“These are the guys who are always calling the shots, so we know we'll see them when we get there.”
The hologram disintegrated and reformed as an even smaller, hunched form.
“Flogs,” Nathen said, passively but not dismissively. “This is speculation, but if the Yew are serious about holding the system for any length of time, they'll have their engineers on the ground building fortifications.”
The short, four-foot hologram looked even shorter with the stooped alien. The image of the Flog displayed its semi-streamlined form fairly well. The beastly, four-legged silhouette gave the false impression that it was non-intelligent, but the rugged engineer's uniform and tool straps belied that vision. Nathen knew that while they weren't geniuses, they were crafty. Flogs alternated between walking on all fours and standing erect, using their thick, rat-like tails for both balance and grounding. It had a wolfish grin that made Nathen suspicious, like the hologram knew something he didn’t. The hologram didn't show the wide range of tools, armor or attachments they normally wore, but the Flogs’ natural-born tunneling claws showed that this was a species that was born to move mountains.
Nathen tapped the table and the hologram changed. Drastically. The short, four-foot Flog suddenly distorted and morphed into a towering seven-foot tall, gray-skinned golem.
“And we of course need to mention the Golos, if we're thinking about the Flogs.”
Nathen leaned back in his seat, letting the hologram speak for itself. Thick hide, tough bones, strong muscles. The large, broad-chested ceremonial Yew uniform on the hulking mono-horned brute did little to disguise its bulging bulk of a body. One could easily believe that such a muscle-bound creature would only operate as a primitive. Despite the common rumor that called them muscle-headed brutes, Nathen knew better. Golo’s were deceitfully intelligent. The deadliest kind of foe.
Nathen shut down the war table and the hologram flickered out. The commander glanced about the room.
“And now let's talk about our other problem. The War Hive.”
Everyone sat forward, attentively. Calico looked confused.
“Wait. We're just going to talk about them? Why don't we look at holos?”
Nathen linked his fingers with a sigh. “We don't have any.”
Calico drew a blank stare. “How is that possible?”
“They're camera shy,” stated Kyler with a grin.
Nathen inhaled sharply and rested his elbows on the edge of the war table.
“Truth is the War Hive has been a bit of a veiled enigma to the Human Race. To say they are aloof is... not the word I'd use. The Insectoids, outside of enslaving or wiping out every race they can overpower, have little interest in communicating with other races.”
Nathen pointed a finger at his translator, laxly. “Example. How fluently do you speak Insectoid Khrip’Tck?”
Calico opened her mouth. Then she closed it. She started to open it again, then frowned, slumping into her seat, thoughtfully.
“See?” Nathen said, folding his arms over each other. “You can't speak it because there's never been any xenolinguistics program with the Insectoids. And how can there be? Half their communication is through the vibrations of membranes and scents. There's never been any diplomatic exchange, no trade contracts, no treaty.”
“There's a way,” Calico said, sitting up. “There's always a way to communicate. Maybe they just... don't understand us enough.”
“On the contrary,” said Nathen. “I think the War Hive understands us far better than we understand them.”
“How does that work if they have never had contact with us?”
“Because they're still intelligent,” came a voice from the rear.
Nathen and the Alphas turned toward the Captain, who was still sitting in the back of the second tier. Gordon lifted a hand with meaning.
“What's remarkable about them is that they've found a way to join together in their own version of unity that doesn't square with our idea of galactic civilization. We share the stars with the Sktish, the Serim, the Ra-Shem, Vigal, Drax. There was even a time, not so long ago, that we had friendly relations with the Yew Alliance. We make peace and wage wars, but always with a bottom line that respects the equal right of the combatants to exist.”
There was a dark, humorless chuckle.
“The War Hive knows no one can exist but them. To them, we are the bugs.”
Everyone was silent at the unnerving revelation of the Captain. Calico swallowed and looked at her commander.
“But how can they know anything about us if they've never made formal contact with our race?”
Nathen reached down and let his arm rest flat against the surface of the war table.
“They've had who knows how long to dabble in war, learning how we non-Insectoid's operate. Sktish, Vigal, the Yew. They may never have fought Humans before, but that doesn't mean they haven't planned ahead for it. They are well aware of us.”
The commander waved it off like the thought was an annoying fly. “But that's not our focus. We're not going to Cravac to fight the War Hive. We're going there to give the War Hive a little boost against the Yew.”
“Easier said than done,” Phillip grinned while idly messing with his datatech computer. “I mean, the Alliance has held the system this long. They're not going to lose it now.”
Nathen darted a glance at Calico.
“Unless they’re up against Warheads.”
Phillip stopped grinning.
Kyler smiled and leaned forward, suddenly much more interested. “Thes just got awesome.”
