Star Force: Resistance (SF75) (7 page)

BOOK: Star Force: Resistance (SF75)
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After a couple of hours a dropship was sent down from
orbit along with a convoy heading towards one of the secure landing zones. It
split off from the group near the surface and buzzed the terrain all the way
out to their position with the lizards not bothering to follow it, fortunately.
Jyra
watched it coming on the battlemap that they
were now fully reconnected with given their distance from any functioning
lizard city…though there was one about 75 miles out that had been reduced to
rubble. It had been the first they’d targeted from orbit and thoroughly razed
in order to clear a decent perimeter to set down their first prefab structures
around. Since then they’d been taking the other cities over land save for the
anti-orbital guns and shield generators that they’d plucked from them.

Destroying an entire city took time and Star Force
hadn’t brought many bombs with them, knowing how inefficient such weapons were
in a long campaign. The charred wreck beyond them had been taken down with
energy weapons only, with all of the high buildings being torn down to the
point where
Jyra
had only been able to see a few
jutted pieces on the horizon before they’d come down into the canyon.

There was nothing left there to pick up their signals
even if they’d transmitted in the open, so using their normal ‘secure’ signals
was of no conceivable threat this far out. And if even they were picked up,
there were no lizard units nearby to intercept them…so long as their ride got
here, otherwise they’d be in a heap of trouble.

But it came without incident, zipping into the canyon
and dropping down right over their location. It opened its boarding ramp midair
and the four speeders flew into the hold of the
Falcon
-class dropship, passing inside its IDF field and allowing
the craft to start accelerating away before the door had even began to shut.

Jyra
popped out the landing
gear and set the speeder down on the deck, with the cloaking sheath having
already been powered down but not removed, for it had been firmly attached at a
few points before the mission. She peeled it back and climbed off at the same
time the others did to find an Archon acolyte standing at the end of the bay
looking at them.

“You guys alright?” he asked.

Leo pulled off his helmet and looked at the helmetless
Archon that was otherwise fully clad in his silver armor. “We’re good.”

“Blow up anything useful?”

“We didn’t stick around for the fireworks,” Brandon
said, likewise removing his helmet, “but unless they found and disarmed the
bombs, which I think is highly unlikely, then you can scratch one lizard
hatchery off the list.”

“A hatchery?” he said with a satisfied nod. “I was
under the impression you were going for some firearms warehouses, or maybe a
production facility.”


Gotta
have lizards to shoot
them or they don’t work,”
Jyra
said as she and Mace
also pulled off their helmets.

“True,” the Archon said, looking them over. “I
gotta
ask…why the old armor?”

Brandon shrugged. “We haven’t always used it, but I
personally like the extra 7% armor on it.”

“Yet you aren’t wearing the heavy model that has 46%
more?”

“A little too bulky for my taste. Maybe if we were as
fast and strong as you guys we would, but it slows me down a bit too much.”

“I’m just an acolyte, so my strength probably doesn’t
exceed yours…yet,” he said, motioning behind him to the passenger section.
“Come on, brought some hot food for you guys.”

“Ah…”
Jyra
sighed. “I love
you.”

“How’s the fighting going?” Brandon asked as
Jyra
slid past the Archon and out of sight into the forward
section.

“Tooth and nail. We’ve got reinforcements on the way,
but we’ve got to hold onto our orbital slot and at least one ground site until
they get here. Since you left the lizards got one of the anti-orbital guns
working again. If we don’t start expanding our foothold soon, we’ll either have
to fight another costly bombardment war or pull back our cover of the ground
troops…which we cannot do.”

“Damn,” Mace whispered. “I didn’t realize it was that
bad.”

“They’re flooding us with swarms of a size we’ve never
seen before, from wisps to tanks to infantry, and the cruiser count in orbit is
going up faster than we can cull them. I think the lizards have been letting us
take worlds while they focused their attention on Skarron territory, but they
know they can’t lose this link in their supply chain so we’re getting the full
hammer, and they know what it takes to beat us. We’ve given them plenty of
lessons in the past of how many troops are not enough. They’re not making that
mistake this time.”

