Adam Williams

**Adam Williams** was the Grand Admiral of Red Wood Industries (RWI)'s Navy and the Commander-in-Chief of the organization. He commanded the RWI *Apollo*, the Daedalus-class Battleship that served as the flagship of RWI. He led the faction during and after the events of the Green Drone War and was close friends with Captain Jack Roberts.

## Biography

### The Green Drone War

Sometime during or prior to the outbreak of the Green Drone War, when the Green Drone Armada emerged from their secret origin point and invaded the galaxy, Adam Williams was promoted to Grand Admiral and made leader of Red Wood Industries, taking control of the flagship, the RWI *Apollo*.

#### The Artifact

As the Green Drone War dragged on and RWI continued to lose ground, Williams met with Captain Sarah Hawk of the RWI *Discovery* and Doctor Colt, head researcher for the Artifact. The Artifact had been obtained by the crew of the RWI *Eclipse* led by Captain Jack Roberts, once he returned to RWI’s ranks, during the Battle of Ravcor. Williams and the rest of RWI Command had received a distress call from Roberts and dispatched the Venture-class Science Cruiser led by Hawk to assist the RWI *Valiant* and *Eclipse* in maintaining possession of the ancient object. The *Discovery* delivered both the Artifact and the *Valiant*’s crew to Icarus and the Artifact was taken to the Black Vault, the core Research and Development Facility of RWI. Williams talked with Colt and Hawk about the doctor’s findings about the Artifact and became hopeful that they could find a way to use the Artifact against the Green Drones in some way.

#### Reunion with Jack

Upon Roberts’ return to Icarus some time later, along with the *Eclipse* and a stolen GDA Destroyer, Williams met with his old friend and his second officer, Commander Sam Reed. They discussed the potential for the Drones’ Atlas Superlaser technology to somehow be replicated onto their starships, or perhaps develop a defense against them. Williams also assigned Roberts, Reed, and their crew to the Defender-class Frigate RWI *Tigris* while the *Eclipse* underwent repairs aboard Cyrus Station, the main command station in orbit of Icarus.

After the *Tigris* was sent on its way to scout out the GDA shipyard facility over the ice planet Demus, Williams boarded the *Apollo* and set off with a few frigates from Crazy North Logistics (CNL), the Defender Frigate RWI *Fortune*, and the Phoenix-class Assault Frigate RWI *Saragossa*. Williams have Roberts temporary command of the *Apollo* while he coordinated the battle from the CIC.

After the battle was over, the *Saragossa* and both CNL ships were destroyed, but the shipyards and defending fleet were secured. Williams, Roberts, and Reed suddenly received an priority distress call from Icarus. Admiral Isaac Sheppard, commanding officer of the RWI *Osiris*, and the RWI Home Fleet were desperately defending Icarus from a massive GDA fleet led by the Commander and his GDA Dreadnought. Williams ordered the *Fortune* to remain behind, marshaled the *Tigris* and two additional Phoenixes, the RWI *Aegis Fate* and the RWI *Pursuit*, and ordered the *Apollo* to jump back to Icarus at best speed.

#### The Battle of Icarus

Williams and his fleet arrived to see the shipyards in ruins, with the Dreadnought and several other destroyers waiting in orbit. Again, Williams coordinated the battle from the war room while Roberts commanded the bridge crew. The *Dreadnought* managed to slip away but all the destroyers in orbit were destroyed at the cost of the *Aegis Fate* and *Pursuit*, which gave RWI orbital superiority again.

Williams soon got word that the Capital City was under attack. He deployed two teams to the planet’s surface: Roberts and his crew were sent to the city to secure important data files from RWI’s headquarters building, while Commander Reed led a team of marines to secure the Black Vault and the Artifact. Williams also set up a makeshift blockade as more RWI reinforcements arrived to prevent any GDA ships from escaping. When the RWI *Charon* arrived, Williams sent it to destroy the GDA Destroyer bombarding the Capital City.

After Roberts reported that the city was secure, Williams soon got word that all contact with the Black Vault had been lost. He immediately diverted Roberts’ team to the *Osiris* to load up and prepare to retake the facility. Williams ordered his second-in-command, Commander Edwards, to keep him up to date with the Black Vault situation while he took a transmission from another admiral, Admiral Scott Davies of the Science Division.

About fifty minutes later, Roberts sent word that he and his team had breached the Vault and recovered Reed, though their escort frigate, the RWI *Liberty*, was destroyed by the Dreadnought. Williams tentatively dispatched the *Tigris* and a few other ships to buy time for the Captain. However, Roberts later reported that the Artifact had been taken by the Commander to the Dreadnought, which soon tried to escape. Williams ordered the RWI *Bishop* and RWI *Goddard* to intercept, but both ships were quickly crippled. At the advice of Edwards, however, Williams pulled the *Apollo* back, launching missiles from a distance instead. This effort was meaningless, as the Dreadnought engaged its FTL drive and fled with the Artifact.

