Star Force: Evasion (Wayward Trilogy Book 2) Read online

  Where there were typically updates or random entertainment playing in holo was now a list of emergency protocols and a map of planetary orbit. The Viks hadn’t arrived yet, but their anticipated arrival point was pulsing as if it was trying to warn everyone else away.

  Esna followed Rammak over to the food, but they split up and went to different sections. They could eat a lot of the same things, but not all Star Force races could stomach the same foodstuffs…plus they also had favorites, so there was a Human section, a Calavari section, Bsidd, etc along with a long wall of common foodstuffs that they could all eat. Esna got herself a tray and stacked on her usual breakfast pancakes and two protein bars along with a glass of green, but her mind wasn’t on the food as she found a seat and Rammak joined her a few seconds later.

  The two of them ate in silence for a long time, then ended up just sitting and watching the map as the other denizens eventually left. Another Human came in and decided to join them, sitting down next to Esna and engaging in some chitchat up until the pulsing dot in high orbit shifted into ship identifications.

  “They’re here,” Andre said as all three of them responded to the single audible ping that accompanied their arrival. “If they know where our base is I’d really like to know how.”

  “We will see soon enough,” Rammak said as the enemy ships wasted no time in easing down into an orbit that carried them eastward around the planet. Currently the base was out of sight on the far side, with passive tracking sensors having been placed elsewhere in order to give Star Force the ability see opposite them. Those signals were being sent via landlines stretched across the planet and a few stealthed satellites in orbit that operated on tight beam transmissions in order not to betray what otherwise would look like an uninhabited system.

  “Son of a bitch,” Andre said as they orbited around near to crossing over the base and began slowing. Their trajectory soon lined up and the 261 ships slowed to a halt directly over them. “They know where we are.”

  Almost as if they heard him, the base command staff deployed the energy shield with waves of pent up matrix energy suddenly zipping out into a flat circle that rode a little over 2 miles into the air. It wasn’t at full strength and would take a bit of time to fully form, but the V’kit’no’sat weren’t going to allow that. They opened fire immediately, stitching the flat shield with a combination of weaponsfire that fell down through the atmosphere and immediately set it aglow in long streaks of air turning to plasma.

  It looked like a light tornado, for the widely spaced ships all had their weaponsfire converging down to a single spot trying to overload the shields and get a shot or two through.

  Esna’s tray vibrated, with her tearing her eyes away from the additional holos of the exterior of the base where the weaponsfire could be seen hitting the shield from underneath, as well as an orbital shot of it from above.

  “Generator feedback,” the tech said. “It happens when the shields are pressed to the limit and switch from floating to fixed.”

  “What’s that mean?” Rammak asked.

  “What branch are you?”

  “Commando,” the Calavari answered.

  “Your armor uses fixed shields, meaning that if they’re hit they push your body. They’re locked to the emitters. Floating shields are not and remain hard wherever they’re emitted. It takes more energy to produce them, but if you have an object you don’t want bounced around with kinetic hits they protect it and absorb the inertia.”

  “So the shields are near to failing?”

  “Or they set them this way from the beginning. Usually it’s an autoshift,” he said as a series of red Ardent beams shot up from the surface and hit a Hjar’at Dak’bri battlecruiser. The 18 mile wide crescent absorbed the hits on its shields as it and the rest of the V’kit’no’sat fleet continued firing, with the resulting rumble on the cafeteria increasing as the enemy ships got closer to the planet and began to open up with their medium ranged weapons.

  But so did the Star Force base, firing back with Sat’chi orbs that rose up through brief gaps in the shield and tore through the atmosphere up to orbit where they splashed against the enemy warships and would have done tremendous damage to the hull if their shields hadn’t absorbed them. But in doing so each hit weakened the V’kit’no’sat shields even as they dropped their own Dey’rey orbs onto the Star Force base.

