Fomalhaut V

Fomalhaut V

Fomalhaut is a young bright star. Its planetary system is a mess, still settling down from its birth pangs. Dust and debris litter the system, crossing the barely stable orbits of immature worlds.

The fifth planet is massive, dense and battered. It has just a thin sheen of atmosphere. Most of the surface is desolate, pounded by meteors and riddled with volcanoes that reach into a cold vacuum sky. But in certain places, great rifts crack the surface. Gases, noxious to be sure, fill these deep canyons. Clouds, mists and even rain obscure the deep fissures.

Down in those depths, few sensors can penetrate. There, the Easterners built forward bases, havens for carriers that launched their Samurai gunships on some of the first raids of the war. There, the M’kkiae gathered for their Grand Offensive.

For six years the enemy built up their bases, digging into the rift walls, even beginning to terraform those cracks with engineered life. But after Sirius we finally regained the initiative. On the fourth day of February, 2260, the First Fleet jumped to Fomalhaut and the Combine, Easterners and M’kkiae both, came out of their holes to meet us.

Fire lit the black sky of Fomalhaut V.