Calico leaned against the armrest of her chair, cringing slightly as she adjusted her seat. “Is someone going to explain to me what a Warhead is now?”
Nathen steepled his fingers together in front of his face and said nothing. Even the rest of the team, elite personas that they were, fumbled to find the right answer. Trent was the one who finally said it.
“It’s the most dangerous life form in the galaxy.”
Calico said nothing, but the explanation brought a lump to her throat she had to swallow. Nathen sighed, glancing up at the Captain before looking back to the war table.
“We're still gathering information on the War Hive,” Nathen said. “But we already know a few things. We know the War Hive Armada is comprised of ships ranging from Grade-D to Grade-A, and can mix it up with the Alliance Fleet. We know their technology is plasma based and is steadily improving, producing new, better machines and weapons virtually every year. We know their military discipline and infrastructure is amazingly complex, and they almost always outnumber their opponents. And we know that, out of all these things I've listed, there is no more terrifying weapon than a Warhead.”
Nathen heaved a big sigh, and plunged ahead.
“Picture, if you can, a thousand pounds of nerve and exoskeleton, powered by a being that was spawned in a dense atmosphere with heavy gravity, granting it not only the magnified strength of an insect, but a nearly uncrackable body that resists most known modern projectiles. Take that, and add three hundred pounds of Insectoid armor to it, making it virtually immune to energy weapons, plasma, and ice. Now, turn it into a cyborg with one oversized mechanical arm and give it a battle ax as wide as you are tall. Finally, take all this together, energize it with the combined horrors of your most aggressive and ruthless nightmares, and endow it with a charming little personality that gives it a bloodlust that can never be satisfied. Oh, and it eats its victims.”
Nathen looked at the others, confirming that this description matched their own.
“That’s a Warhead.”
Calico swallowed. “And we're going to fight one of these?”
“No,” Nathen said, shaking his head perhaps a bit too quickly. “We're not at war with the War Hive.” Nathen scanned the room and received knowing glances. “Yet. Even if we know the War Hive is coming for us eventually, we can't just show up with our fleets and bombard them unprovoked. That's what the Yew did to us.”
“And they deserve what's coming to them,” said Gordon, issuing a sinister growl. “I have no love for the War Hive, but I for one chose to fight the enemy who has declared themselves personally at war with my race. Currently, that solely includes the Yew Alliance.”
“And that, in a nutshell, is the premise of our mission,” Nathen said, bringing the briefing toward a close. “We are going to engage an enemy in theory and an enemy in fact, and provoke a little violence between them. Our focus is the Yew, and making them bleed themselves silly.” Nathen shrugged at the war table. “We currently have no tactical data on Cravac and enemy deployment, so we cannot plan our appropriate action until we arrive. However, we have...”
Nathen looked up at Gordon. The Captain nodded to the Commander.
“Twenty-two hours.”
“…twenty-two hours until we arrive in the Menturion System. I want weapons checks. Equipment tests. Strategy simulations. Enemy combat speculations. Anything you can think of that we would need to prepare against both the Yew Alliance and the War Hive. Griffin's, using what outdated information we have, plot entry routes for the Hybrids and calculate flight data for a natural atmospheric cycle planetoid like this. Make sure rotary blade flight isn't compromised. Everyone to your duties. We'll hold another briefing after we arrive in-system and gain an overview of what we're up against. Until then,” Nathen stood, as did the rest of the team. “Dismissed.”
Chapter 16
:Menturion System:
The Menturion System. A middle ground in the Solar War. One that had little or no overall value, other than it was virtually uninhabited and therefore ideal for skirmishes. The sixth planet from the system’s Sun, the planet known as Cravac, was semi-undisturbed; “semi-” because the actual fighting was done on the planet’s moon, not the planet itself. The gas giant was huge, by far the largest body around the system's star; practically large enough to swallow all the other planets in the system combined. Such mass allowed for a large moon, one that could support its own atmosphere and ecosystem. It was on this moon that the actual blood was being spilled.
But for now, things were quiet. Both sides were taking a break to muster their forces for the next gruesome battle. The Yew ships hung low in the moon’s orbit, fearful of getting sucked into Cravac's superior gravitational pull. The War Hive vessels—specifically designed to withstand turbulent gravitational pull—patrolled the host gas giant's equator, watching their foes from a distance. This was their preferred strategy, avoiding direct confrontation and performing discreet surveillance… Then blitzing full force without a second’s notice. The ground forces on the moon were preparing themselves for the imminent battle. Both sides were watching each other intently, well aware that the first side to blink would likely receive a frontal assault. Nobody was prepared for the shadowy dagger that was about to arrive.
Out beyond the immense mass of the sun and past the circling orbits of celestial bodies, the Menturion System’s gravitational pull faded to a mild presence. Beyond the furthest planet's orbit, the vast void of space displayed as a silk screen of sparkling stars and nebula on a sheet of black velvet. It was a peaceful starscape which was suddenly shattered.