“Any word on another mission for us?” Brandon asked.

“Not yet. Eat up, rest, and get some training in. If
you think of anything on your own again, don’t hesitate to ask. If you really
did get a hatchery, it’ll have an effect. Too bad we can’t confirm it from
orbit.”

“Sorry,” Leo offered, heading past the Archon to find
Jyra
and the food. “Those bombs are too heavy to carry.”

 
 

7

 
 

March 3, 2934

Gvaris
System (lizard
territory)

Far Outer Zone
(on approach)

 

Paul waited in the command nexus onboard the
Excalibur
in the final stages of his
journey to the
Gvaris
System where all available Star
Force fleets were diverting. Those closest to the invasion point that had been
engaged in attacks on less defended systems had already been diverted to
reinforce the foothold Sara had gained on one of the two inhabited planets
there, but in her updated report sent out via courier ship she’d indicated that
the situation had grown far worse despite the reinforcements.

IT’S GOING
DOWN. EVERYONE GET HERE NOW OR WE’RE LOSING THIS ONE.

Per her summarization, he had heeded her request and
dropped what he was doing in the ADZ and gathered up as many Clan Saber ships
as he could, namely the ravagers that he’d been producing independently from
Mainline, but he had also grabbed whatever else he could naval wise and set off
to aid the others that were also converging on that point with a variety of
fleets.

So it only mildly shocked Paul when just prior to
deceleration they picked up a repetitive warning signal being transmitted from
the enemy system. It was Star Force, and indicating that a huge swath of the
jumpline in near the star was a ‘no go’ zone. That meant something was blocking
their path and a collision was imminent, or some other type of nastiness was
waiting for them.

Acting quickly, for the signal strength wasn’t up to
interstellar relay standards and could only reach them a short ways out, he
ordered his fleet to come out at a different jumppoint further out in the
system, requiring a much harder deceleration. Had he not been in the nexus
someone on the bridge crew would have acted on the warning, but he got to it
first and sent the signal out to the ships following the
Excalibur
and giving them a bit more of a heads up before they all
began to push against the limited gravity pull of the star ahead sooner than
normal.

In addition to that the Star Force ships exerted more
than normal power, for typically one didn’t overexert gravity drives during
system to system travel unless you were in a massive hurry. The Clan Saber
fleet hadn’t been going slowly and were making good time, but they always kept
some engine power in reserve for just this reason. Flying blind into a star
system was a good way to run into a debris field that hadn’t been there before,
and the lizards had tried that trick at
Brenaldfor
,
damaging sixteen jumpships on arrival but failing to kill any of them thanks to
the slower speeds of impact.

Since then Star Force ships entering an unknown system
often went in on irregular jumplines or more slowly using a considerable
portion of their gravity drives’ tugging power to actually decelerate slightly
off jumpline by pulling on a planet or even going into a slingshot deceleration
curve around the star where the lizards could not anticipate them.

Paul and the others hadn’t seen many more debris
mining attempts, but if they really were pulling out all the stops for this one
then it made sense for them to have thrown out a bunch of rocks for his fleet
to run into, and cleaning up such things took a lot of time, which was why Star
Force didn’t use the tactic, not to mention for the possibility of snagging
other ships entering that were not the enemy.

So when the
Excalibur
decelerated hard, coming out of the jump first in the convoy, Paul expected to
receive the battlemap information from the other ships in the system and see
debris fields blocking several of the jumplines…and he wasn’t disappointed,
save for the fact that the field seemed to cover huge swaths of space around
the star, and the millions of ‘rocks’ were in fact lizard ships.

“Damn, Sara,” he said, mentally diverting the
Excalibur
off the jumpline and sending
out orders for the rest of his fleet to do likewise, heading for one of the
smaller outer planets where a priority tag was situated, “they really don’t
want us getting this one.”

