Coming Home (Free Fleet Book 2)

by Michael Chatfield

  “The leg joint, specifically groin, then head. They’re sensitive to even getting hit in the helmet.”

  “In Commandos armor, Kuruvian?” Shreesht picked out another victim.

  “Arms then legs, finally hips, aiming for their primary and interlinked secondary convulsive sacks located in their stomach.”

  “Good,” Krom barked, nodding to Shreesht, showing his respect between two warriors. Shreesht worked his way to the side as Krom stood at the front of the formation.

  “You, like I, before training are nothing.”

  “You were an Awakened!” an Avar growled from the rear.

  “Pull your neck in!” Avar growled, his eyes flashing as backs straightened even more.

  “Yes, I was Awakened. Yes, I was powerful, but I was an individual. The Armored Marine Commandos are not individuals; they are a unit. One might be stronger or more technically inclined than another, this serves to improve the unit. As an individual, I could take on many opponents at once. With a veteran Commando unit…” He paused, leaning forward as iron filled his voice. “I could take Avar Hermanti Internmi and Chaleel.” Growls came back from the Commandos.

  Dreckt let a grin appear on his face. You’ve got their attention now.

  “You will follow orders. You don’t and you and your brothers will die.” Krom began walking in front of them as he continued talking.

  “You will be more trained than the Commandos were when they first took the planet Chaleel, but do not think that training trumps experience at any time. You will learn more than you thought possible in a short time, and they will ask to know what you do. In the Free Fleet we must help one another and defeat our enemies totally.” Krom stopped his walking as he grinned hungrily, his eyes cold. Shreesht had the same hungry grin appear in his own face.

  “Mark my words, though, in this battle, our battle master will throw us at the enemy, AND WE WILL SHOW THEM WHAT HAPPENS, WHAT COMMANDOS CAN DO!” Shreesht added his own hungry growl to the other Avarians, the Chaleelian's tongues hissing out in response.

  “WE WILL CARVE INTO THEIR PIRATE SOULS, SENDING THEM INTO THE DARK TO AWAIT US AND OUR BATTLE COMMANDERS!”

  Krom relaxed, lowering himself into a fighting stance as he thumped his foot and beat his chest. Shreesht did the same as well as the other Awakened, the other Avarians looking in shock as the Awakened thumped one leg, thumping their chest, causing the hangar to rumble. Excited and blood lusting growls came from them as they grinned hungrily and joined in.

  Dreckt had studied the Avarian history on the Awakened. They could swear to any leader they desired, but none had made the blood and war oath that tied them to their chosen battle master in hundreds of years. Here, hundreds were making it alongside their already sworn warrior brothers.

  I wonder if he knows what kind of power he wields, Dreckt thought as the oath began.

  Chapter Blood and War Oath.

  I was with Eddie, talking about the special surprise I was concocting for the Syndicate fleet that wished to come into my territory as I felt the ship begin to vibrate.

  “Eddie?” I asked, a note of confusion in my voice as I checked my pad for alerts.

  “It’s nothing engineering related,” he said, looking up and listening to it. He knew enough about Resilient that he didn't need to look at his pad to know what the noise was.

  “It’s a beat,” he said as I looked up and listened.

  Boom, thump, thump.

  Boom, thump, thump.

  Boom. Thump.Thump.

  BOOM, THUMP, THUMP. I walked closer to the noise as I came out of a service corridor and into the main walkway. Avarians were getting into a fighting stance, hitting their chests before stomping the walkway. The noise reverberated through the ship and some primal part of me desired to join in.

  Then they started their oath:

  “Give us war;

  Give use death,

  And know despair.

  We are Avarians.

  We are shadows,

  Blades, and claws.

  Hear our chant.

  We are war;

  We are death;

  We are despair.

  We serve battle,

  Masters lead us

  Not to victory,

  But to death.

  I felt my blood racing as they started over again. I saw Commandos joining in as I lowered myself and joined in, repeating with them their oath. It became fevered until the third repetition when they continued their beat for a few moments before chanting again.

