Star Force: Intimidation (SF17) Read online

  With one more lizard to go the Knight ran off, chasing it around the outside corner of the building they’d approached by and saw it slunking next to the wall, trying to appear as small as possible as it ran on all fours. Its head turned around impossibly far, looking back as it fled with its eyes widening when it saw the behemoth closing on it. Without the pack it might have been able to outrun the monster, but with it there was no way it could escape.

  Ducking its head and rolling up in a ball it reached for the trigger guard, flipped it off and wedged the pack as close to the base of the processing factory as it could then hit the detonator a split second before the Knight’s sword could get to it.

  The explosives within the pack detonated in a flash, reducing the center of the building to rubble and throwing the debris high up into the midnight air in a fountain-like plume that reflected off the moonlight, then fell back to the ground in a hail of deadly, solid rain.

  Jenna’s armor took several debris hits halfway across the complex, knocking her off balance and into a side wall. Reorienting herself she ran out into one of the walkway/roads and looked up at the defense tower, seeing with relief that it was still intact. Her eye line darted to the north where she saw the debris cloud lingering over the destroyed building on the outside edge of the complex, then movement to her left caught her attention and she fired a pair of plasma blasts at a lizard trying to sneak by her position in the confusion.

  It wasn’t wearing a det pack, so she didn’t have to be careful with her shots, one of which clipped the creature in the unarmored shoulder, spinning it around and to the ground in pain. She ran up to it in a flash and put another shot into its scaly head before moving on. Groups of lizards were everywhere, and they weren’t doing her the courtesy of sticking together. Clan security had defensive positions scattered around the complex, but there were so many irregular roads ending in T’s and L’s that it made for shorter lines of sight then preferable. They had gotten some snipers up on the roofs, but the mining complex was large enough that it was difficult to defend without more troops…and they hadn’t expected the lizards to deploy this many of their number on a raid.

  Jenna ran down a short road, keeping close to the right wall as green plasma blasts leapt across the gap ahead. It was a four-way intersection with what appeared to be a defense outpost out of view on the left while the attackers were out of view on the right. Knowing that running out into the middle of the firefight was a good way to get hit, Jenna slowed as she approached the junction and knelt down next to the wall just shy of the crossroad.

  Carefully she popped her head out and back in, catching a brief glimpse of the scene. Getting her rifle up in front of her chest she stretched out into the free fire zone, landing on her left shoulder with her legs still hidden behind the wall and started firing from the ground up at the four lizards skulking inside building doorjambs.

  Her blue plasma took out one of the green firing weapon positions, then made another go dark when the lizard jumped out away from the wall as it exploded into its face with a near miss. A dimmer yellow flash took it down as one of their snipers got a chest shot from further inside the complex. It didn’t kill the lizard, hitting it in the armored body stocking it wore, but Jenna finished it off with a pair of plasma shots as it sat on the ground then shifted her aim to the next target.

  After taking it down she pulled back behind the wall, got to her feet, then charged back into sight and ran forward, rooting out the remaining opposition from their wall niches and clearing the section of street a moment before the anti-air tower opened fire on an unseen target.

  Jenna’s head immediately angled up, searching the nighttime sky while her peripherals remained wary of the surrounding streets. Bright white flashes of heavy lachars cast a strobe-light effect over the complex as the energy blasts moved too fast for the eye to see, traveling at near light speed towards some distant target. Without the ability to track the enemy ships on sensors Jenna knew the gunners had to be relying on visuals only, meaning while the targets were at range they were going to be very difficult to manually hit.

  Jenna had thought the lizards’ aim was to get the tower knocked out so they could bring their ships in for fire support…why then would they be closing now? Unless they thought that blast had been the tower going up.

  Right now it didn’t matter. Other than dodging aerial fire there wasn’t anything for her to do if their ships came in. She had lizards on the ground to deal with.

  “Report heavy resistance,” she said into her comm.

  For a moment there were no replies. Whoever had left their teamcomm on earlier had since corrected the problem and the earlier panicked responses had cut out, now that the security teams had gotten a feel for the fight they had on their hands.

  “Building 13,” someone responded. “Rooftop outpost overrun.”

  “I’m on it,” Jenna said, running back towards the defenders at the opposite end of the street from where she had just taken down the most recent group of lizards. She needed to cut across the interior of the complex to get to building 13.

  As she ran she jumped over a low barricade security had set up, bypassing two lightly armored guards, one with a plasma rifle, the other with a lachar sniper rifle. Both wore half helmets exposing their faces, which looked surprised to see her red armor jumping over and past their position. Jenna ran around a corner then zigzagged between buildings until she got to the small circular plaza that held the base of the defense turret. Looking like a very old grain tower from farms back on Earth, the vertical cylinder had a small open zone surrounding it, offering good fields of fire to the anti-personnel turrets covering the approach should any lizards get past the security forces.

