by Aer-ki Jyr
But Star Force was anyway, and they had these massive Essence-wielding beasts on their side. He didn’t know if that would be enough, but it would certainly give him and the others a fighting chance. He was eager to see what else Star Force had developed to fight the Uriti, and as soon as the ship accelerated away from Pacman he immediately went to the database to look.
He should have done so sooner, but with everything going on he’d been focused on what the Varkemma would be doing…not what the rest of Star Force could do. And he immediately realized how well prepared this Empire was, as opposed to the Vargemma, who only really had Olopar to work with against the larger Hadarak.
Star Force had them too, with several manned by Varkemma already engaged on the front. But they also had various ships of their own designs to fight them, and some that didn’t use Essence. That staggered Puar, for how could one kill a Hadarak without using Essence?
But they could. Not easily, but they could. And some of their weapon systems were truly impressive, not only because of their kill power, but because Star Force could combine the already massive damage with an Essence upgrade and create unimaginable powerful tools of destruction. More so than the Vargemma ever had, because they had always relied on pure Essence attack technology. The Founders had never given them hybrid devices, but Star Force had apparently developed them on their own.
And Star Force’s technology was better than what the Vargemma had, by far. So blending it with Essence made them so damn powerful he wondered why they hadn’t just wiped out the Vargemma in the first place…then he immediately laughed at himself once that thought fully processed. The reason they hadn’t wasn’t because they couldn’t, but because they wouldn’t. Until he’d gone through the LITrpg training…whatever it was…he couldn’t have understood that, but now it was clear. Star Force fought not to obliterate their opponents, but to defeat them. Even if ‘defeat’ was the harder option.
And if this empire shied away from harder options, then they’d never have been prosecuting this war. They’d have retreated inside the Temples and ridden it out with the Vargemma, but there wasn’t a hint of surrender in these people, and Puar liked that. He liked that a lot.
Not far from the Uriti Preserve they came to a system like many others, but instead of jumping on to the next they made a microjump out beyond the system’s edge…to a massive construct that had enough of its own gravity field for them to brake against. Puar knew what this was without having to look it up. It was a Grid Point Nexus, and yet another piece of Star Force technology that did not require Essence.
It was a magnetic jump platform, and it would allow them to travel far faster than you could with normal gravity drives. They’d have to hitch a ride on a much bigger carrier ship, but it would take them all the way down to the ‘Hula Hoop’ that circled the inside of Star Force territory in the galaxy, as well as marking the exterior boundary of what had been the V’kit’no’sat empire.
Now that neighboring territory was a war zone, but one through which Star Force could travel, for neither the V’kit’no’sat nor the Zak’de’ron wished to make an enemy of Star Force. They were too busy tearing out each other’s throats to take on another fight, so Puar had been assured they’d pass through easy enough, for there were designated travel routes that the war would not touch. And those routes led to the bases along the war zone from which Star Force was organizing its evacuation efforts for the locals that couldn’t or wouldn’t move out of harm’s way, for as odd as it sounded, many didn’t even know what a Hadarak was, let alone were aware of the fleets heading their way until they arrived on their doorstep.
Sadly most of Star Force’s fleet was still inside the Temples, fighting the Caretakers and making sure the Vargemma didn’t reclaim dominance, but some ships had returned to the galaxy, such as in Kappa, now that the Paladin had grown to such numbers to replace them. Those ships were now actively engaged in the fight against the Hadarak, trying to hold them back in certain places so the evacuation efforts could get their job done before the enemy arrived.
But that’s not where Puar was going. They were going to the places where the Hadarak already were and Star Force was fighting on planet to keep them at bay while the evacuation ships did their work. Puar felt like a natural fit for that assignment, despite the fact he’d never done anything like it before. And he was glad they were now at a Grid Point, because that meant they would be getting to the war front that much faster.
His ship didn’t have to wait long, skipping ahead in line to dock with a spindly, yet massive carrier ship that wrapped their vessel in support pylons and energy shields, then it launched off the magnetic platform so fast Puar could actually see the stars moving outside the ship.
Star Force’s empire was truly awe inspiring, and he was proud to be a tiny, tiny part of it. If the Founders ever showed up in this galaxy, he doubted there would be a fight left for the Vargemma to make. Star Force was going to deal with it here and now, and Puar was very grateful not to be one of those ignorant dopes sitting back in the Temple doing nothing to help.
The fight was here and now, and Star Force was waging it. And from the look of their magnificence, Puar truly believed they might be on par with the Founders. Perhaps even superior, for the training he’d done in the past months had taught him many things the Temple never had.
He didn’t know the true nature of the universe. He was a tiny Trigorma caught up in the clash of superior empires. All he could do was tackle what approached him when it did, but one thing he was certain of now. Star Force was somewhere he was comfortable calling ‘home.’ He couldn’t explain why, but he felt it. He felt is as surely as anything he’d encountered over the course of his 178,238 year life. This was where he was meant to be, and now that he’d earned his way here, he was never going to leave.