  “Battle Master,

  Battle Commander.

  Salchar,

  Salchar.” There was a pause of three beats before they spoke again.

  “We serve.” Then there was ringing silence as Avarians stood, inclining their heads in servitude.

  They didn’t say anything more as they kept up the new beat for a few more minutes before the ship went completely silent. I could see hungry grins which in my time being a gamer would’ve scared me. They were grins of hunters.

  I found myself grinning similarly. I was one of these hunters. I hadn’t been born one, but through the fire of battle I had become one. I had earned my place. I didn’t welcome a fight but I knew I would leave a mark on anyone that tried to take a piece of me now. Armored Marine Commandos of every races and species I saw had a similar grin. I did not welcome the upcoming battle, but now I wasn’t nervous. After all, I was taking my Commando brethren and Free Fleet with me.

  “You Commandos are crazy,” Eddie said, shaking his head, unsure as to what just happened.

  He didn’t know the brotherhood of Commandos. It was cruel and unforgiving, but it was like a cloak, one that made you feel invincible, like you could trust another Commando instantly even if you knew nothing about them, and you would do anything to protect their back as they would do the same for you

  “You wouldn’t understand,” I said as I felt the adrenaline still rushing through my veins.

  Life started returning to normal and people began moving through the halls, grim looks but focused and steeled eyes as they went about their work.

  Eddie grinned; he didn't and he was fine with that, and he knew I meant no ill with my words, either.

  “These bastards will know when we hit them,” I muttered under my breath as I walked to the nearest rail car, my eyes dark, not seeing the golden lights of floors as we passed them to the bridge.

  I stepped off the rail car as it reached the personnel deck and I walked straight into my quarters. My touch-sensitive desk display glowed a light blue as it recognized me walking in, the rest of the lights still off.

  “Low power lights,” I said as I waved my hand over my desk, the pounding in my head from multiple Wake Ups dimming slightly with the lower lighting.

  I pulled up the desks display into a hologram as I sat in my seat, studying the latest of the sensor readings Monk had sent to me. The Syndicate fleet was now moving into the system towards Parnmal; it seemed they were happy with their sensor readings.

  “Just need you to hold out for another five days,” I said to myself, knowing that five minutes, let alone five days, was a lifetime for those fighting.

  Chapter Patience is a Virtue

  Mad Monk sat in his command chair, his eyes transfixed on the main screen as the Syndicate fleet began moving.

  “Send the First Fleet the newest scans and estimates of Syndicate ship paths,” Monk said in a soothing calming voice, as if he was commenting on the fall of a cherry blossom.

  “Comms, could you get me Felix, please.”

  The veteran comms controller just nodded, making Monk think about how most veterans before a battle grew quiet as they prepared to unleash hell upon their enemies.

  “Connected,” he said simply.

  Monk stopped his line of thought. “Hello, Felix. Are all the preparations made?”

  “The last crews are coming in now,” Felix said, sounding every bit as tired a man that had been working for weeks ought to.


  “Make sure you and your people get some rest; you’ve earned it. Plus, I have a feeling that we’ll be needing your people’s help soon enough.”

  “Understood.” Felix’s voice become grim like the comm controller. “I could-”

  “Get some rest.” Monk’s voice was still calm but with thread of iron to it.”

  Felix sighed. “Alright, I’ll get some food and rest.”

  “Good.” Monk’s voice was light and soothing once again as he sent a message to Commander Chen, making sure that Felix and his people got some sleep and were left undisturbed.

  “Get me if anything happens.”

  “Naturally.”

  With that Felix cut the channel and Monk continued to focus on the star plot of his carefully laid defenses and decoys. Felix’s people had stopped all their secret projects and repairs and turned to making decoys when the Syndicate arrived. The decoys were ECM projectors made to imitate weapons platforms and attached to asteroids with air jet nav-packs. With the interference of the asteroids and the low emission of the nav-pack, Monk only knew where they were due to the real-time projections of the nav-packs guidance system. They were simple to make and there were tens of thousands of them littering the asteroid ridden space around Parnmal, all away from the actual weapons platforms which were heavily shielded and not powered on.

