Naero's Valor

by Mason Elliott

  Naero contacted the Jalleth and offered them terms for surrender.

  The Jalleth on Aedom cursed at her, broke the link, and proceeded to fight to the death.

  The invaders on Mezal attempted to flee from the outset, fighting a staunch rear guard holding action. They attempted to choose rough, highland terrain to slow down the sea of constructs flooding in to overtake and overwhelm them.

  High General Jaer and General Houston Brittles outfought them at every turn, sent the synthezoid horde deluge in, and blasted any of the working starports or bases into wreckage and scrap. Jia and the weary starfighters gunned down any vessel that attempted to get away, but because of the sheer numbers, many fled to Tarod.

  Tarod remained the last stronghold of invader military might on the planet. The emboldened people of Zungo-5 hungered to wipe out the invaders and take back their world.

  The enemy atomic storms failed, but the Jalleth tried a new trick.

  They modified anti-matter artillery batteries, made them mobile, and placed them at the head of their armies. Then they drove straight into the packed civilian masses at hand, causing tremendous death and devastation.

  With the cannon blasts set at wide dispersal this was clearly a near suicidal attempt to destroy as many of the locals as possible before the Jalleth could finally be dragged down.

  While still on Aedom, Naero ordered all of her valiant reps in to take out the bulk of those anti-matter guns. Over half of them would perish in the attempt, but even that effort was still going to take time.

  Too many locals were dying every second.

  To make matters worse, all of the remaining enemy warships and other vessels joined the invader overhead, and poured further destroying ground support fire into the defenders.

  The enemy was on the verge of breaking out, and turning defeat into a lesser victory.

  Naero had no choice. She ordered the construct hordes from the other three continents to flash over to Tarod. The enemy began to burn through them as well, but the reeling mobs of civilians needed a chance to get away.

  She sent the Spacer Marine Remos in as drop troops, raining down upon the enemy forces up in the sky. They swarmed all over those ships, struggling to take them down.

  None of it was going to be enough.

  The enemy was still too strong on Tarod.

  Naero flashed in above the continent at high altitude, gazing down at what would be her failure in a matter of minutes.

  Billions were about to die.

  Her Uncle Baeven had seen the tactical flaws that the enemy now exploited.

  Naero! The enemy is about to-

  Then, an even worse calamity struck the defenders.

  The Jalleth jammed the Remo headset signals at the worst possible moment.

  Every single construct and Remo vanished all at once.

  The great flaw in the Remo strategy had been revealed and exploited in the end.

  Nothing could save them now.

  Even though her brave reps has already taken out over half of the forward enemy batteries by that time, they and Fancy’s troops were all about to be overwhelmed.

  More grave reports reached them from up in the black.

  Jalleth fleet reinforcements had arrived first in the embattled regions. Baeven and Naero’s fleets already withdrew in order to regroup.

  The resurging Jalleth on Zungo-5 already gave the orders to wipe out all resistance, and every remaining civilian. Then they would focus on locating and eliminating the planetary shield.

  Now came Naero’s moment of decision.

  She did not hesitate.

  The fate of the entire war depended on what she did next.

  Naero startapped. She opened herself up to the Cosmic energy flows of all the spheres she had knowledge of.

  She linked with every single one of her alternate reality selves that she could merge with.

  She shielded herself in stealth mode and placed herself in the wide gap between the enemy, and the fleeing locals.

  From a sphere that made her energy form two hundred and fifty meters tall, she towered over the foe.

  Yet she remained invisible and immaterial for the moment, readying herself to attempt to duplicate a tactic that she had seen the Dark Emperor and Elazethrek of the Six use.

  First, she and Om used teknomancy to open up a direct link with the Jalleth High Command. She used the psyonic power of the Cosmic Voice to make her words heard by all of the invaders, as they continued to advance, and charge forwards, destroying all that stood before them.

