Star Force: Paradigm (SF35) Read online

  1

  December 2, 2430

  Lejat System

  Endor

  “Command says we have contacts heading our way,” Reggie said in a whisper inside the surface blind that concealed the entry point to the Canderian base.

  “Details?” Vitor asked.

  “No transports this time. The lizards sent a battle fleet to check up on their missing ships. We’ve got a cruiser incoming escorting a hoard of kirbies.”

  “Damn,” Vitor said, his eyes scanning the forest outside through a slit of a one-way window. “What are our orders?” he asked the Evocati.

  “Others will handle the big boys. We jump the kirbies same as before.”

  “And hope the cruiser doesn’t blast our asses to oblivion in the process?”

  “Pretty much,” Reggie said as a few more Canderians in green camo armor, complete with the force field faceplates they preferred over the Archon/Knights’ full helmets…or at least on a planet like this, with breathable atmosphere and plenty of trees for their enemy to hide behind, which was why they liked their ears exposed so they could clearly hear every little creak and snap nearby.

  “Have the Ninkis been alerted?”

  “I assume so,” Reggie said as he walked to the door that was covered only in a concealment hologram that he couldn’t see out of, nor could anyone see in through. He clicked on his headset comm. “Check in.”

  Vitor clicked his own comm, sending a signal out to his Evocati that registered his readiness on his HUD. Once all 42 members of his Evocaton showed up Reggie led them outside into the evergreen forest as they headed away from their concealed, subsurface base towards the Ninkari village/city off to the southwest.

  None of the Canderians talked along the way, not only because they needed all the breath they had for running through the underbrush that continually tried to slow them down with a mixture of vines, leaves, and thorns that dragged on their armor, but because they knew better than to make any extra noise than necessary, given that their voices would carry out of their partial helmets, as opposed to the Star Force variety that was fully concealed.

  The Canderians ran at just shy of a sprint across ground that held no trails…for they could lead back to their base. The trailblazers’ orders had been specific: Protect the primitive Ninkari population of the planet, and do so without drawing further lizard attention here.

  That was a new exercise for the military civilization, for they lived out in the openness of space and fought in a similar manner…though as the years passed they were getting better and better at operating on planets, and in this case, hiding on one.

  Or rather beneath it. Everywhere the Ninkari had a hut city there was a Canderian base nearby so that they could react quickly when the lizards arrived. They’d been on the planet a quarter of a century, and in that time the lizards had sent ships to harvest the natives 8 times, each of which was thwarted by Canderous. Apparently they’d finally got tired of sending off ships that never returned, and now they had come in force to see what had been happening to them.

  It wasn’t the first time they’d investigated. Many times the lizards had sent a jumpship with cruisers attached in system to find their missing ships…and found nothing. No ships insystem, lizard or otherwise. No debris from where they might have been destroyed, in orbit or on the surface. Canderous had been good about leaving no traces and had apparently dumbfounded the lizards. Now they had sent a fleet to investigate and harvest at the same time, meaning they weren’t going to be able to operate with the same methods.

  But that wasn’t Reggie’s concern. What happened upstairs wasn’t his department. His was to keep the lizards from picking up any of the Ninkari from the city over the small ridge ahead of them, while other Canderian units were doing the same elsewhere. Trick of it was, there were over 120 million Ninkari on the planet, thanks largely to the fact that Canderous hadn’t let any of them be harvested. They reproduced quickly, and were expanding so fast that Star Force had to help them plan out their settlements to avoid starvation.

  The ‘Ninkies,’ as they’d come to be called, were semi-intelligent, compared to Humans anyway, and Star Force had assigned a team of liaisons to the planet that had managed to construct a simple language they could use to communicate with each other, given their native language was a series of barks and chirps that Humans couldn’t well reciprocate, and on top of that it was a muddled mess of syntax. The new language was much more efficient, and gave the Humans a way of communicating with the Ninkari, who’d come to see them as both guardians and teachers.

  Thanks to that relationship being established, shelters had been dug underneath the Ninkari cities, giving at least some of them a safe zone to run to when/if the lizards came back. Reggie appreciated that, for the less of them out in the open the better. Thankfully the lizards wanted to take them alive, or they could just have blasted away at their huts from the air rather than landing collectors on the ground and going after them with tranquilizers and nets.

  On foot Reggie knew it’d take them 11 minutes to get to the edge of the village, given the number of times they’d practiced making the overland trek, but finding exactly where the lizards were going to set down would be a matter of luck, though he knew they preferred wide open landing zones and this city was nestled up into the thick forest, leaving only a handful of spots he hoped they’d go to…otherwise they might get to the Ninkies before Canderous did.

  The Canderians had debated linking an underground tunnel with the village and using it to quickly get there when needed, but they wanted their base to not be connected in a way that the lizards might find it, else they could draw a military response that would further endanger the locals. They had to be ghosts in this, and to do that they had to keep out of the village until needed, come in, hit, and disappear before anyone could check up on what was going on.

