by Aer-ki Jyr
“And that one?” Steve asked, pointing towards the center.
“We do not know. They were not using it in recent memory, though some of the prisoners were resistant to mind raids.”
“Most were just here to flip switches, right?”
“Yes. They knew little. And the memories of those operations do not make sense to me.”
“Show me,” Steve said, already having reviewed the intel previously, but he hadn’t actually ran through the memory downloads. Those were very inaccurate when passed around, so using the reports the Mind Raiders made was what the Paladin protocol demanded, but if he could glean even a little out of the perspectively distorted mess, it would save him a lot of trial and error.
Another Paladin stepped forward with a small memory crown, which Steve placed on his head along with the jewel-like datachip that he inserted into it. The Mind Raiders had imprinted their own memories of the interrogation into the datachip afterwards, and Paladin minds were not very complicated early in life, making it easy for Steve to sort through what they’d seen…the problem was, without intuition, they had a damn hard time categorizing new things, and what it felt like to operate Essence equipment was totally foreign to them.
But not to Steve, so he was able to get the gist of it. These controls were not just push button, but depth gages. How much Essence you put into a node did different things, making the available ‘keyboard’ a great deal larger than Steve had imagined.
With the silvery crown still on his head, the trailblazer walked over to one of the outer stations and raised a hand. He ran his fingertips down one of the angled edges and released some Essence into the trim. It wasn’t a button, but a receptacle that powered the station. When he did so it lit up, but only to Essence view. There was text and even visual monitors of a sort, though since it wasn’t using light it looked very splotchy. Like a kid drawing with finger paints, then throwing water on top of it, so maybe he wasn’t interpreting it properly, but at least the monitors were on.
And what they were showing him was multiple views of the barrier shield status and the nebula around them. Thrawn’s ships didn’t show up, which was odd. Why would you have external sensors that couldn’t see anything…
“Essence-based technology,” he whispered. “You can only detect Essence rushes, and probably big ones at that. I bet this is a Hadarak detector.”
“Are you receiving information from it?” the first researcher asked.
“Yes, but it’s odd. I can see it, but it’s hazy to say the least. I can see the exterior of the Temple, but not our fleet. The nebula only shows up as a perimeter line. I don’t think it’s actually detecting it, just has it marked for when a Hadarak shows up. Any other monitors in here?” he asked, already knowing the answer.
“Not that the Vargemma knew of. That’s the only one they monitored.”
“Then I bet it picks up ships hitting the barrier. That’ll be a shield disruption. Maybe the Knights of Quenar were too small probing it in person for it to show up.”
“Perhaps they did not alter the shield with their interaction…”
“Good point. It’d probably take a big Essence interaction to dent it, ship scale, to even show up. And when they do they can allow them entry, but how?” Steve asked, moving to the other noted station on the perimeter. He swiped his hand across the outer edge, powering up the Founder Arcade game with his 25 cents worth of Essence, but getting nothing more than a blank screen.
“Hope it’s not broken,” Steve half joked. “Send a message to Thrawn immediately. Tell him to start knocking on the door. We may not be able to unlock it until somebody asks to be let in.”
“You want him to attack or attempt passage?”
“Passage. I don’t think the Vargemma have any idea we have a fleet outside. I bet they think the Paladin came in through the Bridge or some other means. Or maybe they think our ships don’t have Stargate drives installed so there’s no point…no, wait, there’s got to be some way to let ships in that aren’t equipped. Do you have anything on Vargemma coming in by any other means?”
“All enter through the portals, but many exit without them. All Caretaker vessels enter and leave through the portals.”
“Before or after we blew up their outpost?”
“We detected no difference in their memories. The stations were a type of encoder.”
Steve frowned. “Explain.”
“Ships that did not have Essence capability were able to be coated in it, then sent to the Temple.”
“Are you sure about that? I thought all their ships were Essence capable.”
“They might be capable, but they were not using their own Essence for the travel prior to the destruction of the outpost. The outpost had its own Essence reserve that had to be charged by the Vargemma, for the Caretakers would not service it. We believe it was built of Founder technology, but of Vargemma construction to facilitate entry and exit of the Temple network.”
“So it’s a cheat they built?”
“That’s our theory based off the traffic logs.”
“Then how were ships supposed to get in and out with Founder blessing?”
“Everything they need is here. Perhaps they did not intend for regular commerce with the outside.”
“No,” Steve said, shaking his head. “The Responder mentioned another means…wait. What kind of Founder technology was used in the outposts? Is there a facility here that’s designed to build them?”
“Not a full station, but Stargate engines are built by the Caretakers upon request.”
“And stationary portals?”
“No. Those are exclusive to the Temple architecture.”
“But there are encoders,” another Paladin differed. “Short range stuff. They use them to get from one position in the Temple to another.”
“I was unaware of that,” the first researcher noted.
The other green lizard pointed to a niche in the wall behind them near the door Steve had entered through. “One of the Vargemma escaped through there when this facility was taken. I was with the initial team inside and overheard the Skirmishers searching for an exit. They found none and did not discover someone hiding in this facility.”