#### Preparing to Strike Back

Twenty-four hours later, Williams had dispatched the RWI *Discovery* to track the Artifact to its base. He also sent Roberts and his team aboard the *Eclipse* to investigate a mysterious Drone Reactionary Force (DRF) signal in the DRF's former territory, and later to help CNL extract one of their missing admirals, Sven Ellis. Meanwhile, he and Admiral Sheppard began amassing a large fleet to take back the Artifact once it was found. Williams put Captain Gideon in charge of the newest Daedalus-class Battleship, the RWI *Zheng-He*, once it had been fully constructed and retrofitted with Atlas Laser technology.

Williams also took it upon himself to check in on RWI’s allies. CNL were willing and able to send a number of ships to aid in the invasion, but the Royal Coalition of Spatial Protection (RCSP) high command had not been heard from in months. Unbeknownst to both allied and enemies, RCSP had been forced to abandon their capital world and go underground, forming a small “ghost fleet” led by Commander Venom of the RCSP *Harbinger*.

#### The Invasion of P3-X2

After the *Discovery* located the Artifact at the presumed GDA origin point, the desert planet P3-X2, but was shot down shortly after, Williams sent the *Eclipse* crew in to scout and prepared all ships for the invasion. The massive Allied fleet emerged from hyperspace near Watchtower Station, Captain Roberts' Colonists’ former base, and smashed through the GDA blockade.

Williams and Sheppard led the ground assault while Gideon and a small fleet remained in orbit to cover their backs. Roberts and his crew left the *Eclipse* in orbit and used the *Apollo*’s V-203 Fighter wing, Red Squadron, at Williams’ request. Williams sent Captain Jonathan Hunter, former captain of the *Valiant* and now the captain of the *Tigris*, to attack the main entrance to the GDA base while Roberts' crew infiltrated the back entrance with ground vehicles.

Some time into the invasion, an officer on the *Apollo* informed Edwards, who in turn informed Williams, that something big was moving and a large power signature had activated somewhere below the surface near the GDA base. Williams soon saw the massive GDA Super-Dreadnought rise from a canyon and start leaving the planet. Edwards advised against engaging directly, as the ship was nearly double the *Apollo*’s size, and Williams agreed, ordering all RWI ships to converge on the Super-Dreadnought and prevent it from escaping with the Artifact at all costs.

The Allied fleet rallied in orbit, but could not get close the the Super-Dreadnought due to the reinforcing GDA destroyers and Dreadnought. Even with the arrival, to Williams’ surprise, of a small RCSP battle group led by the *Harbinger*, the Super-Dreadnought and a small group of ships escaped the planet. After stopping at a nearby moon to repair, Williams ordered all Allied ships to also evacuate back to Icarus.

#### The Battle of the Black Hole

*This is Grand Admiral Williams to all ships. We all know what’s at stake here. But never before have so many come together to fight such a brutal enemy. Prepare yourselves, for this battle will test you all. The GDA will show us no mercy. They’ll push us, but we won’t fall back. We will prevail. Stand strong. Stand together. All ships, report in.”*

> - Grand Admiral Williams before the Allied Fleet begins the Battle of the Black Hole.
>
>

Williams led the RWI, CNL, and RCSP joint fleet in the final battle of the war, in which they made a desperate last attempt to destroy the Green Drone Armada and the Artifact once and for all. After a short briefing with the factions’ leaders, the fleet set out and jumped to the black hole, where the leader of the drones, the Controller, had begun charging the Artifact aboard the Super-Dreadnought.

The *Apollo*, *Osiris*, *Zheng-He*, *Eclipse*, *Harbinger*, and CNL Battleship *Kallax* pounded the five destroyers around the colossal Super-Dreadnought before the Dreadnought engaged. It obliterated the bridge of the *Zheng-He* with its four Atlas Lasers and killing the bridge crew, including Gideon. Williams ordered all ships to focus fire on the Dreadnought, and it was soon destroyed, opening a path to the Super-Dreadnought, which Captain Roberts’ team soon boarded.

Meanwhile, the Allied fleet lost ships as more GDA ships appeared to reinforce. Commander Reed had barely even able to save the *Zheng-He*, and Williams knew they couldn’t hold out forever, as the *Eclipse* was soon destroyed as well. Nevertheless, he ordered all ships to keep buying time for Jack’s team, who soon put an end to the Controller and Commander and sabotaged the Super-Dreadnought’s stabilizers, causing it to drift into the black hole. Williams sent a Valkyrie-class Dropship to extract the strike team, and once they were safely aboard, he ordered the *Apollo* and its fleet to jump back to Icarus.

### Aftermath

Williams remained the Grand Admiral of RWI after the war’s end. He promoted Roberts to Admiral and Reed to Captain sometime over the next month, and put them both in charge of a new project for the RWI fleet called “Odyssey”. He also oversaw the operations of the Joint Expedition Task Force, formed by RWI, CNL, and RCSP to investigate a mysterious signal related to the Artifact roughly one year after the war, although the task force was directly commanded by Admiral Roberts.