Star Force: Baron (Star Force Universe Book 43) Read online

  Sara slowed down and dodged left and right, no longer running as much as evading. The Raptors, also breathing heavily, slowed as well and pooled up with the Archon moving from point to point and not giving them a fixed location to surround. With a series of fakes and quick redirects, she continually frustrated the Raptors as they came within inches of touching her but the slippery Human just moved too damn fast. Their bodies weren’t built for this type of close-in movement, and even with 40 of them they couldn’t cut off enough escape routes, for she wouldn’t stay in the same place for more than a few seconds.

  That evasion game went on for several minutes, with Sara working up a furious sweat and getting the type of high level workout that only advanced drones could provide…except that Raptors were not predictable programs, forcing her to adapt and getting, frankly, a better workout for her than through artificial means. She was doing this for their benefit, but the trailblazer was also benefiting as well.

  Then something happened she didn’t expect. Two of the Raptors collided with one another, but rather than falling and tangling, they bounced off each other and redirected…with one of them coming towards Sara’s path.

  She had to drop and roll to avoid getting touched, and as soon as she hit the ground she knew she was screwed. The delay it took her to get to her feet had 6 of them close in on her, with her evading them but getting too surrounded. There were too many bodies closing in and too few escape routes, with her finally resorting to jumping as high as she could without using her Yenmer, but she did use her Yetu, for that only briefly enhanced muscle movement, launching her into a ‘Jedi jump’ up and over the back of one Raptor.

  It tried to hit her foot with its head but missed, though while in midair she couldn’t redirect, making her landing predictable. Another Yetu burst leapt her over the diving Raptor that nearly hit her feet, but when she reached the apex of her jump another Raptor came flying at her from the right. It didn’t have Yetu, nor did it need it, for they could jump just fine on their powerful legs.

  Sara contorted midair, missing a collision with its head, but one of the tiny arms reached out and slapped her on the butt no less, before she hit the ground and rolled to a stop.

  The other Raptors knew instantly when it happened, for they were always telepathically talking to each other and had figured out a way to do it in a widespread sense without allowing her to eavesdrop. They all came to a stop, some heaving with the heavy effort and one that actually hurled after rolling over on the ground.

  Sara cringed, seeing the puke and knowing the taste of it from her own past experience.

  “You alright?”

  “No,” the Raptor said in obvious discomfort, “but I’ll live.”

  “Been there,” she offered, while sensing the wave of pleasure spreading through the group at their success. It had taken 54 tries, but they’d finally succeeded. “Did you two mean to run into each other or was that an accident?”

  “Accident,” one of them admitted, “but it worked in our advantage.”

  “Yeah it did. I didn’t expect the deflection and that screwed me over. Nice work using it to make yourselves unpredictable. You finally got me.”

  “We’re supposed to be faster,” another pointed out. “And all we managed was a single touch.”

  “You’re barely out of the egg, youngling,” she said, using the Star Force version rather than the ‘hatchling’ the V’kit’no’sat used. Both were correct for egg layers, but the trailblazers had gotten used to using ‘youngling’ for everyone. “I wasn’t even half this fast when I began. Training will make you far better, and you’re just getting started.”

  “Will it make us switch directions fast like you?” another asked.

  “You’ll get a lot better at it, but your tails are a problem. Good for straight running, not for redirects. All our bodies have advantages and disadvantages. You’ll learn to minimize yours, but it will take time…and by time I mean centuries, if not millennia. You’ve got a long way to go, but you’re making good progress. Focus on maintaining that trend and the years will pass on their own.”

  “What now?”

  “You’re not ready for me at full strength, but we’re getting there.”

  “You mean you were running slower than you could?”

  “No, I mean I’m not using all my psionics. I’ve got a lot that can disrupt you so you can’t coordinate and hit me. So far I’ve just been using my muscles.”

  “How so?”

  “Alright, one more lesson for today. You earned it with that touch. Spread out about 20 meters around me in a circle. I’ll hold still in the center, then try and touch me. You won’t be able to.”

  The Raptors did as said, then waited until she gave them the telepathic go signal. They all moved as one, but didn’t get more than a step or two before they started falling to the ground twitching as she created a huge Fornax field around her. Whenever they hit it they lost most of their body control and she kept reducing its radius. They’d get up and try again, only to the hit the field and go down. She let them get within 10 meters then sent a Saven blast out that operated like an Ikrid flash bomb. They were so distorted some of them actually turned around and walked backwards, while those that staggered closer to her got hit with a Jumat blast and knocked away.

  When the Saven blast wore off they came at her again, relentless as always, then all of them froze in place as she released her Ubven, dropping a telekinetic field over the entire area that she did not have to control. It was a field saturation and she could leave if she wanted, but they’d be locked there for a couple of minutes no matter how hard they tried to push free. They could wiggle around a bit as they destroyed the field, but they were stuck and totally vulnerable as Sara was able to walk forward melting the field in her path with the second component of her Ubven that was an alteration of her Rentar, but far more potent because it was geared to her own field.