  Inside his helmet’s HUD, which was projected via hologram just inside the shield that covered his face, Reggie got updated tracking data from the passive sensor stations set all across Endor’s surface. They weren’t as good as active stations that sent out a sensor beam, but they still provided them a heads up via the disturbance in the atmospheric reentry as well as visual spotting. Other than that the lizard tech was hard to pick up on sensors anyway, given their signal absorbing armor plating.

  Reggie saw that there were dozens of signals heading towards their village, all of which he assumed were kirbies. Elsewhere there were other contacts, visible on his battlemap when he zoomed out, heading for other settlements, meaning there were hundreds coming down from orbit to this region of the planet…and who knew how many more elsewhere, making this the largest harvesting attempt to date, giving his Evocaton more targets to deal with than he’d expected.

  But this is what they’d trained for and he was eager to take it to the lizards, so as his six Triarill came over the crest of the low ridge and the mass of wood huts came into view, obscured by some tall tree clumps but otherwise out in the open and vulnerable to attack, the Canderian accelerated his pace on the downhill as he issued deployment orders, tagging various locations within the village on his battlemap via waypoints.

  The six Triarill that made up his Evocaton split, with one staying with him and heading for the largest open area available, which was just this side of the village center. The other Triarill, each comprised of 6 Munifex and one Triarii, diverged slightly as the line of soldiers broke apart as they listened for the sound of engines that they knew would be approaching soon.

  Reggie hit the edge of the village first with the outlying huts, some of which were multiple stories tall, already having been evacuated. It wasn’t until his command Triarill was a quarter mile inside the perimeter did
he come across any of the short, bristly Ninkies, passing them by as they huddled up together inside one of the larger huts, with one poking its narrow head out the wood slat door. The open air windows were also visible with the Ninkies’ green eyes that seemed to glow from the reflected sunlight.

  As per Canderous’s previous instructions, the Ninkies were clearing the streets, which were little more than dirt paths winding in between various huts and trees, offering a varied battlefield with no linear geography. That favored close range combat, which the Canderians liked, but it also made it difficult to navigate to the hot spots and respond in a timely manner, giving the nature of the zigzaggy course one would have to run.

  When Reggie passed one of the taller huts he pointed a finger towards it and one of his men veered off, going inside and climbing up to the top to act as a spotter/sniper. Rather than camping out in the structure itself, the Munifex climbed out onto the roof and jumped to the tree branches a meter away, then crawled up further into the pine-like needles, obscuring himself near the trunk and picking out a good viewing spot of the clearing that Reggie was headed to with the others.

  They got there a couple of minutes before the first of the kirbies arrived, hearing their telltale hum of the lizards’ anti-grav engines. It wasn’t loud, but it did have a different pitch than Star Force tech, which was usually far more quiet. In truth the anti-grav propulsion was silent, but the cooling systems that kept the components from overloading and melting made the noise, and the larger the pull the more cooling was required.

  The lizards liked using sensor-stealthed ships, but they didn’t care about noise levels at close range, so when the kirbies came overhead the Canderians could feel the hum in their bones, even though none had yet set down. A few hand signals from Reggie and his Triarill split up, with him taking position behind a tree on the edge of the clearing that was made up of pounded dirt around a water well the Ninkies had dug. It was no longer functional, given that Star Force had taught them how to make better ones that were indoors, but they’d asked the Ninkari to leave it in place so as to draw the lizards in…which it now was.

  Three kirbies from the 10+ that flew overhead dropped down to make use of the exposed dirt, landing in a triangle around the well and hovering a meter off the ground as they opened their side hatches.

  Suddenly a rocket zipped across the clearing and into the side of the nearest kirby, detonating within and killing most of the lizard troops waiting to come out. That detonation triggered a hail of plasma lances from around the perimeter as all 7 Canderians shot every scaled head that came into view.

  Reggie nailed one in its protective vest, having hit low. That knocked it back into the hold, but it was shoved out again by those behind and it caught its balance upon landing, then scurried off to the side as a sniper shot from a lachar rifle nailed it in the head, coming down from a high angle. The Evocati held his position near the tree, lighting up the lizards pouring out with accurate plasma blasts as another two Canderians overlapped their fire with his own, mowing down all but six of the lizards that got free and scattered around behind or under the kirbies, giving them some cover.

  Without him even having to order it one of the other two nearby Canderians sprinted out to the kirby and hopped up into the hold, disappearing from sight as he headed for the cockpit, intent on taking out the pilots. Reggie stayed put and dropped to the ground, holding his plasma rifle a couple of inches above the dirt and firing underneath the kirby at the lizards’ legs behind it.

  He nailed three of the appendages, but one of the creepy crawlers took cover behind the well where he couldn’t target. Reggie scanned the area underneath the other two kirbies, finding another set of legs to shoot at, despite the further range…then one of the kirbies started climbing out of the clearing, attempting to run away while the other two were still on the ground.

  Two rockets leapt out from different locations, one of which splattered shrapnel against the kirby’s shields. The second one breached the energy barrier and scarred the hull, but didn’t do much damage. As the cargo bay door resealed more rockets came up from the pair, blasting into the side and causing the kirby to keel over, coming back down into the side of the clearing and nosing into a hut where it grounded itself.

