Star Force: Excalibur (Star Force Universe Book 41) Read online

  “You expect they will gain ground again?”

  “It is unavoidable. One thing the V’kit’no’sat value more than the Hadarak is us. We will have their full attention and paranoia once we are revealed.”

  “All the more reason never to help us.”

  “What is done is done, and we are not revealed. Zeno’dor was either wise or reckless, but we are still hidden.”

  “Can you hide from gravity drive sensors?” she asked bluntly.

  “We can, but we cannot scan at the same time.”

  “Can you hide from the Hadarak?”

  “No. They sense mass, and we cannot hide that. Our exploration of the Core was never completed due to the density of their minions.”

  “How do they stop you if you stay away from the star?”

  “Many ships were lost trying, but one made it through. They penetrated deep into the Core, but were hounded constantly. Every time they made a jump the gravity signature increased, like a flash that the Hadarak could see at any range. The ship survived by marooning itself in deep space and waiting them out. It was gone for more than 68 years. When it returned we saw the power they possessed, and knew any further attempts at exploration would fail.”

  “What power?”

  “Planet-sized Hadarak containing so many minions that ships could not escape them. They fill the volume like a nebula.”

  “What about magnetic drives?”

  The Zak’de’ron looked at her more closely. “We tried that as well, but mass is still mass. We can only avoid detection by staying far away…too far away for magnetic acceleration.”

  “Do you have another method of making jumps?”

  “None that work. We cannot get good reconnaissance of the Core.”

  “How did you plan on defeating the Hadarak, before the V’kit’no’sat rebelled?”

  “We did not know. We still do not know. What we did know was that we could not do so alone.”

  “Can’t you reproduce fast enough?”

  “Therein lies our disadvantage. We cannot take massive losses and replace them. It is also why we cannot rebuild as fast as we would like.”

  “Why not use drone warships?”

  “Signal lag.”

  “How so?”

  “Evading minions requires precision flight that lag reduces, and with sufficiently sized swarms machines cannot accurately predict their movements. We attempted to use drones, but they fell in combat at far higher rates.”

  “Then you built them wrong.”

  “If you survive your war, we can discuss that matter further, little one…”

  6

  4 hours later…

  “No, no, no,” Kara said, pacing back and forth in front of the Zak’de’ron in her bare feet, leaving tiny sweat prints behind. The incorporation of the new upgrade to her Vorch’nas was having an effect on her body, in addition to the wealth of knowledge now interlinked to her mind, and her internal heat was rising as a side effect. “That doesn’t work.”

  “Enlighten me.”

  “If you’re going for long term strength you have to cultivate the individual, not the race. Short term you can go with cultural templates. We do with the Paladin. But long term they’re not as effective.”

  “You’re used to dealing with races near your own, not those vastly inferior. You keep them as wards, with limited usefulness to your civilization. We have no peers. All races are inferior to us. We cannot groom them as equals. We tried that with the V’kit’no’sat, to uplift them and offer them a path to peerdom, but none of the races succeeded. They advanced, then stabilized at a comfortable level. They did not continue to rise.”

  “Yet you admit to not being that training motivated yourself.”

  “We are not obsessive about it, but we do what is necessary.”

  “And they didn’t?”

  “They wished us to give them more, rather than be grateful for the advancement we had bestowed upon them. They did not understand that we could only take them partway. You are learning this now with your myriad of races, many of whom do not wish to improve.”

  “Which is why we hunt for the individuals within them that do, separate them from the slackers, then take them as far as they can go without that baggage. If you keep them with their race, the association will hold them back.”

  “And if you take out those with the most merit, the race suffers that much more.”

  “The individual should not be burdened with subsidizing the slackers.”

  “How long do you think you can sustain your current pace?” the Zak’de’ron asked.

  “What do you mean?”

  “You lose the best of you to war and continue to annex inferior races. Growth is more than just numbers.”

  “The wider the field we have, the more individuals of merit we can pluck from it.”

  “But the fields have to be managed, and if not sufficiently directed they will take on a direction of their own.”

  “If you didn’t have to remain hidden, how would you proceed? If there were no V’kit’no’sat to avenge yourself again?”

  “We would be selective. Choose those races that were of merit and slowly groom them, utilizing what abilities they have at the onset, and teaching them to be self-sustaining. Direct them when needed and wait. Advancement takes times, and we will not burden ourselves with direct care of the masses.”

  “We do.”

  “And if you continue at this pace, they will overwhelm you.”

  “We’ve got a handle on it.”

  “Not as much as you think.”

  “How much of my memories have you processed?”

  “All of it.”

  “How?”

  “Programming helps us sort and catalog. I can review any of it I wish by subject matter.”

  “Can you do that without a Vorch’nas?”

  “It is a slower process with Ikrid, but yes. I can copy and record for later analysis.”

  “Then tell me your assessment of Ghostblade.”

  Tew’chor hesitated for a moment, and Kara sensed he was pulling up her stolen memories on her Clan for further review.

