Star Force: Intimidation (SF17) Read online

  1

  August 18, 2261

  Epsilon Eridani System

  Corneria

  A flashing warning light came on in the security station, indicating that a motion sensor in the surrounding forest had just been tripped. It was an outer line segment, more than a kilometer away from the Clan Ninja Monkey mining complex, and it quickly registered a second hit, making the guard on night surveillance duty jerk back in his chair reflexively. Nathan hadn’t thought the motion sensors were worth the effort. The alien raiders had been hitting them from the air for the past month, stealing or destroying what they could, but so far they hadn’t mounted any ground offensives other than dropping their people directly inside one of the many mining outposts on the planet.

  Then again, most of those outposts didn’t have an anti-air tower sticking up over the forest canopy either. To date, none of the Clan mining complexes had been hit since they tried to assault a Clan Samus facility with an identical tower. The lizard ship had been heavily damaged and forced to retreat immediately…so maybe this time around they were trying another tactic.

  That, or maybe a tree branch had fallen across the laser grid.

  A third and fourth contact registered on the same motion sensor, making that possibility slim indeed.

  Nathan tripped the complex-wide silent alarm, sending a signal out to all on duty patrols and stations to expect trouble.

  “Target spotted,” a whispered voice reported in over Jenna-732’s helmet speaker. “Definitely lizard and moving fast.”

  The Archon stood next to a crevice in one of the building walls, eclipsed by shadow from the heavy moonlight. “Just one?”

  “Yes…hold up. There’s a trailing group, moving much slower. First one must be a skirmisher. I count at least four, all wearing backpacks.”

  “You want me to take them?” another voice asked over the team comm.

  “Negative,” Jenna answered. “They’d see you coming a mile away.”

  “Some camo armor would help with that,” the Knight pointed out.

  “Yes it would,” Jenna admitted. “Put that on our to-do list for later. Snipers, any more contacts?”

  She got a host of negative replies, save for the one who’d reported in initially. “Two trailing guards, keeping pace with the backpacks.”

  “Seven sounds low. There may be others in the area. Knights, stay within the complex. Anything gets through, it’s yours. Priority defense goes to the tower. Everyone else, stay sharp. I’m going to poke the bee hive and see what happens. Just don’t shoot me. I’ll signal when I want cover fire, but if they get within line 2 don’t wait.”

  “Copy,” the sniper said, continuing to track the lizards from his perch high up in the trees on the edge of the complex. He was located just below the canopy so the only visual hazards were the numerous tree trunks clogging the underside of the forest. This gave him lines of sight for quite a distance, but those lines were constantly being broken as the lizards moved in and out of his scope.

  He lifted his head from his lachar rifle and glanced back at the mining complex. From the 38 buildings clumped together in a rough circle a tiny blur broke from one on the edge and sprinted across the clearing. Her red armor looked almost black in the moonlight, but it was still far brighter than the camouflaged flex armor the snipers wore to match the tree trunks. From his stand he tracked Jenna’s sprint, dialing back his scope with a free hand as he kept his eyes on her. With the Archon’s superhuman speed and agility it would be easy to lose her, and he nearly did twice as she ran an evasive zigzag course between the trees.

  “Directions please?”

  “Bear left,” the sniper said through his earpiece in a whisper. “Follow the rise 50 meters then hard right. They’ll be there in about 20 seconds. Don’t know where the skirmisher is.”

  There was no answer from Jenna, but he could see her dart to the left and sprint halfway down the bit of elevation in the otherwise flat geography. There were just enough waves in the ground to provide cover from point to point, but from his position he could see and fire down on anyone not hiding behind a tree, giving him both the eyes for surveillance and fire support.

  When Jenna turned suddenly he lost track of her position, now having to use his scope to keep watch. A slight breeze was ruffling the leaves in the trees, dampening any sounds of movement, so the sniper was going to have to rely on his scope and the motion sensors at the base of his tree for warning if anyone came up underneath him.

  “Skirmisher is down,” Jenna reported. “Status on the backpacks?”

  The sniper flipped his rifle around to the approximate area where he expected them to be, zoomed out and caught sight of a bit of movement. He realigned and zoomed back in, seeing them hiking in a row just as they had been before, lurching with each step as if they had springs in their shoes…had they been wearing shoes.

  “Oblivious.”

  “Where are they now?”

  “I lost you.”

  “How deep?”

  “Just crossing line 4.”

  There was a long pause. “Got them. When I take the first feel free to join in.”

  “Copy that,” he said, sliding his finger over the trigger and tightening his grip ever so slightly on the barrel. He didn’t have a tripod up in his tree stand, but then again he couldn’t get a lot of distance in the forest anyway. Freehand would have to do, and it was something he’d practiced extensively.

  “Contact,” another sniper reported. “Northeast. Group of six. No backpacks and moving fast.”

  Jenna didn’t answer, and the sniper kept his nerve and sights on his group of targets. He had the second in line centered when it twitched its head to the right just as a blur of Archon armor jumped out of the woods and knocked the one behind it off the path they were following and dragged it from sight. A pair of shots flashed bright green from the trailing guards, breaking up the darkness as the sniper saw his target back up and away from where the other lizard had been taken. It retreated behind two tree trunks before half pausing, looking every which way, seemingly scared out of its wits.