  The Dey’rey were a new V’kit’no’sat creation only 600 years old and a response to Star Force learning to build shields in such a way that they could resist the tiny, powerful Var’ko beams that most of V’kit’no’sat fleets carried as both a heavy pounder and shield penetrator because they could spot overload most shields…except with Star Force, because they had the blueprints for the V’kit’no’sat weapons due to the ancient pyramid database recovered from a lost V’kit’no’sat colony on Earth long ago.

  Andre explained many things to Rammak and Esna as the weaponsfire continued to fall, with far more coming down than going back up, though two Vik ships did have to retreat as their shields fell too low. If they’d stayed the base anti-orbital weapons would have started hitting the hull, so their retreat took the number of attacking ships down from 261 to 259, leaving an additional two missing from the fleet that Rammak later pointed out had been left back at the star probably to intercept any fleeing Star Force ships.

  But right now running wasn’t the objective, holding out was and the addition of the Dey’rey was stretching the strength of the base’s shield beyond expectation. Andre said he didn’t understand how it was still holding up against the combination of the shield draining orbs and the damaging weaponsfire, admitting that the base shields must have gone to fixed mode on purpose anticipating this much damage without kinetic weapons being used.

  Rammak backed him up on that, citing that the Viks rarely used kinetics. Throwing mass at a target was very effective, but not ammo efficient. That was why virtually all of their weapons were energy-based, save a few they rolled out on special occasions, but their standard warships didn’t carry any of those exotics.

  Put a base’s shields into fixed mode, then get hit with, say, a ramming ship, and the emitters would punch themselves down into the ground, potentially through your base colony if the superstructure wasn’t built like a warship. Even if it was, your base would suddenly become subterranean, which was why base shields rarely went fixed except as a last resort.

  The rumbling that was traveling through the floor and table up to Esna’s tray lasted so long it was numbing her legs as she sat there with Rammak and the Human tech wondering when the shield would collapse, but no evac order sounded. They couldn’t read shield strength from here beyond color coding, but after another 4 Vik ships had to retreat and start recharging their shields the color patterns began to improve even as they were continuing to be attacked. That meant the shields were recharging faster than they were being damaged, and almost as soon as Andre pointed that out the enemy weaponsfire ceased simultaneously.

  The vibrations running through Esna’s body stopped and the Vik ships began pulling back to a higher orbit as the base weaponry continued to shoot them until they were out of range. No hull damage had been done to any of the ships, but they’d still given up on the assault.

  “What’s that mean?” Esna asked both of them.

  “It means they can’t get through the shield without reinforcements,” Rammak answered before the tech could. “They were measuring how much defense we had.”

  “Rate of decrease,” Andre pointed out. “If they were wearing our shields down faster than we could recharge them it was just a matter of time unless we could destroy enough of their ships to change the math. They caught us with partial shields because we were trying to not draw attention to our location, but once the matrix caught up and fully formed they didn’t have enough firepower to get through. If they’d kept attacking our shields would have recharged to full power while we kept peeling off their ships. If they stayed and all continued firing, we’d destroy ever
y one of them without even taking a hit to the surface, but they’re not that dumb.”

  “So they’re coming down now?”

  “Either that or wait for more ships to arrive,” Rammak answered, standing up a few moments later as the orbital tracking shifted.

  “Looks like you’re right,” Andre said, pointing to the fleet repositioning around the curve of the planet. “Unless they think they can slide a shot under the shields. They have to know we can drop them to the surface if needed.”

  Esna looked up at the towering Calavari from her seat. “Tell me where to hide, then go fight. I know you want to.”

  Rammak’s four hands balled into fists, twice each, then he forced himself to relax.

  “No. I’m sticking with you. I’ll fight if there’s no other choice, but the Commandos here know what they’re doing and I haven’t trained with them.”

  “You said you were trained to fight with anyone, anytime.”

  “I’ll just get in the way, Esna. If they get far enough inside the base for me to be of use, we’ll have to evacuate anyway.”

