to the wind and eventually crushed his daughter's forces. Tamiko was captured and brought to the Celestine Ascendancy for trial.

There, the Celestines demanded death for her, and harsh punishment for the entire Song Dominion.

Maddox saw where this would lead - to a resentful Song, who had been understandably very upset about the 2 million dead refugees.

Maddox somehow got one of the Grensuhlian Elders to journey to the trial, and it forced open Tamiko's mind, whereupon they discovered that Tamiko had killed the refugees, not the Celestine Ascendancy.

Perhaps not surprisingly, this made no difference to the Song - their people had suffered and fought for years against the Celestines, and whatever crime the Celestines didn't commit to start the war, the Song believed the Celestines had done far worse since in the following war.

Maddox declared that:

• He would not stand in the way of whatever justice the Celestine Ascendancy decided was appropriate for Tamiko.
• He would not permit the Song to take revenge on the Celestines after the revelation that the war had been set up by his daughter. He promised that whichever side launched an attack would see he and the Free Fleet - the remnants of which rallied around him with Tamiko's defeat - come down on them hard, and as both sides were quite weakened and their people sick of war, it worked. A detente was formed, for awhile at least.
• He, Maddox, was leaving both the Song and the Celestines behind. He'd had enough of this "fucking government bullshit" and that these governments were just as bad as the ones back on Earth that ended up with him mining frozen hydrogen on some god-forsaken moon in the middle of nowhere. He was leaving, and he was taking the Free Fleet with him, along with anyone else who wanted to come.

Tamiko was executed via firing squad at dawn the next day. Maddox watched, and those who knew him well said they felt him turn into an old man as her lifeless body tumbled to the ground.

With that, the First Empire War ended.