  If the Raptors had Rentar they could have moved with some limited resistance, but they didn’t have that psionic, so they were stuck and totally vulnerable, which is why Ubven was the scariest of the tier 3 psionics, or perhaps even the scariest of them all.

  “You can’t move. You’re encased in a very thick Lachka field. It’s my psionic called Ubven, and it’s a single discharge. I’m recharging now, but won’t be able to do this again for some time. Note how vulnerable you are. This is why we wear armor with psionic countermeasures, otherwise you’d be getting shot and killed right now if this was during a battle. Over time you will earn additional psionics, but before you get them you must master your bodies as they are now. We do not give psionics to those who do not earn them. They are not a cover for a weak body. They are not a cover for a weak mind. They are an enhancement for the strong, so get strong and we’ll give you the tools to fight against those with powers like this. Otherwise, you’re just target practice.”

  Sara theatrically snapped her fingers and triggered the entire field to melt instantly, dropping some of the Raptors to the ground who were off balance and not expecting to be unstuck.

  “Lesson over. Good work today. Now go get some food and a nap, then get back to your daily workouts. Training is about working over and over and over and liking it. If you don’t like it yet, keep doing it anyway. It’s the only way you’re going to advance. You’ve got a lot of advantages with the way your bodies are built, a lot more than most races in Star Force, but they’re not enough to beat highly trained individuals in ‘lesser races.’ I can’t outrun a trained Raptor, yet I can outrun all of you…for now. Star Force operates as a team, but each piece of that team needs to be as strong as possible. That’s how you contribute. Make yourself stronger and the team becomes stronger. That’s how we win. That’s how we survive.”

  Sara looked around at all the long faces. Their eyes were intensely focused on her, and she knew they were drinking in every word she said, for these sessions with Archons, let alone the 1s that were in charge of the Raptor faction, were exceedingly rare.
All of these Raptors had to compete and beat out their kin in order to get in this training group, so they weren’t going to waste a moment of it.

  “We are at war with the V’kit’no’sat, and while that war is temporarily on pause it will resume. Others will fight it, not you. You are not ready yet, but if we can survive long enough your skills will be added to ours. You are our hope for long term survival, so your mission now is not to get ready to fight. Your mission is to improve and keep on improving. If the V’kit’no’sat land on this planet, you’re already as good as dead, so do not concern yourselves with what you would do in that situation. We all make the best of whatever is presented to us, and if the situation is unwinnable then we go down fighting with honor. The V’kit’no’sat are our enemy for a reason. They are not honorable and do terrible things. If you face one of those terrible things, it is something you will have to figure out in the moment, so don’t waste time now on it.”

  “I do not say this to scare you. I tell you this so you can focus on your objective. You have to improve until you get to the point where you can help us fight. You’re not there. You’re not even close. So if the war resumed today, you would keep training while I go and fight. Because I would be fighting to buy you time to get stronger. Your part in the war will take place in the distant future. Right now, your only job is to learn your bodies, learn your minds, and advance. Keep advancing. Keep moving forward. The responsibility for the empire is mine, not yours, but if you can improve enough then we will share that burden together.”

  “I need as many allies as I can get, and the Raptors are going to become a powerful faction…but a faction is not built quickly. We will buy you time. That is our job. Yours is to grow. Improve. Learn. And the only way you can do that is to train, train, and never stop training. Save for food. So go get some…and run in, slowly. No need to waste another few minutes,” she said, pointing for the distant bunker that led to an underground facility on the otherwise all natural landscape.

  “By your will, Archon,” one of them said as they turned and slowly ran off, pulling together into a loose, two-wide column as they headed across the grassy field. It was a saying that had come from somewhere, and she suspected it was one of the other Archons. Not the 1s or any other trailblazer, but one of the lower level ones. Regardless, the Raptors had picked it up and adopted it as their way of offering respect rather than just saying ‘yes.’

  Sara blew out a long breath, still feeling the effects of her own workout. She let the Raptors disappear over a small rise before she used her Yenmer and took to the sky, then flew high above them, watching the 2x20 column meander over the terrain until they got back to their bunker, then she accelerated and flew off towards the nearest city where her skeet was parked. She’d flown it here from the main Archon training sanctum that was some 1200 miles away. With the skeet she’d be back there inside half an hour for some additional workouts, then she’d head over to one of the maturias where hatching eggs were kept. She still welcomed as many of them into the universe as she could, but with population levels rising fast it just wasn’t possible for her and the other 1s to meet and greet all of them.

  She regretted that, but it was a sign of how fast this faction was growing…and that wasn’t even counting the converted Raptors. Their civilization was being kept somewhat separate, and they were making such huge progress it was surprising all of the 1s. So much so Sara wondered what the V’kit’no’sat had been thinking holding them back as much as they had…and now that Star Force was finally allowing them to live up to their potential, they’d gained their loyalty in a way the V’kit’no’sat never had…as well as adding fuel to their fires of revenge. The more they grew here, the more they hated the V’kit’no’sat for keeping them ignorant and suppressed for so long. Even in their freedom they still only knew the V’kit’no’sat ways, and that now obvious fact combined with the volume of knowledge Star Force was freely sharing made their hate of the V’kit’no’sat even more potent.

