Star Force: Zealot (SF87) (Star Force Origin Series) Read online

  Two of them exploded under return fire from the command ship, but the more strikes that hit and coated the shields with residue the slower it got…up until it dropped its shields entirely and got another boost of speed as it shed its shackles.

  The hull got coated with a few hits, but then weaker shields reformed and began catching the incoming fire again that gradually built up and slowed it down a second time as the drones from the trailing jumpships finally rejoined Riley and dove into the 293 Trinx ships that had snuck up on them.

  A myriad of weaponsfire broke out between them, but the big beams kept firing on the command ship until the dampening effect was so great that the Zeus lost all maneuvering ability as its gravity drives were denied their grip on the distant gravity wells. It coasted onward, gaining ground on Paul’s fleet that was still racing towards it, but the much larger Trinx fleet coming up from the star was going to get to them first.

  “I got ganked,” he told Paul unnecessarily. “These beams are laden with IDF. I’m dead in the water.”

  “Looks like they’re going to have 3 minutes of alone time with you. Stall as much as you can…” Paul said direly as something else happened on the battlemap. Suddenly several ships within the allied fleet were showing activity beyond the chase they’d all instituted immediately upon seeing the Trinx heading for the Zeus. It took him a moment to realize what was happening, and even then he didn’t fully understand.

  “Looks like the Dati are going to get to you first,” Paul commented as Riley was now engaged in a fierce battle with the ambushing Trinx fleet that was going to end up very one sided if allowed to persist on its own as half his drones caught up and surrounded the command ship while the others hammered the Trinx ships in a melee that was about to cost the enemy every ship they’d sent out to delay them.

  Riley split his attention, focusing on the contacts that had somehow shot out ahead of the rest of the fleet. He saw the last few spurt ahead as several of the Dati ships were clustered together along with the rest of the fleet, with the gaggle of ships all accelerating at their best speeds and not staying in formation. It was chaotic, but they all knew that every second counted and it looked like the Chamra were the fastest of the bunch.

  Save for the Dati when that clump of ships suddenly broke apart with half flying forward in a surge of speed and the other half moving backways and almost colliding with other ships. Somehow they had a system rigged where they could throw each other, and for the force that sent them forward there was an equal and opposite reaction that sent the others backward. Add in their continual acceleration and the Dati ships, in considerably reduced number, were going to get to Riley before the rest of the Trinx did…but at far too great a speed.

  “They’re going to overshoot unless they can spurt in reverse,” Riley commented as he personally sighted a Trinx ship with a Keema battery and saw the beam go in one side of its red hull and out the other.

  “I think that’s exactly what they’re going to do,” Paul said, his voice tight. “Use the Trinx debris to buy you some time.”

  “We can’t…oh, right. My bad,” Riley said, ordering his drones and jumpship crews to grab and haul whatever bits they could when they were done shooting and nudge it into the shrinking gap between the approaching Trinx fleet and the Zeus if only to reduce some of the soon to be incoming weaponsfire.

  When the Dati ships got right up to them and ready to overshoot their little clusters broke again, sending half of them on past even faster than before while braking the other half into range where they could slow down enough on their own and drop into a position between the Star Force ships and the Trinx…but they didn’t sit there and wait to be attacked. Instead they turned and suicidally headed towards the approaching Trinx fleet that, while stretched out in a long line, was numbering over 6,000 vessels already with that count increasing as they continued rounding the edge of the star.

  Meanwhile Riley finished off the last of the Trinx ambush force as he cycled his shields again, getting rid of most of the IDF inhibitor save for what was on his hull and finding that most of his gravity drives were restored. He used them to reposition slightly, with the Trinx only 24 seconds away now and him wanting to make use of the few pieces of debris that had been flung out ahead of them.

  As he watched, the Dati opened fire on the Trinx but didn’t hold to their head on attack. They swerved wide while firing, lacing the passing ships and daring them to break and chase them. The Trinx returned fire but did not alter course.

  In response the Dati slowed and reversed momentum, gradually accelerating to speed to match the breaking Trinx wave and pulling even, at which point they turned hard and cut across the Trinx lines, firing small projectiles into the gaps between the ships that detonated into giant energy nets that draped over several ships at once and held firm for a few seconds until they passed through the Trinx shields and disintegrated when they hit the hull. That disruption flowed in a slow chain reaction throughout the net, resulting in its disappearance a few seconds later.

  But the Trinx ships that had been hit no longer were protected by energy shields.

  The smaller Dati ships swarmed them, pummeling their hulls relentlessly with as much disdain for the others attacking them as the Trinx were showing for all other ships aside from their primary target. By the time that section of Trinx ships hit the main battle that was growing quickly, the Dati had eliminated 6 vessels with another 4 nearly ready to fall. It wasn’t much compared to the vast numbers in play, but it did extend the survivability of the Zeus for a few more seconds as the leading Chamra vessels finally caught up and decelerated hard to land their high volume, low surface area technological dirt clods of vessels into the Trinx fleet as they tore through the Star Force drones trying to get to the command ship.