  Another rocket followed, hitting the aft of the kirby and knocking out what anti-grav it had left, bringing the entire blocky ship crashing down to the dirt…whereupon one of the intact plasma cannons rotated around and started taking pot shots at the Canderians.

  That reprisal didn’t last long, for a hail of plasma lances targeted the now shieldless battery and slagged the weapon, followed by the others that were visible on the half buried ship, though none of them returned fire, having had either their power feeds or control lines severed from the rocket damage.

  The other two kirbies never fired a shot, having been boarded almost immediately upon landing. With their pilots dead they floated in place while the Canderians hunted down the last of the lizards outside, then signaled the all clear to Reggie.

  “Open the door on the downed kirby,” he ordered, followed by another pair of rockets being launched into the side of the already damaged ship. After the smoke settled he could see a hole in the side, leading to the interior hold, which he hand signaled towards.

  Two of his Munifex ran forward and hopped inside, going after the lizard pilots. A few moments later he got a sitrep over his comm.

  “Lizards are down, one casualty. Ona took a couple hits to the chest on entry.”

  “Is she fighting capable?” Reggie asked.

  “Burns only,” the Canderian responded as the pair climbed back out the hole into the sunlight. As they did he could see the scorch marks on one of them, but as far as movement was concerned Ona didn’t seem too disabled.

  “Retake positions around the perimeter. These might not be the last heading our way,” Reggie ordered as he ducked back behind the tree and in front of a hut, giving him a partially concealed position from where he could check up on the other Triarill via his battlemap and comm. When he did he noticed something much larger on approach.

  “Everyone get under cover. We’ve got a cruiser nearby. Don’t let them see you.”

  8 klicks away from the village, which held over 100,000 of the small Ninkari, a small patch of dirt in between the thick evergreen trees was covered in a thin layer of grass and weeds, soaking up the sunlight as a lizard cruiser floated its way over the forest, watching the kirbies as they spread out to take their living plunder. When the first signs of resistance sprouted the cruiser altered course, heading towards the signs of trouble while deploying fighters.

  As it did that patch of grass suddenly took flight, ripping out from the ground around it as a concealed Canderian assault tower rose up above the treetops, powering up its weapons and defense shields as it targeted the enemy cruiser some 3 kilometers away, well within its firing range.

  A cleansing beam reached out across the relatively short gap and punched straight through the lizards’ shields, tearing into the hull and drawing an almost immediate response from the wisps in the air. The lizard fighters wheeled about and headed for the tower as the cruiser slowly did the same, returning plasma fire as it came about that impacted and exploded the trees surrounding the turret, with only small pieces of the green fire getting through to the shields, which rebuffed them easily.

  As the plasma continued to flow from the cruiser the forest around the tower was set afire, with the gap between the two targets clearing out and giving the lizards a better shot at the spindly Human construct. When the fighters got close they lit up the shields with tiny specs of green, all the while the anti-air defenses powered up and began firing rapid lachar blasts back at them from multiple cupolas.

  The wisps dropped from the air like flies as the cleansing beam continued to cut into the lizard cruiser, then the turret’s plasma cannons came online as a shield generator on the cruiser was hit and a portion of its hull was exposed. Two blue orbs shot out, blastin
g into the hull plates and making like shrapnel bombs while the lizards’ deluge of plasma blasts hadn’t yet penetrated the turret’s shields.

  The exchange went on for another 20 seconds before the cruiser pulled up and accelerated away from the tower, heading almost straight up as it tilted to give the aerodynamics a better edge on the atmosphere, getting it out of plasma range first, while still taking cleansing beam strikes well after it shrank to a tiny dot in the sky.

  Elsewhere around the planet identical towers were popping up and scaring off other cruisers while the Canderian ground troops were making quick work of the kirbies via ambushes and heavy weapons. Those few that got back into the sky were taken down by deployed towers, while a scattering of others were pursued and eliminated by drone starfighters launched from hidden bays and piloted by Canderians safely tucked away beneath the surface.

  Every kirby formation that came to ground was eliminated, and every cruiser that came within range was turned back damaged. Once the enemies were gone the turrets retracted back into the ground, though the dirt wasn’t replaced over top of them, figuring the lizards already had their positions tagged anyway. Some of the kirby formations that had further to go to get to their targets were recalled, fleeing back up to orbit or to nearby cruisers to dock upon.

  Altogether the lizards’ harvesting attempt was thoroughly and bluntly blocked, with the lizards in the warfleet overhead beginning to plan out new, more robust assaults on the towers while landing troops outside the villages so they could hunt down the ambushers who they thought were Human, though very few reports had made it back from the teams on the ground.

  As the cruisers and kirbies were on their way back up to orbit and making runs to dock with the pair of jumpships and the fleet of cruisers they’d deployed, more contacts began arriving on an unusual jumpline, not coming from the star but from another planet in the system and putting them about an 1/8th of an orbital arc away from the lizard fleet.