  “Then why do you look like you’re ready to run off and help now if I wasn’t here?”

  “Old memories. The last time this happened I didn’t make it off the planet.”

  “Oh. Right. Sorry.”

  “What branch are you?” Andre asked.

  “Nothing,” Esna said with a sneer. “I got rescued.”

  Andre’s eyes widened. “You’re the one recovered from Mace?”

  “We both are,” Rammak answered, still watching the hologram of the ships repositioning.

  “Damn. You just got out from under their tails and here they are again. If I were you I’d be pissed with the galaxy right now,” he mentioned as he stood up with his tray. “But on the upside, you’ll probably be on the first evac ships when they arrive.”

  “We have ships coming?” Esna asked hopefully.

  “This base has a Gondor transmitter. If they haven’t used it already they will soon and call for help. We just have to hold out long enough for it to get here.”

  “How long?” Rammak asked.

  “Outside my area of expertise. I’m a mech tech, not a naval strategist. I don’t know where our other bases are, let alone our roaming fleets, but I know they’re out there and they’ll come. Until then I wait and patch up whatever battle damage gets sent back to me. You two I guess just wait,” he said, taking a step towards the return slot for his tray on the far wall, then he stopped and twisted his shoulders back to look at Esna. “If they do breach the base, stay out of sight and play for time. Help will come. We didn’t build these bases out here expecting them to be left alone forever. There are contingency plans in place. You survived before, make sure you survive again. Keeping you two alive is an extra insult to the Viks.”

  With that he walked off leaving the pair alone as Esna grabbed Rammak’s lower wrist and held on. A moment later he sat back down and resigned himself to being an observer in this fight, but it was clear to Esna that his reflexes were fighting him. He’d been hiding from the Viks for 800 years, and now that he was back where he belonged with the rest of Star Force he had a chance to fight again and the warrior inside him didn’t want to sit and watch while others did just that.

  Esna wanted to do something too, but if Rammak wasn’t good enough to keep up with the Clan people in this base, there was no chance of her being anything more than baggage they’d be forced to protect. Better to stay out of the way and leave them free to fight, but a part of her didn’t want to sit still either.

  “Is there anything we can do to help? Like move crates or something?”

  “Nothing now, but if we sit here for hours doing nothing but watching holos we’ll be less ready to fight if we have to.”

  “So what then?”

  “We head to the track and take a light run. Not enough to exhaust us, but enough to work out the anxiety and get us in motion. It’ll be hours at the soonest before any ground troops can get to us. They have to land them not only beyond the shield perimeter, but out of range of our anti-orbital guns. They can tip low and skim the horizon to shoot the enemy drop pods if they come too close.”

  “Can they shoot the ground troops too?”

  “They don’t tip that low, but we’ve got other weapons for that when they get close.”

  “And what if they don’t land troops?”

  “Then we’ve got even more time that can’t be wasted sitting still. If we can do nothing to help in the defense, we can at least train.”

  “I should have expected you to say that. Let’s get going then,” she said, grabbing her tray and heading off. Rammak delayed a few seconds still watching the ships in orbit repositioning, then he followed Esna to return his own tray into the receptacle. Once their hands were free they headed off through equally deserted corridors and had the track area almost to themselves once they arrived. Both of them slipped off their uniforms and ran in their under garments and casual shoes, the latter of which wasn’t a disadvantage unless they were going to do a really aggressive workout.

  Rammak headed off at his own pace and left Esna to hers, with both of them running several miles and getting the jitters out...mostly. Esna was still worried about what was to happen, but she was probably the only one on the base that didn’t already know what a Vik invasion was like. She’d been attacked once on the ground and that had been bad enough, but a whole fleet of ships and the number of troops they could carry was something that blew her mind. She had no idea what was coming, but she did know it would be bad.