  He pulled the trigger and sent a yellow lachar burst straight into its chest armor, then followed it up with three quick subsequent trigger pulls, landing two more shots of laser/charged particles on target and dropping it to the ground.

  Moving his scope around he dialed it back slightly, looking for more targets just as he caught a glimpse of Jenna tackling another one, this time one of the guards, and snapping its neck like it was a toy. The lizard stood only a few centimeters shorter than the Archon, but its thin physique couldn’t stand up to her physical strength. She dumped the body aside and sprinted off, choosing not to use the rifle slung across her back for some reason.

  The sniper caught sight of the lead backpack, now running off wildly. Its run/hop made it easy to spot, but a bit more difficult to target. He had to line up a shot through the trees and time it to the cadence of the hop, but the lizard was getting closer and closer to his position, skewing left, which increased his odds of a hit with each meter it traveled.

  He pulled the trigger and sent a yellow flash across the dim forest, traveling so fast it was gone before it began, that hit the lizard low of where he had aimed, impacting it in the left shoulder. The creature spun about, rotating its shoulder back out of shock or pain. Two more lachar blasts hit its torso as it twisted, bringing its pack around into the firing line. The second of the torso shots hit the upper corner, chewing through the thin casing and into the explosives beneath.

  Suddenly a huge chunk of forest shredded in a fireball. The concussion wave knocked the sniper out of his stand and over the edge towards the forest floor several meters down. His rifle flew
from his hand as his safety strap caught him at the waist then pulled him against the tree trunk as it snapped taught, banging his helmeted head against the hard bark.

  He tasted blood as he hung upside down, his head ringing, as a cacophony of voices lit up his comm as engagements began to break out all around the mining complex as the explosion eradicated any hope of a surprise attack by either side.

  Reaching ‘up’ to his face as he hung upside down, he felt several tears in his cheeks and one deep one across his nose. He pulled a small piece of wood out of his chin then felt around for more. His hand came away bloody but without any more debris so he reached up to the line hanging him from the tree and pulled himself into a sit-up position, getting his head right side up as he felt a lot of resistance to the movement in his gut.

  He looked down at the flexible body armor he wore, seeing his abdominals looking like a porcupine with splinters covering his body. With his other hand he began pulling them out, thankful that most of them hadn’t made it all the way through.

  A few blood-soaked patches attested to some penetration, but none of it was serious enough to register past the ringing in his head. He was so dazed that he didn’t even feel the splinters imbedding themselves in his ungloved hands as he pulled the wood shrapnel out of his armor. Once his abs were clear of debris he pulled himself all the way up and kicked off the side of the tree trunk to set himself swinging clear.

  With his legs now beneath him he pulled up enough to slacken the rope then disconnected the latch at his waist with one hand as he swung back in gently towards the tree trunk. He got his feet squarely on it and walked down until his hands ran out of rope. Grabbing the latch at the bottom he swung his feet free and beneath him, then let go and dropped another two meters to the soft forest floor.

  He collapsed to his knees, banging one on a root, but otherwise landed more or less how he’d hoped. Pressing a hand against his pained forehead he looked around, trying to get his bearings as well as locate his weapon.

  Where the lizard had exploded was now a smoking crater. Several trees were missing, blasted into pieces and throw out so far and wide that a large hole was now present in the otherwise opaque canopy. The sniper pulled his nightvision goggles off, whisked a few drops of blood off them and wiped them clean against the backside of his pants where there wasn’t any splinter debris. He swiped away some of the blood on his face with the back of his hand, finally noticing the splinters in his fingers. He slipped the goggles back on and worked on his hands, pulling out the tiny pieces of wood as he spotted his rifle a few meters away.

  Kneeling down next to it and scanning the immediate area he saw no lizards, nor did he see Jenna. Fighting past the pain in his head he grabbed his weapon and began walking back towards the sounds of the ongoing firefight at the complex, hoping to get at least one good shot off to help the rest of his Clan.

  Jenna had just taken out the last of the guards when the det pack blew. The blast wave knocked her back against a tree, but she stayed on her feet and used the distraction to catch up to and kill the other backpack carrier with a fist to the face then a quick snap of its neck as it lay on the ground, stunned. Three backpacks down, one obviously exploded.

  With this group taken care of Jenna sprinted back towards the complex as the comm lit up with reports of new fighting breaking out. With their stealth approach now toast the lizards were pressing their attack…and there appeared to be more of them than they’d realized.

  “Any more reports of backpacks?” she asked as she ran, hopping over part of one of the destroyed trees. Her armor was heavy, as was the gravity, but she’d been training in this environment for so long she no longer felt the difference.

  “Affirmative,” someone answered. “Coming in from the west.”

  “Do not let the backpacks get inside the complex. Snipe them if you have to, but do not let them get within blast range!”

  Any confirmations were lost in the overlapping voices and the sounds of battle. Apparently at least one person had left their comm on, so any and all noises were being transmitted.