  The gunners inside let her pass as she ran across and around the big turret as its peak lachars continued to flash in bursts whenever one of the lurking lizard ships came a little too close. Jenna disappeared on the other side, back into the cityscape, firing at and killing a lone lizard that had managed to break through their lines…not a good sign.

  The little twerp, standing only as tall as her shoulder, managed to nick her in the left knee before she shot it down. The armor melted and rehardened within half a second, giving her a little click every time she moved the joint. It didn’t appear to slow her movement any, but the sound was annoying and would make it difficult for her to sneak up on anyone.

  That wasn’t going to be an issue at the moment, given the sounds of plasma and the heavy lachars from the tower. The lachars had a distinctive high pitched whine, while the plasma was a bit lower in tone. Audially, one was a bee sting while the other felt like a heavy slap to the face.

  When Jenna got close to building 13 a couple lances of green plasma hit the ground behind her, having overshot as they came down from elevation. She spotted the lizard on the edge of the roof ahead and to the right of her, then ducked to the side as another one came into view and fired on her as she approached an intersection.

  Her shoulder hit the wall, then she rebounded back off it, sprinting ahead and crossing the side street until she was up next to the wall of building 13 and underneath their firing range. She ran ahead towards an open door, seeing the charred bodies of three of their Clan security guards in the street nearby.

  Barging through the door, Jenna ran in and up a nearby stairwell, not finding any resistance inside. The building was a standard model, meaning the interior makeup was the same as others in use by Clan Ninja Monkey and Star Force. Jenna had memorized the layouts for all their facilities so it took her little time to get to the roof, whereupon she ran up against three lizards spread out to various points on the building’s perimeter.

  Suddenly a hotspot formed in the middle of her back, pitching her forward and into a somersault…which she rounded off and came up on her feet facing the opposite way. She shot the lizard behind her, then the one beside it a few meters down covering the back wall.

  Jenna ignored the heat and jumped up into a run to the side, twisting ar
ound and firing on the forward facing three lizards as they turned around and attacked her. She got the first one easy enough, but the other two went evasive, running sideways as they fired back, making her next pair of shots miss. She did likewise, juking right and left until she got one of them, then she ran directly towards the last of them, jerking at the last moment to avoid a pointblank shot before jumpkicking into the ugly thing’s chest, knocking it off the two story building and down onto the street below.

  The Archon brought her rifle up and fired down at it as it lay dazed, killing it with a shot to the neck. Wasting no time she slid off the side of the roof, grabbing the edge with her free hand so she hung for a split second, decreasing the height of her fall, then let go and dropped to the paved ground below.

  Her feet hit hard and she wisely rolled out of the fall down onto her knees, shoulder, and then back, feeling the damaged spot just above her waist as it pivoted unevenly. Her somersault stalled out as her feet came back up under her, dumping her back on her butt. Jenna recovered quickly, getting up and running off before someone could make an easy target of her.

  Suddenly the high pitched whines of the turret’s lachars were overshadowed by the crush of green plasma hitting the energy shield on the lower sections of the tower just below the weaponry. The thin shields held up against the first two shots, but the third and fourth hit the armor plating before the Clan turret returned its own plasma fire.

  Two heavy booms sounded as gigantic light blue plasma spurts leapt out from the top. A secondary explosion happened elsewhere, past buildings that were blocking Jenna’s view. The incoming green plasma stopped and a moment later she saw the energy shield reform over the turret’s middle in a sparkle of a renewed matrix coming to life, then disappearing back to invisibility.

  The mechanics at the turret top swiveled and the two lachar batteries began tracking opposite targets, firing off flashes constantly with the occasional plasma lance thrown in, making Jenna twitch in response to the slight concussion wave being thrown off each time.

  The Archon caught and killed two more lizards as she worked her way out to the perimeter of the complex, then flanked to the left towards the nearest sounds of a firefight. She assisted another Knight in finishing off a group of snipers, coming up from behind and catching them off guard before a loud whistle/shriek sounded. A moment later most of the plasma rifle fire ceased as the remaining lizards began retreating.

  “Like hell they are,” Jenna said, seeing several running across the grassy field surrounding the mining complex, making for the tree line. The Archon sprinted after them, finding herself only slightly faster. She held her fire, hoping to catch up to some of them before they realized it.

  They got to the trees before she did, but Jenna didn’t slow. She continued to run after them, but they were good at being evasive and ran through the forest with ease. Undaunted, she continued to pursue a group of three for more than a kilometer before she got close enough to shoot at the rearmost of them.

  Her blue plasma lance missed, hitting a tree trunk and spraying bark out like a concussion grenade. A few chips hit the lizard, which jerked to the side so fast it was almost comical. The other two immediately turned around, offering suppression fire as Jenna took cover behind a thick tree. When their return fire ceased she broke cover, seeing that the lizards were on the move again.

  A twitch of movement to her left caused her head to twist…nearly running her into a low, leafless tree branch, which she ducked under at the last moment. A fourth lizard was coming up from behind, one that she had a chance of intercepting, so she took off after it, letting the other three go.