“That did not appear in the Mind Raider interrogations.”
“Perhaps because they were not aware of it. I have no conclusive proof, only deduction, but there have been reports from other teams…”
“He’s right,” Steve said, accessing the battlemap and using his Sav-enhanced mind to search through millions of reports with those parameters. “There’s a lot of disappearances that were not explained, and some of them indicated these wall depressions as a possible sort of escape hatch, but upon deconstruction they found nothing. This one hasn’t been touched, right?”
“Correct.”
“Then they may be able to get a small strike force in here that way. Damn. I need Cora in here. Whatever comes through is going to be badass.”
“Can we disable it?” one of the large Dragoon guards asked.
“If we start tearing apart the tower the Caretakers will try to stop us,” Steve said, tapping against the side of his leg as he thought. “And there’s nothing stopping someone from Stargating through the walls anyway if they get close enough to sense the Essence Rush from the equipment. I’d rather know which direction they’re coming from, so we leave it intact and set an ambush.”
“Cora,” he said, accessing the battlemap and seeing her mech kicking Vargemma ass, much as he’d expected. “I need your Saiyan blood in here now. There’s an VIP access point that they can use to get a Terminator in here if we manage to get the shield breached. I can’t fight and operate the door handle at the same time.”
“Tunnel?”
“No, a Stargate portal. The Paladin think it might be an intra-Temple travel grid for the higher ups. One was seen leaving here when the facility was taken. I’m pretty damn sure they’ll send something back when they find out what we’re about to do.”
/> “Damn it, it’s not exactly going well out here. Some of these bastards are using disintegrators to chip away at our legs, and I can’t tell which ones can and can’t. They all look the same.”
“I need you here. We’re the only ones that can fight with Essence. The Paladin will be slaughtered if even one gets through.”
“Heading back,” she said evenly.
“Go unseal the main door,” he told the Dragoons. “I welded them shut.”
The Thrawn-sized Paladin nodded and two of them left to get the doors open for the other trailblazer as four remained on site guarding the researchers…with most of their attention now on the indentation in the wall that had previously only appeared decorative.
Cora was not happy leaving her mech, but she understood the situation. They hadn’t expected to fight hand to hand if the Paladin could hold the perimeter, but if there was a backdoor way in for a handful of people, then Steve was right that they were going to be elite troops they’d send, and the Paladin had wisely avoided all such combat when possible, pulling back and fighting from range. The Vargemma had so many Essence techniques it was going to be hard to defeat them if they didn’t play by the no-kill rules, and if it meant stopping the entry of the Star Force reinforcement fleet into the Temple, she didn’t count on them holding back.
When she got back to the tower she hopped over the defensive barricades and headed upstairs, finding Steve fiddling with one of the odd work stations as a slew of Paladin surrounded the room, all pointing weapons towards one empty wall niche.
“That the portal?” she asked.
“How’d you guess,” Steve said without looking at her. “I think I’ve got this figured out, and if it works we should be able to get a few ships in before they notice.”
“Do it.”
“I’m waiting for Thrawn. They have to knock first.”
“Can you pick the portal they will come through?” she asked, staring at the wall niche.
“Um…not sure yet. I think it’ll give me options once the first ships touches the barrier. We’ll have to play it by ear.”
“As always,” Cora said, keeping her armor fully on as she walked up and stared at the point on the wall. “How is this thing supposed to work?”
“Probably a personal charge.”
“Can we jamb it with an outgoing bubble?”
“No clue. Don’t mess with it yet.”
“I won’t,” she promised, looking over the few Essence input nodes/switches in it. “Were you playing with it earlier?”
“No, why?”
“There’s a residual effect. Like a drawdown after use. I can barely see the buttons as is. This might be an invisible portal after it fades away. One that you can only use if you know where to throw some Essence. These input ports are not normal.”
“Fascinating. We can discuss it after we deal with whatever comes through.”
“We may have to kill them,” Cora pointed out, “in order to hold this location.”
“Try not to, or we’ll have two armies to deal with.”
“I’m just saying…”
She left it at that as they all waited patiently inside while the war raged beyond. Cora monitored the battlemap and issued a few orders where she felt appropriate, but the Paladin knew what they were doing. The trailblazers had helped encode their genome with the proper procedures, but you couldn’t program intuitiveness and adaptation. You had to figure those out as you gained experience, and the Paladin here had some, but not much. Fortunately the Vargemma were not well equipped or that bright, but like always they had numbers. It was the added Essence weaponry that really made things dicey though.
Eventually the display that only Steve and Cora could see altered, with a single marker popping up and, like Steve had guessed, had several commands with it that he could choose from.
“Hold on. Here we go,” he said, choosing a link to the portal nearest their current location, but one still thousands of miles away.
As soon as he did so the exterior marker disappeared and the real time battlemap monitoring of the inside of the Temple showed the portal slick over with the pseudo water effect…then a moment later a ship winked into existence sticking partway out of it.