  “You do not have the industrial muscle necessary for the war that you face, but you also do not have the vulnerability such industry entails. Your strength is mobility. It is also your weakness.”

  “Why?”

  “We know from experience. When we fled to the Rim we fled in a mobile fleet such as yours, harvesting resources on the move and not putting down permanent infrastructure for a long time. We could not build fast enough, and the V’kit’no’sat eventually tracked them down, cornered them with superior numbers, and prevented them from gathering resources. Your Ghostblade requires privacy to function. If you are hounded, that will evaporate and your Clan will starve to death with lack of resources.”

  “Prior to the fall of the planet-based territory then, because I don’t think they’ll be hounding us while there are planets tantalizingly defying them.”

  “Your Clan provides a useful, but limited function. The diversity of strategy does you credit, but it will be insufficient for what you will face.”

  “Even if we decided to backline them?”

  “You do not have the resources for planetary assault, even if you take a Uriti with you.”

  “The V’kit’no’sat have a lot of systems, not all that heavily defended.”

  “All it will take is a small fleet combined with planetary defenses to thwart you, because you will not fight in the most effective way. If you learned, and took a Uriti with you, then you could do sufficient damage to force the V’kit’no’sat to deploy a wider defense and draw some resources away from their invasion fleet.”

  “Define ‘effective.’”

  “Kill them quickly, wherever you can. You do not have the resources to take them prisoner, so you must bombard their planets using the Uriti and destroy them without mercy. Cleanse their planets as they did yours. I need not tell you how such a process works, for y
ou are intimately aware of it.”

  “We won’t fight that way.”

  “Then you have no hope of backlining the invasion fleet in a sufficient enough way to cause them to care. They will be suffering so many losses against your other Uriti that whatever small damage you can do in their systems will be but a grazing hit. They do not like taking losses against those they consider inferior, and they go to great lengths to avoid them, but when they face a formidable opponent they change tactics and expect losses. They have suffered so many against the Hadarak they know well how to fight in this manner, and once they enter it the bloodshed will commit them to the destruction of their target. Nothing else will consume them. Backlining will not work unless you do the most damage possible.”

  Kara started pacing again, thinking hard. Tew’chor was answering a lot more questions than she’d expected him to.

  “Your lesser races cannot help you,” he added. “You must fight with your elite, and you hobble your elite with so many resources being diverted to the needy masses. You do not have the time to assimilate them all.”

  “What would do you then, in our position?”

  “Pour most of your resources into drone production, and stockpile them so you have sufficient numbers to blunt the initial attack. The V’kit’no’sat will try to use massive fleets to overwhelm your planetary defenses and minimize their ship losses in doing so.”

  “If they mass their fleets, the Uriti will devastate them.”

  “Only if they attack systems where the Uriti are.”

  Kara stopped pacing and looked up at the giant gold head that had what looked like smooth, aerodynamic spikes flowing off backwards.

  “Typically they fight in your face, strength against strength. Are you suggesting they will avoid the hardest fights?”

  “If they cannot find a weakness in your Uriti to exploit, then they will fight you where the Uriti are not. They would be insanely foolish to do otherwise, and battle experience against the Hadarak has taught them many hard lessons in the absence of our leadership. They will avoid the Uriti unless they have the ability to destroy them in a more efficient way. If they do not, you have a significant chance of bleeding their fleets to such a level that they cannot take your territory even if they destroy most of the Uriti.”

  “But not all?”

  “You must retain some as a deterrent. If they destroy all of them, they will win far into the future. The V’kit’no’sat can replace ships faster than you can. It will simply be a matter of time before they amass another fleet and return to finish what they started. You must retain the Uriti. You cannot treat them as being expendable. Planets are less valuable. The Uriti are priceless.”

  “Which is why I’d expect the V’kit’no’sat to target them first.”

  “They cannot fight the Uriti like Hadarak while your fleets operate with them. They can’t deliver enough damage fast enough, and the Uriti have far more firepower than the Hadarak. The combination is too potent, so they must remove your fleets before they can try killing them. If not, the cost to the V’kit’no’sat would be too high and there would be no guarantee of success, for the Uriti could escape to a star and recover inside. The Uriti must be isolated in order to be destroyed.”

  “So they go after our planets where the Uriti are not, and hope we don’t move them there quickly enough?”

  “More likely they will stall in other locations, pinning your Uriti in place while other fleets do the hammering. You only have 74, so if they assault 75 systems with massive fleets, one will have to fight without Uriti. If the Uriti leave to assist, then they hit the system abandoned.”

  “That will stretch them thin.”

  “Not if they bring a large enough armada. They have the ships to do it, even without pulling resources off the Hadarak front. It will leave the rest of their empire lightly defended, but there are few who can take advantage of that considering the strength of the planetary defenses.”

  “How many ships are we talking about?”

  “Upwards of 20 million, and their vessels are much larger than yours.”