  Jenna didn’t worry about it as she sprinted into the clearing around the complex, seeing plasma blasts to the north. Hugging the tree line then darting back inside it she flanked a group of lizard snipers blasting away at security guards in a small outpost on the perimeter. They were hunkered down in a small enclosure with inch think armor plates and gun slots, but the incoming plasma was eating through the armor…and if the lizards kept up their pounding they’d soon get through, either hitting the men or forcing them to retreat.

  Seeing a group of 8 or more clustered together, Jenna pulled her plasma rifle off the back of her armor and charged them from the flank, coming in slightly behind them. She fired a bright blue plasma lance into the side of one that was hunkered down behind a tree trunk for cover, briefly bathing the forest around her in blue light. The lizard turned towards her just as she hit it, with Jenna quickly delivered another pair of shots as she ran to make sure it was down before targeting the next one a few meters to its right.

  She hit that one in the leg then jumped to the side, rolling on the ground across her shoulders and coming up behind a thick tree as the others noticed her presence and turned their fire towards her. Dozens of plasma blasts flew past her position, some hitting the tree and setting it on fire. The Archon reached her rifle-bearing right hand around behind her and triggered off a shot one handed from the right side of the tree, then moved left, whipping her weapon around into a two handed grip and shooting the closest lizard she could find before sprinting to new cover.

  She made it there cleanly, then caught a bit of plasma as she danced to the next one. The green ionized gas melted a small rivulet out of her left pectoral plate but it didn’t get all the way through.

  As if in repayment for the hit, the lizard that had shot her took a hit to the head from a sniper’s lachar blast. It dropped dead to the ground as the others suddenly remembered to duck for cover, having exposed themselves to fire coming from the complex in order to track the threat at their back.

  Jenna moved instantly, jumping out of cover and charging directly at them, trusting her men not to shoot her, with her speed in making it difficult for them to even if they made a mistake and shot at the first sign of movement they saw. The armored superhuman leapt between the trees, making for a shallow zigzag that disguised her true approach line and target until she got within a few meters of the lizards and started blasting away at nearly point blank range.

  Not stopping to give them a better target, she fired on the run, juking this way and that while taking another plasma hit to the right leg. This one landed squarely and cut a huge crater into her red armor, showing a bit of black padding underneath as it got all the way through the plate but fell short of hitting her flesh. The impact threw her movements off only slightly, but it did spook her enough to cause a sudden rush for cover…only to have her pop out from the other side of the tree and keep firing.

  Another sniper shot took down a lizard in front of her, leaving her just one remaining. She lit it up with three burn marks down the center torso then ran on by before it even had time to hit the ground. From there she turned hard right and sprinted across the clearing towards the complex, seeing green flashes from inside, meaning that the lizards had already broken through the perimeter.

  2

  A group of six lizards darted along the long wall of a processing building using it to block the view of the defenders as they tried to flank them and get further into the interior. Two of the group had backpacks and all six moved quickly, hop/running close to the wall as the sounds of battle competed with the silence of the night. The long, low building buffeted most of the sounds, causing the lizards to creep in as silently as they could.

  When they got to the other end the first one poked its head around the corner, saw the walkways between the closely packed buildings were clear, and led the others out. They stayed single file but spread laterally to give themselves bet
ter lines of fire as they pressed towards the interior and the anti-air turret at the center of the little mining city.

  The backpack carriers brought up the rear, carrying their own weapons but moving more slowly due to the extra weight. They lagged a few meters back as the first of their skirmishers passed the edge of the building and poked its head around the corner to the left to scout out the area before advancing. Another wide building stopped their forward progress, forcing them to turn either right or left. As the one skirmisher poked around to the left another one ran off to the right side of the paved road and checked the opposite direction.

  It came back flying through the air, landing on its tail halfway out into the middle of the road as a huge, white armored Knight stepped into view, bringing its gigantic shield up in front of its face while keeping only the top of its armored head visible as it charged forward with the top half of its equally white sword sticking out ominously from its left flank.

  The lizards fired at it instantly, barely meters away, but the plasma didn’t penetrate the armored shield. The first of the attackers leapt to the side to avoid being run over but the long sword stretched out and tagged the creature in the chest with a none too gentle poke, stunning it unconscious as the Knight continued to move forward, bashing into the next skirmisher with the plasma-heated and smoking shield. It fell backwards, then the bottom of the shield passed over its chest and came crushing down on top of it.

  The other 3 lizards scattered, firing as they retreated. Two backed up the way they came, while the third tried to run around the Knight and get further inside the perimeter. Showing surprising speed the gigantic Knight crossed over and nearly cleaved the lizard in two with a slash from his sword, knocking the alien half his height back three meters before sprinting forward behind his shield after the other two.

  One of them froze, hunkering down against the base of the building wall and firing at the giant shield, putting more and more smoking craters in it. When the Knight came after it the lizard dropped its weapon and reached down to the strap holding its backpack on, fumbling for the detonator switch. Its hand brushed the trigger guard, but the tip of the Knight’s sword impaled it in the chest, rendering it unconscious before it could pull the safety device off.