Star Force: Resurrection (SF84) (Star Force Origin Series) (7 page)

“Neither did
I
, though it
seems kind of obvious right now.”

“I was still thinking in terms of production. We
couldn’t have built another for at least 20 more years.”

“We could do it in 15.”

“Still too late.”

“You think we’re going to be done here in 15?”

“I don’t know. If we just slaughtered all the lizards
we could.”

“Not an option. Besides, I want to have a walk around
their homeworld and see what’s there. Let’s try not to blow up too much of that
before then, ok?”

“Getting cocky now?”

Liam smirked, this time in apology. “Right. Don’t want
to jinx us,” he said as he fired the weapon again, popping another shield.
“This is seeming too easy.”

“Let’s milk it while we’ve got it.”

“You going down with your fleet to lay the parking lot
again?”

“Yes.”

“The ground forces won’t be available for a long
time.”

“We can start building regardless.”

Liam looked at him oddly, then caught on. “Baiting
them out?”

“As long as we have warships within range, why not?”

Paul’s peer sighed. “We have got to find a better way
to defend a planet. Orbital bombardment is too damn effective.”

“Easy enough when you know where they’re going to
fire.”

“Even then, the V’kit’no’sat could punch through any
shields we have in place this easily. A
Mach’nel
would punch right through our shields with their baby
Tar’vem’jic
,”
Liam said, referring to one of the larger V’kit’no’sat warships and the largest
naval weapon that they possessed, which was a smaller version of what the
pyramid’s main gun was.

“I’m working on it,” Paul said grimly.

“We all are, but you know as well as I do that we
haven’t caught up enough yet. 1,200 years of research with their playbook and
blueprints and it still hasn’t been enough.”

“If this tech was easy, a lot of other races would
have it. Be glad that we’ve got what we have, otherwise the lizards would have
killed us long ago.”

Liam glanced back down at the planet, taking in the
mass of infrastructure and life within it…malevolent life intent on killing
just about everything else in the galaxy if and when they had the opportunity.

“Yeah, I guess we overlook that sometimes. It’s still
scary though. The lizards have nothing that can stop the Bra’hem, and I
wouldn’t want to be in their situation now.”

“No…they have the chance to surrender and live. We
won’t get that opportunity. Whether it be lizards or V’kit’no’sat, they’re
coming for blood.”

“True,” Liam said as another green needle punctured a
shield and detonated the tower beneath. “Let’s keep whistling past the
graveyard then and hope we have enough time to catch up before fate comes
knocking.”

“They’ve also had 100 millennia to make upgrades.”

“Let’s hope Kara is right about them being slackers
when they’re not pushed.”

7

June 7, 3221

Krachnika
System
(lizard capitol/homeworld)

Trexklip

Greg was on the surface of the fourth planet that Star
Force had invaded, helping a team of Bsidd clear out yet another piece of the
lizard infrastructure when he got a report from one of the advanced teams
fighting a few hundred kilometers to the north. The Archon punched another
lizard back into a wall then dashed into a trio to his right, ramming one with
his shoulder and spinning through a wrist lash that caught the other two,
knocking them unconscious with the body blows from his very hard armor.

He put a shot into all four lizards, then used a Jumat
blast to shove back a fifth that a nearby Bsidd finished off for him as a team
of 13 of them finally caught up to his position. Greg mentally signaled to them
to hold position and watch his back while he took the
comm
call.

“What is it?” he asked the Archon titan whose headshot
appeared in a tiny square of his HUD.

“We have a prisoner.”

Greg frowned. “A lizard actually surrendered?”

“Not intentionally. He was unconscious when we found
him, but we now have him in custody.”

“And why are you doing that?” Greg asked, knowing that
every lizard they’d ever taken prisoner by force had killed themselves rather
than remain confined, so Star Force had adopted the practice of only taking
voluntary prisoners with regards to the lizards…of which there never were any.

The Archon’s tiny head image smiled. “He’s a
mastermind.”

Greg immediately stiffened. “How, where, when, and
what’s his condition and current location?”

“Building destruction, pinned under light rubble in a
subsurface bunker, damage induced about 20-25 hours ago, we found him about 10
minutes ago, and he’s sedated and being brought back to the nearest firebase
for treatment and containment,” the titan said, mentally ticking off all the
points.

“Keep him unconscious at all times until I get there.
I’ve got some fighting left to do here, then I’ll personally take custody of
him.”

“Copy that.”

“And you, young man, are getting an extra box of
donuts.”

“A whole box? Not sure I earned that,” he said
deadpan. “The falling rubble actually deserves the credit.”