  I AM SHETANNA. TRULY I AM THE DARK ANGEL OF DEATH–SOMETHING WHICH YOU HAVE NEVER ENCOUNTERED BEFORE. ONCE I REVEAL MYSELF UNTO YOU, NOT ONE SHALL BE LEFT ALIVE. YOU INVADERS HAVE BUT ONE CHANCE REMAINING TO YOU. SURRENDER NOW. YOU AND YOUR REMAINING FORCES WILL BE ALLOWED TO PACK UP, FLEE, AND NEVER RETURN TO THESE SKIES UPON PAIN OF DEATH. DECIDE NOW. THERE SHALL BE NO FURTHER WARNINGS. SPEAK! DEATH IS UPON YOU! SPEAK! THE WAY THIS ENDS SHALL BE ACCORDING TO YOUR VERY WORDS. SPEAK!

  The majority of the enemy was now in range of her little carefully planned demonstration.

  The Jalleth response came swift and haughty. “You backwards creatures are so very sad and pathetic. By all means, call upon your empty, ancient religions, gods, and evil ‘spirits’ therefore, in the face of our certain triumph. They shall not avail you. Do your worst! It is all of you who shall perish. We have foiled all of your petty tricks. Shriek and die now in your impotent folly. We will butcher all of you like animals to the last!”

  So be it.

  Naero uncloaked, revealing to her towering form gazing down upon the assembled hosts of her enemies.

  She spread the vast shadow of her dark wings over them as they unleashed the fury of their advanced weapons against her.

  All just as she had planned.

  Her construct was a huge Cosmic energy collection array. It absorbed and transmuted all types of energy.

  Before her construct and all around her cloaked real form, stood the vast war machine of a terrifying, hyper violent alien race. Army after army, weapons blasting and blazing in fury. They massed teeming and swarming over three hundred kilometers or more, converging upon Naero’s construct.

  Before them, just kilometers away, billions of helpless civilians cowered or ran, countless old, mature, and young, all terrorized and doomed to be cut down and slain.

  No, that was not to be.

  The Dark Angel of Death would write a new destiny–a new doom in that hour.

  She unleashed a dark and horrific retribution upon the invading Jalleth, limited only by her imagination.

  And by now, that power of the Cosmic Guardian had grown very great indeed.

  The sky above them all flashed, gold, then blue, and then deep dark red into black as all of her Cosmic powers churned and mixed into a growing ominous maelstrom.

  A wide circle of Death six hundred klicks in diameter enveloped the surging Jalleth.

  Instantly, millions shrieked and screamed.

  Quickly the circle closed shut.

  The surface and mantle beneath the invader super-heated into a slurry of molten rock and fused glass which could not be escaped. The invader sank down gasping in agony into an immolating thick stew thirty meters deep. They roared in horror and met death in great screaming swaths.

  In moments, their mighty armies vanished in puffs of explosions and gasps of steam. They melted away and were consumed.

  Almost immediately, the land all around began to settle and cool.

  Naero flashed out back to Bodii’s position.

  Her construct faded and shrank away into nothing.

  She was extremely weak by then, close to passing out, close to death.

  Never before had she channeled such power.

  This feat had nearly destroyed her.

  In the confusion, any remaining invaders attempted to break out and run, skirting the vast molten wasteland of fused stone and glass.

  They ran headlong into energy spears and swords
of Queen Boadicea and the last few remaining few thousands of her ferocious Iceni warriors.

  Over eighty percent of the Iceni ground troops were female, just as the reverse numbers were true among their naval personnel. The males of their species preferred naval service up in the black.

  Naero struggled from a high vantage point and watched the battle unfold, while she attempted to regen.

  She marveled at how the Iceni operated as the perfect light infantry and scouts, experts in stealth and camouflage. They moved swiftly, wearing little armor but utilizing company level shielding pods. They carried standard issue blaster carbines, grenades, and microbombs.

  Outside of Spacers the Iceni excelled in their true gift for close quarter combat. They were the absolute masters among near-humans of fighting in tight with their short deadly energy spears and two-handed energy sabers.

  If they could surprise and overtake heavily armored forces and tanks up close, they could also eliminate them.

  The Iceni carved up and smote down the fleeing enemy in short order, proving their great worth on the battle field once more.

