Star Force: Temple Wars Read online

  When they finally arrived Plausious saw the catch on the receiving arrays in his Essence vision, then the transfer down through the Essence-infused machinery until they popped back into reality outside a random building in the wilderness in front of a wall that gave no indication it was anything other than stone blocks.

  “Stretch your wings and tell me what you see,” Plausious said, mentally interfacing with the hidden portal and using its link with the Temple systems to log the presence of the Ren’mak and have it registered as a permanent non-combatant the way all Neofan were…meaning that even if it attacked a Caretaker unit they would not respond aggressively.

  Plausious’s friend said he couldn’t see anything other than trees, but eventually one of the Temple’s machines rose out of a patch of nearby forest and came their direction, resulting in a warning squawk.

  “I summoned it,” Plausious said, flying up to the Ren’mak’s position just in case this didn’t work due to reprogramming of the individual units before, during, or after their construction. “It will scan you and log you as an ally, otherwise every one like this will hunt you down assuming you are part of a Hadarak invasion.”

  “Did you build all this?”

  “Yes we did. It took a very long time, but it’s a place the Hadarak should never be able to find. And if they do, there are an army of these machines to fight them, and more machines to make replacements for these when they are destroyed. That is why you must be labeled as an ally,” he said as the floating Caretaker unit came closer but didn’t stop. Instead it did a flyby and left, sampling a bit of the Ren’mak’s surface tissue with an energy probe that he didn’t even feel.

  “Confirm scan upload,” Plausious ordered.

  The Caretaker frozen in position and displayed a hologram detailing the Ren’mak’s genetic code and other unique identifiers such as blood vessel location, retinal scan, and size dimensions. All would be cataloged and updated as needed, but as of now the Caretaker was listing the Ren’mak to have equal status to a Neofan…meaning the Temple itself would never willingly harm them, and would act to defend them unless they were in combat against another Neofan. In which case they would stay out of the way and observe.

  A flick of a mental command and the Caretaker flew off, leaving Plausious and his friend flying over the treetops with the Ren’mak having to constantly flap to do so while the Reignor remained perfectly still.

  “It is done. You can move freely here now, but the other Neofan are still a threat, so stay with me.”

  “Always. Where do we go?”

  “This is not where Truven will be, nor the Diem. This Temple was taken from Star Force, and they will be on guard for an assault. Our portal arrival will already have been noticed, so I choose to stay here and let them come to us…but let us choose a better spot if we have to fight.”

  “Fight in air or on ground?”

  “Ground, then into the air later if we need to.”

  The Ren’mak took off flying, going straight up to get a better vantage point, and Plausious let him go as he stared across the landscape that very gently curved up rather than down.

  “It has been a lifetime,” he whispered to himself. “We have done some truly grand things, but I am still ashamed to bear the name of Neofan. I must cleanse this Temple and claim it for the lightside, along with as many of my wayward brethren as I can. The others must be sent away, for the only other option is their death…but no. Star Force would find another way, and did, but I do not have the luxury of time or resources. I cannot become a prison keeper, but I also cannot become a murderer out of convenience. If they choose to fight, that makes my choice easier, but every one that dies is a failure on my part to assimilate them. I do not know how Star Force does it so easily.”

  “I see a landing pad. Wide on top. Flat. Can fight there,” the Ren’mak reported, its voice barely audible from so high.

  Plausious flew up to him and confirmed the sighting…barely. “You have good eyes.”

  “And you don’t?”

  “I can barely see it, but you are correct. It is a good place, and I sense it is empty.”

  “How can you sense what you cannot see well?”

  “A trick of Essence. Come. Let’s prepare for their arrival,” the Reignor said, flying off towards the bit of Caretaker infrastructure on the horizon.

  It took two days before the other Neofan arrived, and they came together, more than 1,000 of them on barges in a large convoy across the forest tops, then encircling the landing platform as the Caretaker units coming and going were dispersed by the arriving Neofan to disappear inside or fly off to other locations where they would be out of the way.

  One barge came in from their floating circle and docked with the edge of the landing platform, allowing 14 Neofan to walk off, 12 of which were military escorts guarding the pair in the center, one of which Plausious was quite familiar with.

  “Surprised to see me, Fero?” Plausious said in the Neofan language when the pair walked up near him then stopped and just stared.

  “I am trying to determine if you are a clone or some other subterfuge of Star Force. And that Hadarak…”

  “It is under my protection. Any who harm it will die. Is that clear?”

  “Why bring it here?”

  “It is of value to me, but only alive. Did you not find the tale of my death odd?”

  “I did, but you were behaving oddly before you left. The Star Force taint is still upon you.”

  “Why did Truven invade?”

  “It was a miscalculation. The Vargemma should have tipped the scales and allowed us to seize all the Temples. We did not anticipate Star Force being able to corrupt them…nor you.”

  “You claim I am corrupted. How then would you describe the Diem?”

  “They ensure our purity.”

  “By violating our laws?”

  “Is that what truly happened? They showed us pictures of your death. How am I to know you are really Plausious?”