  It was having the same effect on Sara. As powerful and galaxy spanning as the V’kit’no’sat were, they were screwing over people for no real gain. If someone hurt someone else for a reason, that was unacceptable. If they did it just to do it, then that was even worse.

  And it looked like they had kept the Rit’ko’sor under their foot. Why Sara didn’t know, but it was clear that these newly converted Raptors were far more powerful than their Rit’ko’sor kin once they learned how to work together as a true team and stop distrusting and backstabbing each other.

  Yeah, Sara had yet one more reason to hate the V’kit’no’sat…and one more advantage for Star Force to wield against them. They’d once looked unbeatable, now they were looking flawed and vulnerable, and the difference wasn’t in them, but rather in Sara and Star Force. They’d grown so wise and experienced that they had a new point of view now.

  If they could survive the super war that was coming, they were going to become the IlClan of empires and show the V’kit’no’sat what ‘dominance’ truly was…and it wasn’t stabbing your competition in the back at every turn possible.

  6

  December 23, 4869

  Anxzor System (Ziviri Region)

  Bujom

  Paul had been engaged in heavy combat against the Ziviri for 27 years, moving through their 1,389 systems at a pace of one every month or two. He’d chosen their toughest systems first, hitting them hard and fast with a group of other high level Archons assisting him led by Riona-111. Sometimes they’d be in the same system, other times he had them moving against others. He saved the toughest assignments for himself, which usually also included Riona, for she was commanding the Raptor Mach’nel that had been sent out to him.

  And Paul was immensely grateful for it. It was saving him so many drones, including a few lives, for this war wasn’t a simple one. The Ziviri were not Star Force’s equal, but they were a worthy opponent and were managing to kill some of his people. Archons, Commandos, aerial pilots and mechwarriors. There hadn’t been any aquatics losses to date, but that was because the Ziviri had little in the way of a water navy. That said, Paul still had aquatics units on many worlds taking advantage of that fact and using the oceans as a point of strength to combat the long ground wars that were taking place after Paul moved on with his naval fleet.

  He would stick around long enough to batter the enemy with orbital bombardment and then did some ground fighting of his own, hopping into a mech or occasionally going hand to hand. He didn’t want to leave any system with there still being doubt who was in control, but fully taking possession of the Ziviri and their worlds took years, even if it was just tracking down rebels running loose in the wilds.

  Most of the Ziviri population was being captured and contained, meaning Paul had an army of support personnel following in the wake of the invasions, but despite what others might have thought this was not a safe operation. He hated losing any people, but this really was a war and Star Force personnel were dying. To date he had lost 1,209, and hopefully that number would not increase any further, but there was no way to know for sure. Some of those losses had been ambush attacks on ‘pacified’ worlds were Paul wasn’t, but those losses still ground on him.

  This was the cost of people not doing their job in the distant past. Threats like the Ziviri should never have been allowed to gain this much strength in the shadow of what The Nexus had been. He could understand the Ziviri rising to power in a relatively unoccupied section of the galaxy, but it happening under The Nexus’s umbrella was just infuriating. All of the people he had lost dealing with this problem would have been alive if The Nexus had done their job, but they hadn’t, and he was having to clean it up.

  It wasn’t fair. The people dying didn’t deserve it, but this is the way the galaxy worked. There was no such thing as a ‘safe’ place to be, even within the heart of Star Force territory. As James T. Kirk had once said, ‘Risk is our business,’ and truer words had never been spoken. Paul and the others went where the trouble
was, and sometimes despite their best efforts some of them still died. And after all the deaths at the hands of the V’kit’no’sat Paul had not become numb to it, thankfully, but losing people in his command was always harder than seeing reports of others dying elsewhere. That was because he was responsible for the battle plans, and in a war like this, he chose when and where to attack.

  He wasn’t picking fights with too few units, but he also didn’t have the luxury of coming in with overwhelming force. If he did, the number of systems he could assault would be limited and he didn’t have the time to go slow. So he had to send enough forces without overdoing it, and he was constantly reassessing his choices. If he had sent a few more would that person have died?

  It was something that haunted him constantly, but he also acknowledged that there were many things he could not control. He didn’t accept that, but he did acknowledge it.

  Even now, with the last battle having been fought and won, he was thinking back and trying to find ways to improve. Not because he could change the past, but if he could find better ways to do things, let alone mistakes he could correct, he could avoid losing more people in the future. Paul wasn’t kicking himself like he used to, for he no longer doubted his own motivations, but he knew the fate of so many others were dependent on him and that he needed to be at the top of his game constantly while always reaching to new heights.

  Without him and the others in Star Force, he could easily see how the galaxy would fall apart. They were holding so much together it looked easy to outsiders. Star Force was the rock that so many depended upon that they just took it for granted…until you came out here and saw what non-Star Force territory was like. But even then people didn’t see the full truth.