  She got within ten meters of the lizard then opened fire, mowing it down as it seemed more intent on running than fighting. Standing over its corpse she held still and listened. A few moments later she spotted another bit of movement, then another as more lizards were passing through this section of forest in retreat.

  Jenna realized she must have been near their rendezvous point, otherwise they wouldn’t have been congregating so close together, having presumably retreated from the complex in varying directions. Holding her fire, she took off through the trees and followed their movement and general direction.

  Several kilometers later she nearly bumped into one of them coming up around a large boulder imbedded in the soil at the end of a low hill. Out of reflex she jumped towards it and wrapped her free arm around its neck, dropping her rifle along the way. With her other hand she reached up and jerked, snapping its neck and dropping the body to the ground.

  Looking around and seeing nothing within the immediate area, Jenna reached down and retrieved her rifle. Guessing as to the direction they were headed she ran off as fast as she could in pursuit.

  A few minutes later the sound of engines caused her to slow. Following the sound to a small clearing with a few recently felled trees she saw the underside of one of their ships hovering about five meters above the ground, tucked in neatly beneath the tall canopy. A couple of the lizards were climbing a rope up into the ship while more were appearing from the left and right.

  Crouching next to the base of a dead stump, Jenna noticed three more ships nearby in similar artificially created niches as they picked up their retreating troops. The one nearest to her suddenly retracted its rope and closed its access bay, then drifted up through the canopy and into the sky where she couldn’t see it.

  Her head darted between the others, picking the one she thought was the least loaded, then she jumped up out of her cover and ran towards it. When she got close she took a long range shot at the last three lizards milling about the base of the rope. It missed high, passing over the thing’s head, but it succeeded in getting their attention.

  Instead of standing their ground and fighting the lizards scurried up the rope even faster. Jenna managed to shoot one off, but the others got inside and the ship lifted up before she could get to the clearing.

  A blast of plasma came back down near the edge, knocking her aside with the blast wave. She rolled back up onto her feet and squeezed off three quick shots against the underside of the ship, trying to slide one in the closing door. All three hit the armored hull, making small indents but doing no real damage. The ship disappeared into the dark sky along with the others, leaving Jenna alone in the forest with the few corpses she’d managed to rack up.

  A twitch to her left brought her rifle back up and she put another shot into the lizard that had fallen off the rope. Cautiously she walked up to it, then put another one in its head, making sure it was truly down, then picked up its weapon and began a slow run back towards the mining complex to see how hard they’d been hit.

  3

  October 8, 2261

  Epsilon Eridani System

  Inner Zone

  Paul watched from the bridge of the Excalibur as the jumpship Moya decelerated against Epsilon Eridani’s gravity well, coming out of the jump in between the orbits of the system’s 2nd and 3rd planets which were both currently on the other side of the star. After a few moments the first data feeds from the sensor relay grid began to flow through into the holographic chamber that Paul stood within, looking down on a map of the system as tracking data for their ships began to update.

  He noticed several warship icons nearby, ostensibly guarding the jump line, which he took as both a good and bad sign. Good in that they still held their position, but bad given that they felt the need to place ships here on a constant basis.

  “Begin decouple,” Paul ordered.

  The Excalibur’s bridge crew snapped into action and within a minute the kilometer-long battleship was free floating within the inertial dampening field of the jumpship. As a pair of destroyers moved out laterally from the niches that the triangular hull had left in the docking portion of the Moya, the Excalibur began to sink ‘down’ and exit the carrier’s hull from the underside. Carefully using thrusters only, the battleship emerged from the jumpship and flew clear of the jumpline as the destroyers moved into flanking positio
ns.

  The Moya also moved off the jumpline, heading in towards Corneria as the waiting escort ships picked it up, forming a defensive halo around it, but the jumpship only moved forward at a crawl as it waited for its twin to arrive an hour later.

  The Tardis emerged on the same jumpline, exiting at a slightly higher jumppoint due to its lesser mass. Unlike the Moya, the Tardis wasn’t carrying a battleship, but rather a host of smaller drone warships which it quickly released and the Excalibur took control of, forming a second defensive halo as both jumpships smoothly accelerated in an arc around the star’s gravity well towards the 5th planet in the system.

  They arrived at Corneria two days later, settling into low orbit with a host of dropships rising up from the surface to begin unloading cargo and personnel. In addition to traditional supplies, Paul had brought with him an arsenal of combat gear and a small army of Archons, Knights, and Star Force security personnel.

  Leaving control of the Excalibur in Captain Evinson’s command, Paul transferred down to the main Star Force colony on the planet where he met up with Duke Hightower for a brief confab before joining an Archon-only briefing session along with Greg, Morgan, and Rafa.

  “The attack on the mining outpost also brought with it our first Knight death,” San explained. “One was taken out with a det pack we think was intended for the tower, but it never made it that far. It did blow the hell out of one of our outer buildings but none of the lizards ever made it to the tower courtyard. After several attempts to do so they issued a recall order and retreated.”

  “How do you know that?” Greg asked.