  The Trinx vessels were of three designs….basic warships, vassal warships, and heavy warships…though some of them had been reconstructed into troop transports without giving any exterior clues as to their purpose. One of those basic warships flew along with the flow of Trinx ships and dove around a massive Chamra interdictor as a few others stopped to engage it for the simple reason that there was nowhere else to go with so many other Trinx vessels blocking their maneuvering possibilities.

  The troop transport continued to fly forward, firing at targets when able but not deterring from its course. Other Trinx warships plowed the road for it without being obvious about their intentions, fighting their way through Star Force drones and into the short gap around the command ship that was a free fire area. There the troop transport hit a wall and all but stopped until its engines increased power to push through the energy field that was all but pinning it in place along with several other ships as the Star Force vessel fired on them.

  More Trinx vessels made their way in, stressing the field, and suddenly half of them darted forward, completely passing the command ship and flying out of weapons range behind it. The troop ship was still stuck and motoring closer as a warship dipped in front of it and physically rammed a drone that was coming in to block it.

  A few meters more and the troop ship was past the energy field and only a kilometer away from the hull as blast of energy hit it and tore a chunk of the ship apart even after the shields absorbed most of the blast. A few seconds later and the prow of the ship hit the Star Force shields that were getting weaker by the second as more and more Trinx ships got through the defense lines while the bulk of the allied fleet was only just now arriving to try and peel them off.

  For whatever reason this troop ship survived while many others were blown to bits at pointblank range, lasting long enough for its forward armor plates to blow off and reveal the shield penetrators beneath them. They pressed into the invisible energy barrier and gradually forced a hole to form, barely two meters wide, then slowly they peeled it apart wide enough for the entire ship to slip through.

  It never made it to the hull through. A seldom used rail gun battery tipped over as much as it could and fired a slug into the
side of the ship, punching a hole through one of the power generators and cutting the power to a third of the ship. Subsequent slugs did additional damage and took the ship out of commission.

  A few tractor beams held onto it, latching it in place to be used as a physical block while the shields reformed around all the little gaps it had created, but two Trinx ships behind it fired on their own wrecked vessel and blew it apart enough that another troop ship was able to dive into the gaping hole, bypassing the command ship’s shields surrounding it, and pushing through the wreckage down to the pristine grey hull beneath with the wreckage actually acting as an additional layer of protection for it.

  When the forward section of the troop ship got within range it tore through both the remains of the Trinx vessel and the Star Force plates with cutters designed for such a task. Likewise there were other breach points across the giant donut as Trinx ships made their way through and attached like ticks that were slowly burning access points inside. But just as many that got through were pulled off by the ship’s weaponry or the nearby drones that were sometimes making suicide runs to sheer them off when weaponsfire alone wasn’t sufficient.

  One Trinx ‘tick’ was sheered clear off by a Sety vessel that got within a few hundred meters of it and fired a beam directly through the nose, subsequently hitting and weakening the command ship’s shields on the other side, but ensuring that this Trinx vessel could deliver no more damage to the Zeus.

  But more kept coming in and too many for the command ship to hold out against, for a lot of the incoming Trinx vessels were diverting slightly to intercept and peel off the support so more of the sporadic troop ships could make it to the target.

  Eventually one did get through, burning into the hull and breaking through the armored plates just before it was destroyed. With that opening noted, a Dati ship flew in and sat over top of it until several more Trinx ships destroyed it and forced another troop ship into position, docking against the hull and sending a spurt of soldiers down through the breach.

  They were all vassals, the robotic Trinx infantry, that began blasting and cutting apart the underside of the armor to make room for more to come in as that troop ship was pried off by a Jonstar ram. The few dozen vassals that were deep enough in the command ship to survive kept digging, tearing out components and shoving them off into space to make room for the next one to fight its way into position.

  When it arrived it was able to deliver far more, all of which quickly continued to pry out components and make additional room up until they breached one of the maintenance areas. Atmosphere flew out, pushing several vassals into space while the other ones latched onto broken equipment and held tight until three of them welded themselves into place around the hole and together emitted a containment shield that stopped the atmospheric flow.

  After that the others passed through the small opening and got their feet on deck plates, immediately transitioning into combat programming but finding no one nearby, nor would they for more than 20 minutes as they were the in the far exterior of the ship where the crew only went to make repairs or perform maintenance. That gave the vassals free run of the area and they quickly set up a perimeter to allow for more and more troops to enter, eventually with a few Trinx themselves accompanying the robotic troops.

  They came in knowing that their minds could become compromised, but that wouldn’t affect the vassals. They were programmed not to take orders from the Trinx with them unless they fell within standard protocols, for there were concerns that the Archons could do more than just freeze their minds. No, they were here to supplement the vassals and do reconnaissance that they could feed to the rest of the fleet, adapting as needed to however the ship’s crew decided to put up a fight.

  Destroying this ship was an option, and the backup plan, but their primary objective was to take it and the Chixzon intact…or if the Chixzon couldn’t be captured, at least secure the technology that it was using to control the Hamoriti. Even if it was encoded, given enough time the Trinx would figure it out, and they could keep the Hamoriti suppressed as they had been doing as long as needed up until the time came when they could end this threat and gain their power for themselves.