  Kara closed her eyes, cringing at even trying to think of what that sort of an invasion would look like. “When’s the last time they deployed that many?”

  “The Rit’ko’sor rebellion.”

  “Have they ever used that many ships against an exterior opponent?”

  “Other than the Hadarak, they have not. They have used more than half that number against the Dak’vis, but nothing on the level that you will face. Then again, you are not truly an exterior opponent either.”

  Kara recognized that name, from a race that no longer existed, for the V’kit’no’sat had wiped them out long ago back when the Zak’de’ron still led them.

  “Can we ambush them enroute?”

  “I expect them to be in position and waiting the day the truce expires. You would have to attack before then, and I sense that is not an option for you.”

  “In position where?”

  “Beyond your borders.”

  “So they’ll still have to travel to their target systems, and they can’t move that many ships very fast.”

  “They will most likely use multiple routes. They will not use a single jumplane.”

  “If we attack them in transit with the Uriti, will they run or fight?”

  “They will run, unless their arrogance have made them truly stupid.”

  “And if we attack without the Uriti?”

  “They will fight and destroy you.”

  “They will be vulnerable at the start of each incoming jump. If we can get there ahead of them, we can do significant damage before we have to run.”

  “They will not make it easy to track them.”

  “How?”

  “They will hunt down and destroy your scout ships in multiple systems, letting them choose which to come through under a fog of uncertainty.”

  “Our ships are as fast as theirs.”

  “They have their gravity drive sensor. They can lay in wait and jump yours when they arrive. You will be driven away or destroyed, or at the very least have your communications network equipment destroyed. If that occurs, they can bring their fleets through before you have a chance to report back and summon an ambush fleet. The V’kit’no’sat know how to move massive fleets quickly and quietly.”

  Kara smiled as an idea hit her.

  “Your mannerism bespeaks an advantage. What are you thinking?”

  “I was thinking that if the V’kit’no’sat were passing through a system and a Uriti happened to be hiding inside a star, it could come out and sit on their incoming jumpline and destroy them as they entered.”

  “You would have to get it there undetected, and your control ships as well, but it is a viable possibility if you can predict their route. I would recommend a system one jump away from a potential target, but do not expect to be able to move Uriti around without their scouts knowing of it. Until you can scan using your ghostbane technology, expect them to have a presence in all your systems.”

  “Do you know a better way of detecting ships jumping into a system?”

  “Yes.”

  “Care to share?”

  The Zak’de’ron lowered his head and twisted his neck so that his eyes were slightly lower to the ground than Kara’s, with his snout almost dragging on the deck as it came within a meter of her tiny body.

  “I have put you in a bad position by stealing your memories. It was necessary and you had left an avenue for me to do so. If you had discovered the technological block I would have demanded you lower it when we met, for I had to know the nature of your civilization and your intention for the Rit’ko’sor. We do not want you destroyed. We very much want you to continue to be a problem for the V’kit’no’sat, and even if they did not exist your civilization would be considered a welcome neighbor. We cannot be allies, given our need for secrecy, but we are not enemies.”

  “Your codes and vital procedures,” Tew’chor continued, “I have alrea
dy deleted. The rest of your memories I will keep for myself and not share with the other Zak’de’ron unless it becomes necessary. The intrusion does not beget trust, and I wish to make amends for that. We have already trusted you with the knowledge of our existence, and you have not betrayed it. If you were to do so, the V’kit’no’sat would most likely ignore you and come hunt us. You could save Star Force, for a time, by revealing us.”

  “You know we won’t.”

  “Indeed, it is not your way to betray, unless first betrayed. Understand, little one, I had to make sure Star Force would not become another V’kit’no’sat. I am convinced that will not happen, but I still urge caution with the Rit’ko’sor. Never the less, I have behaved as an ally should not. You are not my servant, so I will honor your request in compensation.”

  Kara raised an eyebrow, and not because of the dragon breath blowing in her face. “How so?”

  “I will give you a technology that even the V’kit’no’sat do not possess. It will make it almost impossible to enter a jumpline so warded,” he said, with Kara feeling new data suddenly appearing in the part of her mind that was actually the Vorch’nas. “It will require a station at the jumppoint, but even we cannot get one of our vessels past it unless we enter at such a slow speed to make the travel non-functional.”

  “A Dragon’s Tooth?” Kara asked, seeing the name in mind’s eye.

  “A name I have fashioned from your distant past. I find it odd that your mythology would remember us and not the V’kit’no’sat.”

  “You’re not the only avians.”

  “How many others breathe fire?”

  “The Les’i’kron,” Kara pointed out the obvious.

  “They are a remnant of us, and yet even through that remnant we were remembered and not the V’kit’no’sat. It is an irony that we find highly appropriate.”

  “How do you know so much about us? Have you penetrated our relay grid?”

  “No. We have tried, but your communications system is secure. We cannot break it without making physical contact with your equipment, and out of respect we have not.”