Bellerophon

The Bellerophon is the flagship of the Aer Stolos, the Empire's flying navy. The Bellerophon and its sister ships Perseus and Minos were commissioned as a response to the dissent flaring at the borders of the Empire, in that era controlled by the matrilinearly descended Imperial family. Rather than buttress the Imperial control over the embroiled provinces, however, the shadow of the Emperor's warships apparently served to stoke the furnace of rebellion while driving it further underground.

The screw driven Bellerophon class airships were the pinnacle of aerial superiority until the development of the Banner-Kresslich Engine 9 years later in what came to be known as BK 0. Also contributing to the end the Empire's use of the Bellerophons was the siezure of the Bellerophon herself during the first battle of Rackham's Redoubt. Members of the separtist group Alarum (from which the modern Alarmists take their name) had seized the clifftop fortress as a ploy to draw out the Empress (and specifically the Bellerophon) and force a confrontation. During the battle the Imperial warship was ensnared with line-shot, boarded, and captured. Though the Bellerophon was destroyed in Commander Rorch's gambit to draw the zealots into the pass, Alarum's tactics were ultimately successul in paving the way for the defeat at the Carpathian Pass. To this day the Bellerophon Crest (a spear crossing a spread wing on a blue field) remains a rallying symbol for populist agitators willing to oppose the Empire on the one side and the Chapel on the other.

Citations: Empire, Rackham's Redoubt, Banner-Kresslich Engine

Elias Lassiter