  After so many years of dutiful service, the idea of the latter felt as just compensation for their loyalty to the Ancients’ legacy and the Trinx boarding the command ship and those dying in the ships making such a feat possible were fully committed to that end. Star Force could not be trusted with the Hamoriti, and they would take that control from them one way or another, no matter how many of them had to die in the process.

  That was the oath their race had sworn long ago, and they were not about to abandon it now that their fealty had been rewarded with a possible solution to the inevitable doom that they had stubbornly resisted for millennia.

  9

  Veronica Rith stood in the equipment room along with the other 7 Knights onboard the Zeus. While they liked crewing onboard Star Force’s navy ships and handling the odd jobs required of them, sitting and doing nothing when the ship was in battle was annoying, making the current beating they were taking all but unbearable. They watched a holographic map of the battle taking place around the ship and saw all the damage the hull was taking in addition to the destruction of so many drones and allied ships trying to keep the Trinx off the command ship.

  They also saw the breaching ships sucking on the hull like ticks. They didn’t know what they were doing for sure, fearing that they would be sending bombs inside the armor to shred the interior of the ship. The Knights would be safe within the armored core, but the bulk of the ship that allowed it to move and fight would not be. They might live, but they’d be dead in the water and little more than debris waiting for a rescue that might not be coming considering how many enemy ships were pouring in around them.

  Then there was also the possibility that the Trinx were going to pound the Zeus until there was nothing left of it, and armored core or not, eventually they’d get through to the crew unless others intervened.

  Suddenly each of their HUDs lit up with orders along with an automated message playing. Veronica didn’t have her helmet on, so instead another hologram materialized in front of her eyes with the neck of her armor sending out a tendril that connected up to her left ear.

  “Intruder alert. Enemy troops have boarded the ship. Rendezvous at provided waypoints for combat,” the computerized voice said evenly as a position on the edge of the Zeus’ armored core was indicated.

  The Knight next to Veronica punched his own hand in anticipation and anger, but none of them said a word as they filed out. All of them were eager to get into the fight, but the fact that the Trinx had boarded their flagship was equally pissing them off.

  Commando Sans Brett ducked to a knee behind a chunk of machinery in one of the maintenance wings deep into the outer ring of the command ship as a zap of energy flashed over his head from one of the mechanized infantry that had invaded the ship. The ‘clankers,’ as they’d been labeled by Star Force a few months earlier, had decent armor plating that took a lot of hits to get through, but they were dumb as hell. When they had numbers, however, they were very dangerous and the few commandos with Sans were fighting on the withdrawal after making contact with this group as they pressed their way through the ship while stopping periodically to sabotage equipment.

  Sans returned fire with a quick sniping shot from his plasma rifle, then pulled back behind a bulkhead as his shields got cooked. With his eye line momentarily off the attackers, he saw a mass of white armor coming up behind them and got a ping on his battlemap a split second later.

  The huge white shield of the Knight was held up in front of him taking hits as the commandos dropped into file behind the blocker and Sans did the same as soon as they passed, grateful for the help. They ran up to the clankers and the Knight punched one with the shield itself as a burn mark became visible in it as the enemy weaponsfire began to eat through.

  The tall machine staggered, then a shoulder added to
the back side of the shield toppled them both over as the commandos unloaded into the clankers at point blank range.

  The Knight released the shield and darted forward, tackling another clanker around the legs and driving it backwards into a side wall. It lowered a hand and shot into the Knight’s shielded back a moment before the oversized Human lifted the machine off its feet and spun it around slowly before a short toss sent it on its head and the Knight’s knee landed in its back. Sans saw the Knight pulled out a weapon and pump a repeated salvo of plasma hits into its back until it burnt through the armor and eventually killed the machine.

  Meanwhile he was shooting others and getting quite a few dings in his own armor. A few more shots and he had to fall back, giving himself time to regenerate shields. As he did so a flash of green flew past and his battlemap tagged the blur as an Archon ranger. With him came orders, and Sans pulled back and circled around to the hallway one section over, running to get into position while also giving his shields enough time to snap back into position over his dirty white armor that seemed inconsequential compared to the gleaming Knight.

  He had a lot of running to do, for the ship was split up into sections that had a lot of machinery in them and the access ways were limited. Halfway there he came across someone else, not a machine, but an armored individual with two headtails and a black visor over its face. As soon as it saw him it fired a ruby red bolt that hit him in the center of his chest, then it spun around and ran fast as he dodged to the left in anticipation of a second shot.

  Sans tagged the intruder on the battlemap then headed back to the flanking maneuver the Archon had indicated.

  Veronica sprinted for all she was worth, having dropped her shield long ago and had her weaponry on her back so her arms could swing free and hard. She rounded a corner nearly skidding into the far wall as her right foot lost traction, but an outstretched hand caught and redirected her momentum as she came back within sight of the swaying pair of headtails ahead of her. The Trinx, she assumed, had just gunned down an Archon and ran. She’d taken off after it and nearly lost it twice, for it had a camouflage unit that was damn near a cloaking device.