A Knights of Quenar ship.
“It worked!” Steve said as a slew of additional markers popped up on the exterior of the Temple once they saw the first ship get pulled inside. “We have a KoQ battlecruiser inside now.”
“Welcome to the Party,” Cora said inside her helmet as she sent a signal out through the Paladin relays to disguise her current situation. “Get to this location now and defend it without killing anyone or the Caretakers will join in the fight against you.”
“Are you secure?” a Knight of Quenar responded.
“Not for long. I don’t think they knew about the ships waiting outside,” she said as another ship came through the same portal as more shimmering puddles began to appear in all of them around the Temple interior, “or they would have taken this facility back by now. We’ve located a hidden Den’gar portal in the tower that they can use to send assassins to stop us, so get us some Essence-capable troops down here to hold it. There are only two of us right now with Paladin backup.”
“We will come immediately,” the KoQ said as another three of their ships emerged inside the Temple, but all at different locations, spread millions of miles apart. A second ship had emerged directly behind the first, but apparently the portal system was not fast enough to let them all enter all together, and Steve was right to get them in here as fast as possible before the Vargemma had a chance to really react.
“Cora, I have to do this manually for each ship.”
“Shit,” she said, keeping her eyes on the inactive portal before her. “How much Essence is it taking you?”
“I’m fine for a half hour or so. After that I might be in trouble.”
“I’ve got KoQ on the way to back us up. We just have to hold until they get here,” she said as the wall niche suddenly lit up visually. Red vertical bars appeared, broken at various points, then a shrill whistled followed. Probably warnings to get away so no accidental fusings took place. She and the Paladin were half a room away, with several of the lizard bodies physically blocking Steve as he mouse-clicked ship after ship inside.
Cora took a step closer, leaving the Paladin as flankers as she would draw the first attention of whatever came through, then unknown to the others due to her armor, her hair went blonde and her reflexes increased to nearly instantaneous as she waited for the pop of displaced air soon to come that would precede the first of many travelers hell bent on their destruction.
5
A ripple of air washed out from the momentary vacuum that was quickly replaced with the air from the travel bubble and the two individuals held within it. Both were Jestiv, standing some 8 feet tall and covered in feathers…but they couldn’t fly. They looked more like gorillas than birds, with more mass than a Calavari and T-shaped heads with a trio of eyes on each end.
As soon as they appeared the Paladin fired stun blasts at them, as did Cora from his wrist-mounted weaponry, seeing them hit shields on the unarmored Jestiv…then a flash blinded her, with her quickly purging the telepathic technique as she felt an attempted intrusion into her mind. Her Ikrid block prevented it, but the Saven-like psionic didn’t require access and worked its effect on the Paladin, keeping them blinded for several seconds.
Cora washed the effect away, having practiced against true Saven many times in the past to increase her rate of response…and then when her mind cleared she used her Ikrid to transmit the location of the two Jestiv to the others before they recovered, allowing them to start firing again enough to down the first of the intruders before it could act again, but not the other. Cora saw a brief Essence wave appear in front of her and she responded with a solid Essence barrier…but it wasn’t enough to stop her from being hit with a concussive Essence slap that threw her across the room and into the far wall.
&nb
sp; Her barrier actually held up, but was pushed back with her under extreme force…meaning these invaders weren’t run of the mill Vargemma. They were highly skilled Essence users.
As she bounced back up to her feet her body was caught in an Essence grip…as were all the Paladin. Their weapons turned upward and away from the standing Jestiv as the portal behind them begin to light up and whistle, indicating more were incoming. Cora was able to use her own Essence to push back against the grip just enough to slide out of it, but all the Paladin were stuck and they were in trouble and Steve knew it, for he sent a battlemeld prompt to Cora before likewise slipping out of the grip and abandoning his post, meaning for the moment no more ships could come through.
Both of them ran across the room, but not towards the Jestiv. They flanked it on either side, trying briefly to hack its mind, but as they suspected it had considerable telepathic defenses, so they extended a Neofen conduit between them, creating an invisible ‘clothesline’ that ran into the Jestiv and dragged him backwards as they passed, then with a little Lachka slap from them both, they rolled him into the portal…which caused it to temporarily deactivate due to the obstruction.
Steve got knocked aside by an Essence slap, but Cora launched a Jumat blast into the enemy and drove him back another meter as he tried to get out of the way to allow additional reinforcements in. The Paladin, with their limbs now free again, started firing and as the two Archons kept the Jestiv pinned, and enough of the blasts got through his weakened shields to hit his Essence barriers that replaced them. That provided enough of a distraction that the Jestiv couldn’t keep pushing Steve and Cora away from him over and over again, and soon Cora got within touching range and delivered a punch to his gut that a hasty Essence grip caught inches away from his chest.
Then Cora released a localized Fornax field that didn’t reach all the way back to the Paladin, and it caught the Jestiv off guard and lowered his defenses for a split second…allowing both her fist and a slew of stun shots to get through, with Cora’s armor absorbing some of the Paladin’s missed fire as well.