  Naero spotted Bodii at last, leading the rout and final elimination of the enemy remnants. This fierce warrior queen was the paragon of her people.

  She stood 1.60 meters, superbly conditioned, white gold hair worn in Iceni horsetail fashion. Like most of her kind, Bodii had intense steel blue eyes that flickered with a touch of Cosmic power. Eventually, with time, her species would evolve into near and then full energy beings. Their skin was a pale cream color, and their fine features gave them a deceptive youthful appearance.

  As a people they were quick to smile and laugh, but that disarmed many and led them to underestimate Iceni prowess.

  On first meeting Iceni, many others mistook them and their superbly toned forms for those of acrobats, or dancers perhaps.

  Iceni followed a rigid code of honor bound conduct, unknown to outsiders, and strict mental and physical disciplines from birth. They excelled in combat of most varieties. They were tough and hardy; Iceni resisted illness and healed quickly.

  Bodii and her troops wore the lightest possible nano hooded fatigues of the latest camo morphing patterns. They included lightly armored ablative boots, gloves, elbows, knees, shoulders, forearms, and neck, shoulder, and torso plates. The hoods even had a morphing four piece face mask. The nano suit could seal up and become a quick EV spacesuit, or otherwise adapted for extreme cold, heat, or underwater ops.

  This new Joshua Tech battle gear rivaled Spacer tek, but of course, that’s what it was based upon.

  Naero mused upon all of these things as she sat up, gasping and watching the mop up, still not sure if she was recovering or dying.

  She called out to the Iceni queen in telepathic fear, Bodii, I’m close at hand. I need your help, please! I’m very weak.

  Bodii lifted a fist, halted, and looked all about. Hundreds awaited her command. “Sisters and brothers, our mighty friend Admiral Naero is nearby. She is spent, hurt, and injured. Locate her at once and get her to medical. Notify me when she is found! We owe her our lives. We all just witnessed how she brought us this mighty victory!”

  Naero closed her eyes and rested lightly, waiting for strong hands to take hold of her body.

  Bodii would see her safe. The war was won.

  Naero had made certain of that.

  *

  In the aftermath of the war, the first GSA and Irregular re-enforcements did arrive within two days, and in far greater numbers than anyone expected after that

  The defending fleets had stubbornly held against all odds. With Zungo-5 secured, the GSA beat the invader back into the Unknown with great loss for the Jalleth.

  A full contingent of the GSA’s latest Ultrium fleets proved to be a fierce opponent indeed.

  An extremely costly naval defeat sent the once haughty Jalleth fleeing in full retreat into the Beta Quadrant, along with their shattered reinforcements.

  The Jalleth acted as if in shock.

  What had happened to them was illogical, beyond their comprehension. It had been generations since they had known what many would call fear–let alone a crushing defeat.

  After Naero fully recovered, Khai joined her on a secret pleasure world nearby that Baeven and Jaer knew of. The world was called Shuriiga-2.

  Many of their GSA and Irregular crews rotated onworld among the peaceful, white sand tropics for shore leave.

  Then Jaer did a strange thing.

  He holographically scanned one of the most beautiful beach waterfalls on the planet.

  Then he painstakingly replicated it in one the great nano-arena’s that he had installed within the vast confines of his huge planetoid fleet carrier The Thunderhawk.

  Once all was to his liking, he invited Naero and Khai, and Baeven and Jia to join he and Bodii for a private, quiet, romantic dinner. Just the three couples.

  Bodii personally requested that Naero and Jia bathe with her and prepare themselves with the exquisite nano raiment gathered from untold worlds.

  Washing and soaking under a waterfall did feel extremely relaxing, bathing naked under the bracing cold water of the those nano falls. Naero felt herself dissolving into soothing, luxurious comfort. For a short time, her many cares, worries, and sorrows left her.

  Even Jia enjoyed the experience, giving herself over to it. This was all new to her.

  Bodii stood only slightly taller than Naero. Both of them were short and athletic. Jia was of course very tall and goddess-like. They bathed and washed their hair, laughing, and teasing each other like young girls. They laughed and jested.