Star Force needed Essence-capable troops to fight the Hadarak, and he was glad to answer the call. He had a new pack now, as did the other Varkemma. And the sooner he could draw Hadarak blood alongside his new pack the better to cement the bond. A few months now, and he’d be at the war zone.
He just wished it was tomorrow. As all the Varkemma onboard his ship did.
8
June 23, 128691
System 3992007 (Hadarak War Zone)
Middle Stellar Orbit
The trip through the galaxy changed Puar as much as his time in Redemption did. From the instruction of the Archon to his interaction with the other Varkemma and the starship’s crew, he emerged at the end of the journey not as an outsider looking in, but a true member of Star Force eagerly awaiting his chance to start paying back the empire for all that it had done for him. And today was that day.
Puar waited in an observation room with the other Varkemma as they watched the hologram of the system on approach. Their ship was a tiny dot traveling on a visible jumpline that led into the star. The closer they got the more the destination system filled out and the star itself began to grow in size. When they finally got within its significant gravity well the starship began to brake, with the path it traveled on the jumpline now marked in red as if it were leaving skid marks in space.
The system zoomed in rapidly as it did so, eventually leaving a star the size of Puar’s head floating to the far right with the ship dot in the center of the room. Judging by the distance they had not entered low stellar orbit as was regular, but had over-braked in order to come to a halt far from it. Several Star Force beacons were active in the system and constantly broadcasting, which allowed the transport to get an immediate update on what was happening and where without having to wait for the signal lag of their own sensors to tell them.
The fur on Puar’s back rose as he saw icons for Hadarak vessels pop up on the map in low stellar orbit, and they were not just minions. There were no Wardens there, but there were larger ‘warship’ versions along with clouds of minions waiting to ambush anyone coming into the system. Puar’s ship had dodged them by coming in shallow, and the only reason they could do th
at was because of Star Force’s immense engine technology. Otherwise they’d have had to take the last leg at a snail’s pace in order to avoid hitting that ambush.
But the Hadarak couldn’t cover an entire system, and this far out the space around them was clear for now, but they weren’t staying put. His ship was already moving insystem towards the 3rd planet and accelerating slowly due to the inopportune gravity pulls. As a new jumpline appeared Puar saw that it was curved, meaning they were not just pulling on their destination but using other gravity wells in the system as well to speed their transit. That meant they couldn’t travel on a straight line if they wanted the maximum speed possible, so their course ended up looking like a shallow bow angling outward from the star in the direction of a not so near gas giant.
Around that gas giant were several moons, and they were covered in Hadarak icons along with markers indicating where there had previously been inhabitation that was now overrun and tagged as totally destroyed. The 3rd planet had none, but there were still some Hadarak activity on the barren planet.
Puar waited patiently, and when they got near the 3rd planet a few minions tried to intercept them, but they weren’t fast enough. The transport used some of its momentum to slingshot around the planet to a new micro jumpline and launched on it without coming to a full stop. The sideways momentum was nulled out enroute, and the holographic map zoomed ahead to show their destination and two other planets nearby that particular slice of the system.
Both were covered in Hadarak icons, but one of them had a Warden on it…or in it. It was partially visible, but most of its mass was sunk into the crust with armies of minions moving around on the surface, and probably below it, bringing back materials to feed it from the crust while it sipped on magma straight out of the planet from below.
That planet had large swaths of it with visible inhabitation, broken but completely devoid of anything but Hadarak life. The other planet as well was equally devastated, but no Warden had landed on it. That planet, their destination, also had Hadarak icons on it, a large fleet in space, but their work wasn’t done yet. Two thirds of the planet were still inhabited, and there were a number of Star Force vessels holding position over the natives and providing them cover while large transport vessels were pulling them up off the surface via thousands of dropships running constantly like bees moving around a hive.
“There we are,” the veteran Varkemma said, folding his arms and thumping his tail on the deck plate twice to get everyone’s attention. “Just like we told you. We’re losing the planet and the forces arrayed against us are too large to defeat. That Warden can smash anything it wants just by landing on it, but for the moment it doesn’t seem to care about the evacuation. There aren’t enough Star Force warships here to do anything more than delay the conquest. They’ll provide our air cover while we delay the ground assault. Doing so a mere hour will save tens of thousands of lives.”
He pointed to the Star Force icons clustered together into defensive herds above the planet.
“Those transports are designed for tight packing, and the fact that there are so many here means they’re empty. As soon as they fill up they leave, and as more come in they park and wait while sending their dropships to help fill the first in line. When it leaves its dropships go with it, but they all work to fill a single ship at a time in order to get them out of the warzone as soon as possible. Less to defend that way.”
“Also, multiple evac points. Looks like there are 3 transports loading from different continents. That reduces the flight time of the dropships. Everything is maximized to get the most people off and clear of the system. They don’t have enough of a blockade to stop the transports from leaving, so once they get moving they’ll make it out. Getting them out of orbit is the only issue, and it looks like there’s a decent defense fleet to do that. Otherwise they would have been overrun already.”