“Noted. How bad are his injuries?”

“He’s pretty torn up, but he’ll keep all his limbs.”

“Head wounds?”

“Concussion, but I think his marbles are all still
there.”

“Thank you,” Greg said with emphasis.

“Just picking up the trash,” the Archon said, his
image winking out as he got back to work killing other lizards.

Greg contacted his command ship in orbit and arranged
for them to prepare a holding cell and all necessary medical treatment to keep
the mastermind alive, then he also go back to the task at hand, not wanting to
risk his Bsidd unit by his absence and not wanting to order them to pull back.
He’d finish up this latest push, then when they settled into defensive
arrangements he’d take his leave and go have a chat with their elusive
Jackalope
.

Other than Kara, nobody had ever seen a mastermind in
person. No mastermind had ever been captured.
No body
had ever been found. They were known to exist in many systems, based on the way
the lizards there fought differently under their control, but they were kept
well hidden
despite many attempts to root them out. This
one having got caught in a building collapse and still living was a stroke of
crazy luck…so much so that Greg had the mastermind thoroughly scanned for
booby-traps of any known kind just in case this was a Trojan horse to get at
the Archons.

Greg suspected it wasn’t, but he didn’t want to take
chances. The lizards here were beat, but they were making Star Force fight
tooth and nail for every last bit of ground. This invasion could have been over
years ago if only Greg and the other trailblazers had authorized total
bombardment from orbit, obliterating every last thing on the surface and most
of the subsurface. There would have been pockets of survivors underground that
could have been hunted down and killed or left to starve to death afterwards,
but Star Force was not going to fight like that.

He knew they were making this harder on themselves,
but they were not going to become barbaric. The lizards were going to have a
chance to surrender, each of them as they came into their areas, and Greg would
be damned if they ever got in the habit of just shooting them on sight before
they had a choice. Star Force was not going to become the lizards in order to
defeat them. If they had to be killed, then so be it…but it would be done Star
Force’s way on honorable terms, no matter if the conquest of this system took a
century to complete.

The same was true of the assaults happening in other
star systems, for Star Force wasn’t just fighting here. This was the most
heavily fortified lizard system by far, and while there were other nasty core
worlds to tackle there were probably not going to be any like this again. This
was going to be the worst of it, and even if the lizards were building a new
capitol in the coreward region it would take an insanely long time to develop
it to the extent that even one of these six planets had risen to.

All of them were essentially one big city split up
into shielded segments, and all of them stretched far underground where orbital
rounds could not follow. Every building, every subsurface level, had to be
fought into and cleared, looking out for explosives and other booby-traps, and
sealed off so the lizards couldn’t flank the invading troops and get into areas
already cleared. It was an insanely difficult task that Star Force now achieved
almost casually…unless you were on the ground, where you realized the enormity
of the endeavor and just how damn good the troops being deployed actually were.

And now the Star Force type of war was giving them an
added benefit of a mastermind prisoner. With the templars and sovereigns all
assumed to have been evacuated there was no chance of catching one of them
here, but needle in the hay stack was an overly generous comparison to this
situation where you had trillions of lizards and planets full of infrastructure
to hide in. Greg was overly pleased that their methodical assaults had paid off
in this lucky stroke, and neither he nor the other trailblazers were going to
waste the opportunity it gave them.

None of them were here yet, busy with other things in
the system, so Greg was going to have first crack at him. When he arrived back
on his flagship he headed straight to the holding cell, entering in his pink
ViLord armor that had a few scratches on it from recent battle. It stood out
brightly compared to the already gleaming white armor of the Knights standing
guard, who nodded down at him as he walked past them.

Greg retracted his helmet and looked at the nearby
medtechs. “Learn anything yet?”

“Cognitive density is far larger than the librarians. I’m
guessing this variant is by far the smartest the lizards have…though without
being able to examine a templar I can’t say that for certain. It’s no wonder
these guys are used as their battlefield commanders.”

“Much more than that, I’d guess. Find any bioweapons
in him?”

“No. All indications are he was really caught unawares
and his imprisonment was an accident.”

“Good. Wake him,” Greg said as he took a step towards
the security field in front of the medical table where he lay under several
scanners.

“He’s not restrained,” the medtech pointed out.

“I can handle that, but I can’t push out the
medication you have in him.”

“Very well,” the medtech said as he gestured to
another who began operating a control panel. Within the chamber most of the
medical sensors retracted into wall slots where they couldn’t be damaged, but a
few mechanical arms remained. One of them reached down and injected the large,
muscular lizard with a counter-serum that would clear the sedation medicine
from him within a matter of seconds.