  It was the Queen of the Iceni who started singing at first. She sang a lilting love ballad of her people, about a mighty warrior princess and her prince who fought across an entire battlefield to reach one another, and win the day.

  Naero sang a few quick Tua songs thereafter, of welcome, celebration, and love.

  Then Jia sang, a song of the Drians, and its echoing beauty and majesty quickly filled the falls and the holographic nano space with flickering, dancing light and energy. The effects became enchanting and as mesmerizing as any ancient glamour.

  Kexxian songs were not the only melodies to carry wonder and power.

  “Let’s dress in our chosen raiment and return to our handsome mates,” Naero said. “I have enjoyed our time and these lavish falls enough. Now I long to enjoy an excellent meal and to spend the night in the arms of my beloved. I want his hands upon me and mine upon him. Do either you ladies desire the same?”

  Jia and Bodii laughed.

  “Of course we do,” Jia said. “Bae’s love for me is like the fire of life itself. I will always wish to be with him, in every way.”

  Queen Bodii continued to laugh. “Indeed. Our lovers have never left us,” she revealed to them. “They watch us now, sharing drinks and enjoying the view. We shall fuel their fantasies tonight and set them ablaze with desire.”

  Naero did not mind. She had long been secure in her body and who she was. She did not care who saw her physical form. Each of these men loved their mates and would have eyes only for them. She trusted them. They were men, not silly boys. Baeven was her beloved uncle, and Jaer her trusted friend and comrade.

  He had invited them all to this private dinner with only the best of intentions.

  “Have I ever told you how Sam and I met?” Bodii said to them.

  Jaer vehemently hated his middle name Samson.

  Bodii was the only living being that he allowed to use it, more like a pet name.

  She laughed in happy memory. “Both of us had been wounded during the Battle of Garraka-4 with the forces of the Great Adversary. We recovered and took our regen in the warm, verdant mountain springs and the many tumbling falls of Kurvalla. The vola birds sang to their mates and flitted about, changing their bright colors at will under sun, moon, and starlight. And when the tropical showers washed over us and fled, rainbows abounded everywhere.”

  Bodii actually giggled. “Sam stumbl
ed across me by accident. He didn’t think I was aware of his presence, but I was, all the while. He watched me bathe and soothe my hurts for over an hour. I took my time, and did my best to put on quite a show for him.

  “He once told me afterwards that that magic hour watching me healed him more than he had attempted to recover in many years. For my part, I never told him that it was death to look upon the Queen of the Iceni while she cleansed herself and then dressed.

  “For a year thereafter Sam courted me and I courted him, as we both continued to mend far beyond our physical hurts. Both of us shed many tears, and many burdens. He finally went beyond the death of his first wife and their children. I managed to get past the loss of my parents, grandparents, and my older brother. The war had been very cruel to both of us, as it had been to many others.”

  Bodii looked up into the light, and tears rolled down her face like glittering gems. “Amid all of our sorrows, we found each other. We found love again. A great love. And ever since, Sam has copied the falls of hundreds of worlds, and let me choose to bathe myself beneath their waters for our mutual delight.”

  She smiled eagerly. “Yes, dinner is ready by now. Indeed, my good friends, my battle sisters. Let us go sup with our gallant men. Let us gladly be with our lovers. And let us know joy and ecstasy this night beyond measure. We have earned it.”

  They donned their luxurious garments quickly.

  Naero took their hands in hers on either side of her, and flashed them into the adjacent dining hall where all was ready.

  The balcony of the dining platform did indeed overlook the nano falls, and had full view of the illuminated waters down below.

  All three of the men, Khai, Baeven, and Jaer met the three beauties with wide, happy smiles and warm, gentle eyes.

  Each couple had an oddly shaped divan to themselves, a piece of soft nano furniture that was part sofa and the other part oval bed. It was the epitome of comfort. Naero made a note to get the nano specs of the exact design from Jaer and Bodii.

  Jaer’s chefs rivaled Naero’s own. The feast for the six of them was magnificent. Naero enjoyed some carefully prepared strips of rare purple meat that was the most delicious thing she had ever tasted. And she had tasted a lot.