  He sat there silently as he regarded the timer; it’d be eighteen hours before they came in range of the decoy live weapons system.

  “I’m going for a walk, Akatsuki.” Monk bowed his head to the stations second in command.

  “Commander Kim,” Akatsuki said, bowing his head in return as he moved from his seat to Monk’s. He studied the room before walking through the opening bulkheads in a reflective light, seeing the work that had gone into the walls to hollow them from the asteroid Parnmal called home. He got on the rail car, nodding to those on it as he secured himself in with a harness and was hurled through the station. A few got off before he got to one of the undeveloped areas of Parnmal waiting to be expanded into a habitable area for those that dwelled in her rocky exterior. He walked through the rough corridors, reaching a hatch—one with a red light indicating that there was no atmosphere on the other side.

  Monk pressed his hand to the scanner on the wall. It connected with his identification chip and beeped open. There was no rush of decompression as Monk continued into a roughly finished corridor, the door shutting behind him as he repeated the process with the second door and walked out onto a cat walk that connected to a rail car. He stepped into it as it shot out from a tunnel and into the expanse of a pressurized space dock.

  There was no one here—as Monk had ordered Felix to send all of his people to get rest. There were four more of the carrier ships in various stages of modification waiting in their cradles as fighters were stacked in their storage formations on another side.

  Monk stopped his car as he studied the area more. There was another section of the massive space dedicated to experiments and projects. They had everything from side arms and Mecha weaponry to planetary weaponry and space drives in there. Whereas the people in the Free Fleet knew how to repair the systems and even make some of them, most of the Free Fleet didn’t understand the science behind it. The Kuruvians and their natural insatiable curiosity made them great researchers. They pulled apart everything Monk and Felix would let them so they could see how it worked. The people working in this massive space had progressed the Free Fleet and science of all the races by centuries in months.

  There were newly built assembly lines that chugged away, drones continuing their work even as their creators were sleeping.

  “We learn so much, yet it is in the hope to wage war more effectively,” Monk said sadly as a crate of rail gun canon rounds were picked up and taken by a drone to a magazine that would feed them through the massive weapons of destruction.

  Monk arrived at the command tower which hung from the roof. He wandered through the halls to the break room, grabbing a tea as he sat at one of the couches and looked out on the hangar, finding the drones that worked on various projects throughout the area.

  Monk had elected to have a divorce from his ‘battle wife’ as most people were calling their forced partners. She was a kind girl, and they elected to stay friends. Monk had found it weird—having a wife that was only ten—but she was someone he could talk to.

  Maybe in a few years. He smiled sadly to himself. She was with Salchar and his fleet. He knew that Salchar would do everything in his power to keep his people alive, but lives were lost in war. Monk expected that his and the people of Parnmal might add to those lists.

  He drank his tea, emotions such as fear and loss flooded though him, but slowly a smile grew across his face.

  “Well, it’s been a good run, anyway” he muttered to himself, toasting the galaxy as he sat back, thinking about what he’d accomplished in his life, the people that followed him and the planets the Free Fleet now represented.

  He knew Salchar would ravage the Syndicate fleet with whatever he came up with, but the Syndicate had more than four times the force of Salchar’s, and they were all second line ships or ships of the line and in much better repair.

  Grim determination filled Monk as he felt resolve filling where there had been confusion. He finished off his tea and walked back to the rail car.

  If they want this station, they’re going to have to get through me. Monk felt excitement within his body now. He’d already accepted his death, and a man without a care for living was a deadly man indeed.

  ****

  Captain Kelu looked over the ships that the Lady herself had given him command over. His original fleet had increased with his reinforcements, minus the ones from Earth which would be there in two weeks. The Orvunut was as loyal as Kelu to the Lady; once he got a message from her he'd burn his ships up to be there.