The remaining monitoring arms disappeared from view as
well several seconds before the mastermind began to twitch its way back to
consciousness.

Greg kept a link into its mind so he could forestall
any attempts to kill itself or cause other problems, but beyond that he let it
wake naturally. Eventually it shook its head clear and rolled to the right,
catching itself on the edge of the bed before falling off, then looking out
through the clear blue energy field at the Human beyond.

Greg waited for it to slit its own throat, but to his
surprise it didn’t try. Merely snarling as it rolled its thick legs off the bed
to free its cramped tail, then it walked up to the energy shield and looked
down at the trailblazer and others, standing as tall as the Knights behind Greg
and massing considerably more. The lizard looked like a tiny version of
Godzilla minus the back spikes, though he got the feeling this guy could move a
whole lot faster if he wanted.

“
Do you speak?
”
it asked in its native language.

“
Somewhat
,”
Greg answered, reforming a piece of his helmet to cover his right ear. “
My armor will translate the rest.
”

“
Why am I not
dead?
”

“
You know we
offer surrender options
.”

“
What do you
demand of your prisoners?
”

“
I’m here to
talk
.”

“
More likely to
scan my mind
.”

“
Why aren’t you
trying to kill yourself?
” Greg wondered.

The mastermind stared at him with black, glassy eyes.
“
You have forcibly taken prisoners
before?
”

“
We tried. They
all killed themselves, and we couldn’t get any to do differently. Eventually we
just returned those we had left
.”

“
Returned?
”

“
We sent them
back to you. We’re not interested in killing you, only defeating you. When you
don’t surrender you leave us with no other option. Haven’t you figured that out
by now?
”

“Archon,” one of the medtechs said in an alarmed
voice. “His vitals are crashing.”

Greg dug into his mind deeply, searching out the
cause, but it was on the lizard’s conscious thoughts and therefore easy to
access and trace back to the knowledge he needed.

“He has a mental kill switch. His body is shutting
itself down.”

“I can’t treat him when he’s awake!”

“
You cannot stop
it
,” the mastermind said, staggering a step as his body began to
self-destruct from the inside out. There was no toxin of any kind involved,
simply his mind triggering his body’s hardware to shut down.

“Like hell I can’t,” Greg said, the air around his
armor shimmering with distortion as he walked into the shield between them. His
body passed through and he froze the lizard in place, extending a hand towards
it and peeling back the armor covering his pale flesh as he pressed it against
the lizard’s thick green scales.

The medtechs flinched when they saw him go through the
shield without lowering it, not knowing how that was possible, but they forced
themselves to focus on the task at hand and brought a few of the scanners back
out from their wall niches, waiting for the Archon to lay him back down but he
didn’t
.

“Get the Kich’a’kat now. It’s the only thing that will
work,” he said as he could feel the status of the lizard’s body and his feeble
attempts to heal it failing utterly. There was no damage involved, simply a
shutdown, and he didn’t know how to override that so he tried to force his
heart to keep pumping and a few other organs functioning but it was a losing
effort. He could drag it out only so long, then the body parts simply ignored
all further input.

“Hurry,” he demanded.

“It’s coming,” the medtech informed him, referring to
the one original regenerator that each trailblazer kept with them when in the
field, though Star Force had many lesser copies made from their own tech. But
everyone knew they were mere toys compared to the real deal, and he really
hoped there was something in their automated programming that could fix this
internal sabotage.

By the time an Archon outside his armor came running
in carrying the small shiny silver device the lizard was already dead, with
Greg telekinetically holding his body upright in a standing position. Greg shut
the energy shield down so he could pass him the Kich’a’kat, then he put the
device on the lizard’s chest.

For a moment he thought it wasn’t going to activate,
but then it melted down and extended out its little rivulets until it covered
half his body. Greg had withdrawn his hand, but without a functioning mind to
access he no longer could monitor what was happening inside, so he glanced back
at the medtechs who were monitoring their own sensor equipment.

“Nothing yet,” one reported.

Greg could see inside the lizard with his Pefbar,
watching the tiny tendrils continue to spread out, but it wasn’t until they
reached the mastermind’s brain was there any reaction…but it came from the
Kich’a’kat rather than the lizard. The branches it had extended into the body
quickly withdrew and the material extended up into the brain with thousands of
tiny, thinner than hair-sized extensions accessing bits and pieces without
damaging them in ways that still boggled Greg’s mind.

He did note that some tendrils still remained,
connecting to the heart and lungs, and soon those organs began to function
minimally, with Greg guessing that the Kich’a’kat was manually working them in
a way that the trailblazer couldn’t.