  But the base shield had held up to their attack, and if Andre was right there would be help on the way. She just didn’t like being helpless to do anything about her own survival, though she much preferred having such powerful allies around rather than trying to run on her own, or even with Rammak. This base was full of what they called ‘badasses,’ and as much as she didn’t want to see what a Vik assault looked like up close, she was curious to see how Star Force fought en mass.

  Esna quit her run earlier than Rammak, for the Calavari was in far better shape than she was. The young Human waited patiently for him like she usually did, then they both left the track feeling better and headed for the nearest holo feed they could find.

  It didn’t take long to locate one, for they were spread all over the base, and in the few hours they’d spent training the Vik ships had moved as far as they were going to go, now outside of weapons range and tucked in low to the planet and just above the atmosphere as thousands of ‘tiny’ objects were traveling up and down between the ships and the surface below them.

  “They’re landing their army,” Rammak said to Esna near the empty corridor save for a few people rushing past now and then. “Once they get all of them down to the planet, they’ll start crossing the distance on foot.”

  “On foot? Isn’t that hundreds of miles away?”

  “They’re not in a hurry, but they’re so big that a mile for them isn’t the same as a mile for you.”

  “Like the Era’tran?” she said, remembering. It had run so fast trying to catch her on the back of Nor’far she couldn’t believe it.

  “There are no Era’tran ships in that fleet,” he said, with her immediately being grateful.

  “Who is up there?”

  “Based on hull designs, seven races. The worst of which is the Hjar’at.”

  “Are those the ones with the spikes?”

  “Yes,” he said grimly.

  “Better than the Era’tran at least?”

  “No,” Rammak said, shaking his big orange head. “Worse.”

  3

  June 14, 4812

  Orlero System (Devastation Zone)

  Tauntaun

  Jared-11924 tapped his right index finger on the rim of the control board in front of him as he stood within the command nexus, a small circular platform with a host of holograms rising up in front of him detailing the outer edge of the base perimeter defense and the approaching V’kit
’no’sat army. The tapping was from impatience, but it was nearly the only sound in the base command center as all the personnel sat or stood quietly as they waited, monitoring sensors and relying on the Archon to lead their defensive counterattack.

  But the time wasn’t quite right yet, hence the waiting. The V’kit’no’sat were choosing to approach split up by race…which was unusual. In joint assaults they would mix their formations for maximum kill power, but right now they were stretched out into 6 long columns moving side by side across the icy plains on approach to the first major terrain obstacle on the defense perimeter. It was a rough and jagged outcropping that ran for several miles, but once they got on top of it they’d have a smooth stretch in halfway to the base, which was where Jared expected them to approach from.

  Their formation still had time to swing north or south and go around it, but that would put them into a series of canyons that made counterattack easier. Those canyons would eventually lead to the roughly circular plain that extended all the way up to the sheer ice walls where the main base hangar doors were, and if you were trying to be subtle that’s how you would approach…but the V’kit’no’sat were not subtle unless they had to be, and either out of confidence or caution they were going to avoid the canyons and come straight over the upper plain.

  They didn’t have any vehicles or ships to carry them up the incline, but then again they didn’t need any. Their combat armor had limited anti-grav good enough for short jumps or descents, but there would be a transition time climbing up to the higher plain would disrupt their already lazy columns.

  It looked like they weren’t worried, and it was true that they were still more than 50 miles out from the base, but after all the centuries Star Force had been fighting the V’kit’no’sat they should have known better than to expect an easy assault.

  But that’s not what worried Jared the most. Their six columns were of varying sizes and comprised of Hjar’at, which back on Earth in the old days were known as Stegosauruses, Deo’mat and Qua’cho, which respectively were Ankylosaurus and Dimetrodon, plus three more races that hadn’t been present on Earth when it started out as a V’kit’no’sat colony. The Per’tal were the smallest, about the size of a horse and quadruped like the others, but could run exceedingly fast, looking more like a tiger in motion than a heavy hitter like the Wass’mat were.