  The Reignor’s chin tilted up slightly, and suddenly a Men’shua ensued between the pair. A telepathic struggle that they had often undertaken to test each other’s strength, and as a means to teach the younger Neofan his weaknesses and how to guard against them being exploited.

  Plausious knew all his weak spots, and went for them in series as Fero tried counterattacks where his former master was the least strong. It was better than any genetic fingerprint, for a clone or imposter would not have the same mental makeup, nor the familiarity with the other’s mind, and when Fero finally succumbed to the superior onslaught, Plausious sensed he was convinced, but his companion was not as she tried to intervene and stop the momentary subjugation, but her skills were far less than either of the males, making Plausious wonder why she was here.

  Fero answered in a manner she could not overhear, saying that she was a watcher assigned by Reignor Truven to ensure that the Neofan in this Temple did not become contaminated by their contact with Star Force. And if they did, she would deal with the contamination by whatever means necessary to protect the rest of the Neofan.

  Plausious scowled, and to Fero’s dismay he pointed to the female and lifted her off the ground in a stranglehold.

  “You let this insanity persist?” he accused Fero, as well as the others in the barges looking on as the escorts reached out with their own telepathy to break Plausious’s hold on her…and succeeded.

  She dropped back to her feet, with an evil look in her eyes.

  “He is full of taint. Kill him before he infects the rest of us.”

  In that moment Plausious had a choice to make of how to handle this situation. He knew Star Force would handle it in a different manner, and probably be more successful in the long run, but the Reignor knew his people and their culture better than Davis’s empire did, and other than imprisoning them all indefinitely and claiming the young to train properly, he knew there would be no willing conversions. The Neofan would become a burden long before they began to be of use, and Pla
usious knew this galaxy did not have that much time.

  Without even sending the Ren’mak off his shoulder, Plausious waved a hand in the direction of the Overseer…and cut her head off with an Essence blade that he extended out across the gap between them with her feeble attempts to stop it being negated easily with a suppression technique.

  He did it so fast the guards were caught dumbstruck as her head fell and rolled across the ground while her body remained rigid and standing for several seconds before finally tipping backwards and falling with her Gorvaj catching it and propping it up halfway as they too went rigid.

  “Unless you all want to die,” he bellowed vocally and telepathically, “you will abandon this madness. There is no taint in myself or in Star Force. It is a lie of the Diem, just as my death was. You know the rules. A Reignor cannot be exiled unwillingly. So if I stand before you now, how can the Diem be intact? How can they be untainted if they break the very basic tenants of our society that have kept us from killing each other into extinction like the younger races. Where is the respect for those that have lived millions of years and will live more? They left me on that Hadarak world to die without even the benefit of a warning. No questions were asked. No review was made. I was betrayed. So tell me truly, who is tainted? Me? Or the Diem?”

  No one spoke, and no one moved, but Plausious sensed many on the verge of attacking.

  “Explain how the Diem can be untainted. Any of you? If you are about to move against me, let it be for solid reasoning and not unintelligent zealotry. How can the Diem be truthful if I am still alive? How can they guard our society when they break its laws? They are supposed to guard against the law breaking, and yet it is they who do it? Answer me, Fero.”

  “We saw your body eaten by the Hadarak.”

  “Then how am I here now?”

  “I do not know.”

  “Insufficient response.”

  “You do not understand the…changes that have occurred since your death.”

  “I can guess. How many Neofan have been killed for this taint rather than exiled?”

  “The Diem said it cannot be allowed to spread across the galaxy. Exiling the tainted would contaminate others.”

  Plausious’s eyes filled with rage. “How many?”

  “Thousands,” Fero said, breaking eye contact in shame. “And you will be too for killing her.”

  “Not by you,” Plausious said, spitting the words out as he stared down the others. “I am Reignor Plausious, leader of House Atriark and now sovereign ruler of all Neofan by my decree. I am betrayed by the Diem, but that betrayal has opened my eyes to existing faults within our race. I have rid myself of those faults and become stronger than I once was by embracing the lightside. Star Force exposed me to it, but it wasn’t until I was marooned alone on a Hadarak world that I discovered what the lightside truly was. It is superiority incarnate. And that superiority is what defeated your attempt to dispossess Star Force of these Temples. Rather than accept this and learn from it, the Diem has labeled it a taint. This is a lie designed to hide the truth. The Diem deceives you, and I will not stand for it.”

  That was all the guards could take, and two of them fired their weapons at him…beam weapons emanating from staffs…but Plausious caught and deflected both beams using an overlapping Essence technique as he reached out and simultaneous grasped the weapons and pulled them from their grasp…only to snap them in half before them and toss the broken technology to the ground at their feet.

  But they didn’t stop there, and began a series of Essence attacks with the other guards joining in, but Fero didn’t move. That saved his life as the Ren’mak flew up above Plausious’s head as the Neofan defended himself from the multiple attacks, then it launched its own Essence wave down upon the group.

  It was little more than a distraction, a simple blinding shroud designed to black out their senses and easily countered if you were skilled enough…but it required them to switch their attention off the Reignor momentarily, and because they did not expect the Ren’mak to have any Essence abilities, the blind hit them with full effect.