As the battlemap transmissions were picked up, the
ship’s computer made them instantly accessible to Paul’s mind, allowing him to
read through them far faster than his eyes alone would have allowed. Rather
than going through the summaries he instead went straight for the tactical
feeds and used his
Sav
to start running through the
battle history since the last records Sara had given them as his ships
continued to drop out of their jumps and follow his command ship over to the
priority tag slowly.

The situation was not good. The lizards held naval
dominance throughout the system save for several points that Star Force was
hunkered down in. The main planet still had a Star Force fleet in an orbital
slot covering their ground invasion corridor, which had added another lizard
city to its possession since the last report, but otherwise was still hemmed in
firmly by the enemy in an Alamo-type scenario, save this one was taking place
across a region hundreds of miles in radius.

What had not been in the previous report, at least not
by the time he’d left the relay network, was Star Force bases on not one, but
four outer worlds. Two were moons around a distant and cold gas giant, with the
other two being on planets that held no atmosphere at all. Each of them had a
defense fleet guarding what was listed as active construction projects, one of
which Liam’s ID marker was at, in addition to 3 other trailblazers that had
apparently already made it to the system to reinforce Sara and
Kiran
.

There were also lizard fleets around those
planets/moons, spamming swaths with nothing but cruisers, and Paul intended to
head not to the ‘safe’ zone above this planet’s outpost, but directly into the
lizards to say ‘hi’ on his way in.
 
He
didn’t even bother to wait for the rest of his fleet to catch up, instead
barreling straight into the outer band with a quick microjump that wouldn’t
allow his presence to be detected given the lag of the lizard sensors.

When the big donut of a ship decelerated he was within
120 miles of the nearest lizard ships and drifting closer on purpose,
eventually coasting to a near stop within weapons range as the cruisers
inexplicably ran rather than stood their ground and fought. Paul raised an
eyebrow and took off after some of them, for while his ship was bigger it was
also the faster. He succeeded in killing a few dozen cruisers before a
holographic transmission from Liam appeared in his nexus and off his right
shoulder.

“You won’t get many that way,” his fellow naval expert
advised. “They’re blocking transit of smaller craft but refusing to engage
short of insane numbers. If we take after them in force they’ll counter with
the same, but otherwise this has become a chess game that we are badly in need
of more pieces to move around…especially those ravagers you brought.”

“You’re welcome. Now tell me what the hell is going
on? The last report I got didn’t indicate a lizard fleet one tenth of this
size. Where are they coming from?”

“Both directions, but the masses are coming from their
core systems. I think we’re seeing the reserves they’ve been holding onto, but
not the last of them. There’s been a continuous flow of ships coming in, and
despite some initial successes at sniping them on arrival, the lizards are
doing a good job of preventing that now. I can’t stop them with that many ships
around the star, which if you’ll look at closely contains some chess pieces of
their own…which are also growing in number.”

Paul bit his lip even as he was controlling the still
ongoing hunt for some of the cruisers in orbit with part of his mind while he
spoke to Liam. “26 invokers? Please tell me you’ve killed at least one?”

“And 13 assault pillars,” he added. “No, we haven’t
been able to get close. We can’t jump in on top of them with so many ships
around, and we get swarmed when we try the front door. I think they’re going to
mount an attack on our surface troops with the assault pillars, which is why
we’re building additional bases out here.”

“Explain that.”

“We need resources to build our own anti-orbital
battery.”

Paul raised an eyebrow. “Why not request a Sentinel?”

“I get the feeling the moment we bring one in we’ll
invite a counterattack to take it out before it can be assembled. I don’t want
to risk that until we can properly defend it. We need a strong point, at least
one Keema battery that can reach out and pound an invoker or assault pillar and
provide a pocket for assembly. Then we can bring in the Sentinels, several hopefully.”

Paul thought about that for a moment as another pair
of cruisers bit the dust to drones that had deployed mid microjump and cut them
off on their run to a larger group of ships that were also beginning to pull
back towards the stellar jumppoint.

“You think we can build one without them knowing about
it?”

