The Rebel Flagship

The Rebel Flagship is a ship currently in Sector 8, being used against the Federation.

## Background

In Episode 21, Jose reveals that the Rebel Flagship contains Simon, the AI that started the Rebellion. Thus, if the flagship was destroyed, it would very quickly end the war. While the information that the Kestrel carries is extremely secret, Agent Morocco reveals that they are not the first to attempt the mission, as 7 other crews died trying to destroy the Rebel Flagship, while 6 died on the way to delivering the information. The Simon's goal was to eliminate all Federation dreadnoughts, cruisers, and their main secret base in The Last Stand.

## Episode 38

The flagship features prominently in the final episodes of Kestrel Adventures, piloted by and the mind controlled Elites. The ship docks with Novak II's Rebel Dreadnought The thought dead Darwin Black manages to sneak aboard the flagship in order to kill Simon, not realizing that he was an AI. Novak encounters Darwin aboard the flagship and is surprised to see him alive, however Darwin is adamant on killing Simon and upon realizing that the supposed benefactor of the Rebellion is the Flagships AI, he shoots the core and damages Simon and the flagship in the process but is killed before he can finish the job although he does activate a federation distress beacon aboard the vessel which is how the Kestrel Crew are able to track it through jump-space. Darwin Blacks attack on the AI core results in Peter Tiedrich entering the flagship and connect with it in order for the ship and Simon to remain functional.

## Phase 1

The Kestrel and flagships fight begins in episode 39 with the Flagship going straight for Jane Tully's Dreadnaught in order to destroy it. Jose manages to get Manon to establish communications with the Flagship and Simon. Jose attempts to convince the AI to surrender the rebellion, and asking whether it's "what Adrian Romero would've wanted." Simon, however rejects the offer and the flagship turns to fight the Kestrel. The two ships battle throughout the rest of the episode in a fairly evenly matched fight. However Novak II's distractions of the Simon AI causes the Kestrel to gain the upper hand and causes the flagship to be supposedly destroyed, however this turns out to be false as the flagship emerges from the cloud of smoke in it's phase 2 state, losing the cloak and Ion weapon the ship then jumps away.

## Phase 2

The Kestrel jumps after the Flagship, using the Federation distress signal the ship is emitting to follow it and comes upon the Flagship and engages in the second phase of the fight, this time the Flagship has diverted alot of its power to the drone system and proves itself to be more dangerous in the fight and severely damages the Kestrel with several attacks from its drones, power surge, missiles and beam weapon, Simon gloats throughout the fight to the crew of the Kestrel, however it is once again in vain as the Flagship is again bested by the severely damaged Kestrel, causing the ship to once again explode and lose the right portion of itself, however it activates its Zoltan shield and jumps away (in arguably one of the coolest sequences of the show)

## Phase 3 & Destruction

The Flagship arrives back at beacon 8-18, followed closely by the Kestrel Cruiser, the flagship manages to get the jump on the Kestrel with a volley of it's Burst Laser and Missile weapon, which the Kestrel cloaks to evade and returns fire with all it's weapons, though they are rendered ineffective by the flagships overcharged Zoltan Shield and then returns fire with its power surge at the Kestrel, though miraculously the Kestrel evades most of the shots with only 4 landing, which takes down the shields of the Kestrel. The Kestrel fires another volley which takes down the Zoltan shield, the flagship begins to fly using some kind of Zoltan powered engine which allows it to perform rather miraculous maneuvers during the fight.

The fight continues between the Rebel Flagship and the Kestrel, all while the battle between the Rebellion and Federation rages on around them, however Simon finally realizes how the Kestrel is tracking the Flagship, and gets one of his Elite Soldier's to destroy the computer, Simon then begins the jump sequence for ship, but is stopped by Tiedrich, who with a fragment of the memory of Adrian Romero, breaks from the mind control to prevent Simon from jumping away from the Beacon. Pavalo, knowing Tiedrich was under mind control promises to clear his name before firing one last volley at the vessel, causing it to begin exploding, all the while Tiedrich, now fully free from mind control laughs to himself as he is engulfed in the flames of the flagship being destroyed, along with Simon.