“Get geared up. In an hour, maybe two, you’ll be hitting atmosphere in teams with assigned targets. Do not waste your Essence on the little shit. There are too many to kill. Let your escorts handle them and take out your targets. Those the fleet drones are either too busy to deal with, or they’re too armored for them to deal with quickly. The more pressure we can take off them, the more of the little shit they can clean away far faster than you can. They’re the sweepers, you’re here for specific targets. Do not get distracted,” he emphasized, then thumbed over his shoulder towards the door.
Puar went with the others, lazily walking down the halls knowing time was not crunched. This was the moment he’d been waiting for, but now that he was here he was scared. Not because he felt he’d fail his mission, but because they were outnumbered and if they weren’t organized correctly they’d get slaughtered. Plus that Warden could kill any of them it wanted, and the thought of going onto the planet without a way to defend against it made him very uneasy. The ship could run away, but on the ground he had nowhere to go if that monster appeared in the sky overtop of him. It was 128 miles wide, meaning he couldn’t run fast enough to avoid it if it came down.
Reganno had spoken of trust, and now Puar realized what that meant. They were throwing themselves into an enemy they couldn’t defeat in order to save as many people as they could that were otherwise as good as dead. It felt reckless, but also right. Puar was just shaking because he’d never done this, on any level, and the sooner he had something to focus on doing he’d be alright. He had to be.
He got armored up with the others, then they boarded their own dropships with his containing only four Varkemma. The others were biped, two of which were smaller than him and one larger. He was the strongest Essence user amongst them by far, leaving him with defacto command, though his battlemap would be giving him the direction needed once they got to ground, just as it now showed him in his helmet their fast approach to the planet and emergency braking just above the atmosphere where several drone warships were waiting and already in conflict with minion swarms.
The transport’s own weapons opened up as soon as it came within range, and the drones moved to escort position, soaking up damage while shooting down most of the minions that tried to race past…not to damage the giant ship, but to ram it and deposit IDF goo on the shields that would momentarily slow it until the shields modulated and in effect shoved it off.
There weren’t enough minions to kill his ship, but there were enough to kill the drones without their help if they stayed to fight. The timing was well planned, for before their shields got to the breaking point the drones withdrew along with the transport around the curve of the planet and down into the atmosphere above a ‘safe’ zone where many more drones were floating low over the ground and shooting ground minions as they tried to get into the urban areas that had been designated as evac zones for dropship pickup.
Puar could see immediately that the drones could only cover small patches of land, but with them roaming quickly they could intercept waves coming towards the natives. It wasn’t perfect, but there were Star Force troops on the ground, both commandos and mechs, to fill in some of the gaps…but that’s not where his team was going.
His dropship launched from the transport before it even came to a stop, with the winged craft hitting the atmosphere hard and slicing through it as they picked up some aerial support from a squadron of skeets. Puar didn’t know if they were manned or not, but they acted as an extra layer of protection as his ship flew towards its destination and his team got their orders.
They were in the form of text only, for there was way too much going on for the Archon to issue them direct explanations, but the text along with maps and graphics was sufficient enough to make Puar’s adrenaline rush.
Your target is an approaching Dumbo-class Ultra minion. Its armor is sufficient to stand up against direct naval bombardment long enough to allow minion waves to approach the city. If the navy targets the minions instead, the Dumbo will get within range and begin attacking the city with lobbed corrosive nodules that detonate on impact or above the city, rainin
g either directly destructive fluids or biological weapons, some varieties of which infect and take over the host body, turning them into weapons for the Hadarak. Others consume the host and cause it to produce more biological agent, spreading further in an expanding cloud of hazardous vapor.
Allowing the Dumbo proximity to the city is automatic failure. Allowing it physical access to the city will jeopardize any entrenched defenses, for its armored limbs function as battering rams. Conventional weapons are next to useless except in large amounts, meaning ground troops have no effective counter against it. Mech combat must be extensive to disable it. Naval bombardment is the best option, but with limited assets the distraction will allow the minions to swarm the city. This is also failure.
Your team must intercept and destroy the Dumbo before it can reach the city using your Essence weaponry. Be warned, the Dumbo is capable of self-defense and is surrounded by escorting minions, meaning you will have to fight your way to it. Strike swiftly. Prolonged engagement gives the Hadarak the advantage.
“How can we conserve Essence and fight our way to the target?” Keel’vo asked.
“Look,” Puar urged as the battlemap was updated with their eventual landing zone, even as the skeet squadron around them spread out and began to engage isolated Hadarak aerial units moving to intercept them. “There is a unit already on the ground we are joining.”
“Scionate?” Juuma noted. “They’re smaller versions of you, right?”
“They are smaller,” Puar agreed, “but far inferior. This unit has no Essence users. They are commandos only, and fast ones. You will be the slowest. Move at maximum speed or we will become easier targets.”
“I can keep up with you,” he insisted.
“No, you can’t,” Puar said with a huff.