Liam nodded. “Totally subsurface. I’ve already got the
site picked and being prepped, but the lizards are forcing us to use jumpship
convoys to get the resources from planet to planet. Dropships are being chased
down when we try, hence the chaperones you’re greeting now.”

“And if we kill all these off they just replace them
with more?”

“At the rate they’re getting reinforcements we can’t
piecemeal them to death. 100 cruisers, 1 drone, if they scatter most will get
away and they’ll win the numbers game by the looks of it. We’ve made some
deeper attack runs near the star, but those they will not relent on. If you
want to do some hunting around the edges be my guest, but your ravagers are
going to draw a lot of attention. They know now to focus them.”

“Figured they would. I…damn,” Paul said as his mental
update on the battle reports finally came to one particular entry. “They tried
to ram an assault pillar into the planet?”

“Thankfully
Kiran
saw it
coming and diverted it. But yeah, they’re
gonna
use
them as big missiles if they can.”

A sick feeling crept into Paul’s gut. He knew the
lizards were capable of this, but up until now their kamikaze tendencies had
been smaller scale or a last resort. He pulled a bit more of his mind away from
organizing the orbital hunt and left that to his bridge crew as he analyzed
what had been an approach to the main planet.
Kiran
had taken his own command ship directly into the cruiser swarm behind a wedge
of drones that had acted as blockers, ramming the lizard ships as necessary to
get him through.

But then the assault pillar had turned off, apparently
realizing it wasn’t going to get within range to hit the ground…or at least not
where it had intended, for the command ship could nudge it off course and land
it on the lizard-held sections of the planet easily enough. That was one perk
for only controlling a tiny sliver of the surface. They had to hit a very
narrow target and even a bump at range could send
them
hundreds of miles off course.

“You’re also worried about them ramming the
Sentinels?”

“Less so. They can move if needed, but I think they’ll
turn into bug zappers with the cruisers going for them. Big pieces are a
liability at this point. We need scores of drones to cover while we place them
appropriately. I’ve also requested some special tech from back home, but will
try to build some of it here. Right now we need raw materials, so any spare
techs you have onboard please send down. We’re
more short
on hands than equipment at this point.”

“You sent for more, I assume?”

Liam nodded. “We’re building war colonies on these
outer worlds while just trying to hold onto our piece of the main prize. That
way they can’t take out everything we have in just one surface strike.”

“We need kinetic shield generators…big ones.”

“That’s what I sent off for, but if we’re going to
block an assault pillar modular units won’t cut it. Right now a planetary Keema
battery is higher on my want list.”

“Why are we still trying to take lizard cities if
we’re planning to build our way out of this?”

“For as many reinforcements they have coming in,
they’re still building and growing plenty on site. If we can take some of those
factories offline, so much the better.”

“And more ground for us to defend.”

“Sara’s on it. We’re claiming a few strategic
locations then torching the rest, capturing the cities long enough to gut them.
If the lizards want to take them back they’ll find a few surprises waiting for
them.”

Paul smiled. “Bit of justified irony there.”

“I know you just got here, but what are your
impressions?”

“That we’re fighting the war we thought we’d have in
the core out here first.”

“Not quite, but close. They know this will sever their
empire in two and that any future convoys will be ambush bait. They either hold
here or cellular divide into two separate entities. If we can split them, I
think their pushing into Skarron territory will diminish without their
industrial powerbase feeding it.”

“It may slow them down, but I’ve been going over the
Voku reports in detail and I think they’ve already prepared for that
eventuality. They’re bulking up key worlds on the other side of the border in
what looks like the outer reaches of a new core network. Not sure where it is
yet, but I get the feeling it’s already out there and growing by the day. Too
bad the Skarrons aren’t living up to their rep. Even with the light Preema
support they’re not making any counter gains, just stemming the tide a bit.
Cal-com even admitted that they’ve pushed near to the edge of the galactic arm
coreward and beyond his ability to monitor.”

BOOK: Star Force: Resistance (SF75)
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