  Yet, his fleet stood at eight dreadnoughts, twenty one BC’s, forty-five destroyers, the same number of cruisers, and a hundred and sixty-two corvettes. It was the largest fleet assembled since the Syndicate had taken Union space, and Kelu hated it.

  “Captain Zestur is again requesting that we stop crawling like Forvud in muck,” the comms officer said tiredly.

  Kelu felt sorry for Urlow; he’d been handing all of the comms traffic from the unhappy pirate captains. With so many first line ships, there was a massive problem with chain of command. Sure, Kelu was in charge, and no one would go against the Lady, but that didn’t mean that they wouldn’t question everything he said, especially if it didn’t fit into their fighting tactics—which usually consisted of charging the enemy, and not caring for the casualties.

  Captain Kelu would normally be endorsing these kinds of tactics, but that would be against a group of ships, not the biggest station in the sector with enough natural armor to take direct hits from planetary cannons for days. A few of those cannons littered around could take out a dreadnought's shields in a few hits.

  So, nice and slow we go, Kelu thought, the other ships captains filling up space with their annoyed transmissions.

  Jorsht had shown smarts and cunning, but he wouldn’t fool Captain Kelu.

  Urlow put down his headset, massaging his cranial receptors.

  “Captain Eilo now,” he said as he ended his latest complaint.

  “Weapons signature!” Sensors yelled.

  “Give me-” Kelu didn’t finish uttering orders when Tactical yelled out.

  “Weapons firing! Hit on first line ship The Destroyer!”

  “Direct hit,” Sensors yelled out.

  Kelu watched as the first line ships side was cracked, a scar running across the left side and across the engines. Three were out and the ship was venting atmosphere.

  They didn’t have their shields up, Kelu thought darkly as he realized he didn’t feel anything.

  “Tactical, why am I not feeling us returning fire?”

  “Captain.” Tactical looked to his station, his face greening like the Blurduz race did when they wer
e embarrassed.

  “Gunners, take down that platform!”

  “Comms, get me the fleet.”

  “You’re on,” Urlow said a second later. Damn good pirate, Kelu thought.

  “Get your shields up! Otherwise, I’ll board you in the name of the Lady and replace you.” His voice filled with cold fury as he did a cutting motion, Urlow cutting the comm.

  “We got the weapons platform. It was a short range rail cannon,” Tactical reported.

  “Sensors, I need an early warning system for those things. Helm, reverse thrust and coordinate with the rest of the fleet to hold position relative to us.” It took a full ten minutes for the fleet to break and pull back.

  Sloppy, Kelu thought as he looked at the five ships that belonged to his personal fleet which had braked and come into position within three minutes.

  “Sensors.” Kelu drew out the word, making it a threat as sensors shivered.

  “They have sensor shielding but there’s a leak for the power generators, we’re isolating momentarily.”

  Kelu grunted as he waited another five minutes, feeling his trigger finger twitch with the need to reinstate his command. Sensors stopped their furious flurry of activity.

  “Updating plot now,” they said with a relieved breath.

  On the main screen, the asteroid field added five more markers, each a red dot with a faint red circle around it.

  “Set our range sphere too.” Blue circles overlapped for Kelu’s fleet as he could see his range was more than twice the weapons systems.

  “Comms, relay this to the rest of the fleet. Nav, correct our course to bring those weapon systems under fire before we get to them. Correct as needed.” Kelu sighed; their approach was going to take a hell of a lot longer now. They’d need to play cat and mouse with the weapons platforms, and move around asteroids to get a clear line of fire, or waste their fire into a useless rock. All of which would mean using ordinance Kelu hoped to use to crack Parnmal and having shields up all the time which, with the power plants on some of the ships, would be an interesting game of roulette.

  And it’s up to me to make sure I don’t have anyone charging in. Patience is a virtue, but I don’t think I’ll be able to hold onto it by the time we get to Parnmal, Kelu thought as the fleet continued on at a quarter of the speed that they’d been traveling at.