  Before most of them could swipe it away with a cleansing wave, Plausious had sprinted forward and physically attacked two of them, breaking bone with blows practiced against much harder Hadarak bodies to perfection, and adding Essence attacks on top of them as he did not keep his distance in this fight, preferring to be within melee range and using the guards’ bodies as barriers against the others’ attacks.

  Fero stood there, not attacking but also not helping the guards, as Plausious broke all of them in such efficient and feral fashion that the former Reignor ended up standing in front of Fero with his back to them as they crawled on the ground with what limbs they had remaining. Several had been tore off completely, with others smashed beyond recognition, and at least some had their necks broken, for they were not moving at all.

  Plausious was angry, and Fero could sense it, but he was standing perfectly still demonstrating the control a proper Neofan required, as he looked at the barges beyond.

  “I have seen the Endgame,” he told them all. “My preborn knowledge has shown me that we are nearly upon it, and it is not what we were promised. Only lightside power can trigger it, and Star Force is about to do so. When they do, all who are darkside will come to them and try to stop them. Just as you have already done. Star Force will be destroyed, or they will succeed and trigger a new race to be spawned by the lifesprings. That is what the Endgame does, and it has happened before in the distant past. But it also brings destruction upon the galaxy it occurs in, how I do not know. When the Endgame occurs, the Neofan will be destroyed. I have seen this in many ways, and not just in this galaxy, but everywhere…though I have told no one before now. Our race is over if we do not ascend to the lightside. Our past actions have tainted us, and I am here to remove the taint and give us a chance to survive what is coming. The universe is about to replace us, as it has replaced countless other races throughout the ages. We will only persist through the coming Endgame if we are worthy, and right now we are not. I have to make us ready. I have to make us worthy. That is my responsibility as a Reignor, and if I fail, we will all soon die.”

  Plausious looked around, sensing those on the barges were of mixed feeling. Many were ready to attack him, but some were now fearful, for his vision ability was why he had been elevated to Reignor long ago and they respected it more than they did him.

  “How many races have we discovered the remnants of?” he demanded. “Races more advanced than us who were destroyed by means unknown. The universe is littered with their rubble, and we will be no different. Star Force, for all it has accomplished, doesn’t have the strength to survive the Endgame on their own. They will fall too, though I hope I am wrong about that. I did not see the Diem’s betrayal coming. And I did not see our obvious flaws throughout my entire life. But I see them now, and we have a window of opportunity for redemption. It is narrow, but if we act fast we can save our race and save Star Force. Only together will have a chance to survive the Endgame. They are the key to our survival, and we to them. Not to join their empire. But to support it from the outside. To take the brunt of the attacks that are soon to come. You do not see it, but Truven’s invasion was one such attack. Completely illogical, but you all were compelled to follow his orders. And why? Why did you do that? Why did the Diem?”

  “Because you are tainted with the darkside, and it will compel you to attack the light. The Neofan are not as dark as others, but we are still tainted, as I was before my betrayal. I no longer am. Those who wish to follow me into the small chance of a future we have left, you may do so without reprisal for past actions. We have no time for such things. Those of you who do not wish to follow this path, you will leave this galaxy and not return until such a time as you are willing to set aside what you believe it means to be Neofan and learn to become better.”

  “The rest of you who choose to do neither. Those of you who will stay and resist my return to power. I hav
e no time to coddle you as Star Force would. I must act swiftly or our race will be destroyed. And like this arrogant scum,” he said, gesturing to the decapitated female, “if you do not join me or leave this galaxy, you will meet your doom.”

  “It won’t work, Plausious,” Fero said sadly. “The old days are gone. We are now scared of contact with outsiders, and any who do not share the proper safety measures are purged. They will not follow you,” he said as the barges began to drift in closer to the platform.

  “And what of you, Fero?”

  “I had to watch you die once. I won’t watch a second time,” he said, turning his back on Plausious and walking to his barge alone, leaving the wounded guards where they lay as the other barges began making contact and disgorging their troops.

  “So be it,” Plausious declared, warning the Ren’mak telepathically that this was the moment they had planned for. “I’ll take you all on…”

  7

  Fero didn’t look as he drifted away on his barge alone. He heard the pops and hisses of Essence combat going off behind him, but his gaze held firmly ahead. He couldn’t save the former Reignor from his fate now, and he wished that Plausious had been wiser than just charging his way in here making ludicrous demands. His exile must have truly driven him crazy, but his killing of the Overseer was a blessing in disguise, for she had been a rope around Fero’s neck for some time now and he was glad to be free of it, if only temporarily.

  The Diem would replace her with another, but that could take a few years. Until then he would hold command of this Temple without having to be second guessed…but what the former Reignor warned about was resonating within him. He felt like the Neofan were on the road to destruction, but having it plainly stated was still a shock. The debacle of the Temple invasions had made many question Truven, but the Diem were stepping in to silence any dissent and Fero was off better keeping quiet than drawing their ire.