CNV Cerberus

Kraken-class SDN
Mass: 27,000,000 tonnes
Dimensions: Length: 3800m Beam: 2170m (max) Height: 1085m (max)
Armament: 360 heavy charged-particle cannons, 120 heavy grasers, 120 anti-ship missile systems, 5 superheavy FTL-boosted particle cannons, 1 spinal-mount ultraheavy FTL-boosted meson cannon, assorted PDS/ABC systems
Defence Systems: Triple-layered Microsingularity Screens, full DEW suite
Powerplant: 9 hydrogen-plasma fusion reactors, 3 FTL-interface powerplants
Engines: 3 gravitic-manipulation drive nacelles, 3 FTL drive units
Crew Complement: 10,000 (plus up to 5000 embarked marines)

    Named for her class's three distinctive engine nacelles, and their resemblance to the three-headed mythical canine guardian of the underworld (apparently common to the vessel's homeworld, which raises xenoscientists' eyebrows), Cerberus is a super-dreadnought battle platform and mothership whose immense, heavily armoured and shielded hull wraps hundreds of weapons batteries around a full factory-refinery centre, enough docking capacity to service multiple capital warships, the cargo space to equip an entire regiment, and the powerplants capable of keeping such a monster fully on standby at all times.

Acting as the flagship and operations centre for the entirety of FLEET, her extensive command, control, and communications facilities play host to the Admirals' situation conferences and councils of war on a daily basis. A truly mammoth vessel designed as a theatre flagship in entire interstellar campaigns, this ship is one of the largest warships FLEET operate – and they can only barely afford the massive fuel and energy requirements. Her internal construction and refinery systems, in conjunction with those of the Funky Horror, are invaluable for keeping the rest of the fleet running so far from maintenance facilities. Never designed to see atmosphere, and with engines so big they would cause ecological disasters if she tried, the ship is almost always relegated to a standoff role in high orbits. Her flag bridge also doubles as a command centre when the Funky Horror is over the horizon and communications or transit delays could be dangerous. Massive defence systems and layer upon layer of armour ensure the finest strategic minds FLEET can field remain safe in the thick of combat.

Built as she is to lead fleet engagements, and by naval architects who believed in leading from the front, Cerberus's primary armament is her spinal-mounted cannon. Running almost half the entire length of the ship, this colossal linear accelerator volley-fires a stream of gluon-neutrino plasma containing highly unstable mesons at distant targets. On impact with a sufficiently dense target, these decay back into normal particles in an immense hull-shattering storm of energy. Tachyonic matter can also be bled off from her FTL reactors and made to lase by grav lenses in three smaller batteries mounted on the engine nacelles, creating a crude but very long ranged beam weapon - sniping, on a starship scale.

Such massive and sophisticated weapons installations aside, Cerberus's secondary batteries are "merely" row after row of particle cannons and missile tube clusters in three armoured belts, while her forward hull and nacelles are studded with grasers - "gamma-ray lasers", that focus far more energetic hard radiation rather than light. At the lowest end of the scale are the thousands of lighter laser and particle batteries used for point-defence, their firecontrol systems intelligent enough to pick off the one yellow-winged butterfly in a forest of white ones a light-second away.
 
Despite the hail of fire she is capable of laying down, FLEET's commanders frankly admit Cerberus is something of a white elephant for day-to-day operations. In the "normal" combat situations encountered on Earth her weapons systems are insane overkill, risking friendly fire at best and planetary devastation at worst, preventing their use in any fire-support role beyond the most spectacular hard-target strikes. For now, her mission profile remains a supporting one, holding back at flag position or occasionally looming overhead to launch massive strike craft waves or support other vessels as they enter the atmosphere. The vessel remains unlikely to see serious action in the foreseeable future...unless someone plans a planetary invasion, or a massive escalation means FLEET have to fight the kind of foe who needs gigaton energy blasts before they fall over and die. That's when FLEET grin and say "but that's pretty much the point, isn't it?" - Cerberus's job is to bear the metaphorical Big Red Button, just in case Stanny forces the issue or the Goddess ever needs an invasion, which the Admirals are confident will happen sooner or later.

Admiral Loweko holds court aboard Cerberus. As one of the few FLEET warships with faster-than-light communications and sensor equipment, from her war room he can monitor the status of FLEET and Board units systemwide - and have his pale fingers on the triggers to reduce entire continents to puddles of glass, but his officers point out everyone can do that up here anyway.