Three blinding flashes, each within a second of each other, emitted from the jagged tear in realspace. On the third flash, a ship’s double-pronged silver spearhead shot from the rupture of hyperspace. Its rear-mounted thruster engines blazed with energy, marking its exit trajectory from hyperspace with a rapidly vanishing fire. The single, massive hyperspace engine slowly powered down, allowing the superluminal gateway to seal behind the sleek ship. The mobile headquarters fired its frontal maneuvering jets, slowing it to a safe speed as it drifted in-system.
At the top of the mobile headquarters, the slanted armor shielding of the bridge slid back like the visor on a medieval helmet, revealing the ever-busy crew working about their controls. Centered over the command pit, Gordon Bryor sat steady in his captain's chair as the crash webbing retracted into its unseen slots. Nathen stood beside him, gripping the high back chair with one hand for stability. The de-acceleration from hyperspace re-entry had pitched everyone forward, but no one was reporting injury.
Nathen rubbed the back of his neck and cracked it. “Dropping into realspace always gives me a crick in the neck.”
Gordon didn't respond and immediately centered his attention to the sensor operator's report, staring at the display as it began mapping out the Menturion System. The first things to appear were the inner system planets, and of course, Cravac. The gas giant dominated the system with its presence, dwarfing its moon, where the real action lay. It was almost too distant, but Haven Alpha's state of the art long-range sensors picked up over a dozen enemy ship signatures right away.
“I don’t see their main defense fleet,” said Gordon, reading the data. The captain frowned, stroking his beard thoughtfully. “In their position… Yes… They probably have a strong orbital defense grid.”
“Will it be trouble?” Nathen asked.
“Not for us,” Gordon said, dismissively. “Haven Alpha can slip in under phase conditions easily. The Alliance likely has a ground base that can project jamming telemetry up to their tactical defense satellites. It’s possible they cracked this particular War Hive’s fleet frequencies and have their targeting and navigational data good and throttled. Makes fleet defense much easier.”
“How many craft are in orbit right now?”
“Only one carrier and its support. Probably already used most of its forces up.” Gordon pointed his hand at the image of the majestic Yew carrier. “Although… I would not mind removing such a tempting target from the equation.”
“Don’t get ahead of yourself,” Nathen warned. “We want the War Hive to do the dirty work for us. If a Human ship started pumping rail gun rounds into a critical Yew command craft, it might accelerate their need for retaliation. We need to approach this delicately.”
“Yes,” Gordon said, absorbed in thought. “Of course…”
Nathen frowned, analyzing the lack of enemies in view. “This empty orbit could be bad news for us. The rest may have already pulled out, which means the situation has stabilized in their favor. Or the main fleet could be on its way. Let’s try and be quick and…”
Nathen was cut off by a single red strobe from a proximity alarm.
“Contact, in-close!” reported Gordon's sensor operator.
“Report,” Gordon barked, staying calm but urgent. While the sensor operator tried to get a fix on the details, Haven Alpha's navigation expert turned in her seat to look up out of the command pit.
“Proximity mapping shows a ship off our port side. Tonnage suggests... frigate class, at least.”
“Range.”
“Approximately five light seconds.”
“Tripping over damn cats in the dark…” muttered Gordon. “Give me light.”
The vidscreen image of the distant orbit of Cravac suddenly changed to a port side shot of deep space, which promptly zoomed in and enhanced. There, barely visible to the eye against the black of space, was a sinister-looking hull like a crumpled wolf’s head, sneering with black streams breaking off its prow.
It was a Human ship; a Demolisher-class Mark IV battle frigate.
“What the spit are they doing here?” Nathen asked out loud.
No one answered. The ship was still many miles away, but Haven’s advanced magnification made it look like they were right outside the window. At five light seconds, the ship was several hundred thousand miles out of weapons range, but with a whistle it could be on them in a second. And as they watched, the frigate changed course and began nosing its way into an intercept jump course with the mobile headquarters.
“Nosey joystick jockeys,” Gordon commented, harshly. “They’re coming to investigate our hyperspace bleed off.”
“Sir, I have a tight beam directing at us.”
“Then they know we're here,” Gordon said, resting back in his chair. “And they're close, if they can beam o
ur comms. Give me identification.”
During that second, waiting for the results, the bridge fell completely silent. Tight-beam communications were relatively short range. If the ship turned out to be hostile, there would be little time for Haven Alpha to turn to meet the threat. A moment passed where everyone held their breath, then a camera feed from the port side of the mobile headquarters snapped as the Demolisher made the five second light jump in the blink of an eye, coming back into realspace just a mile from Haven Alpha. A risky move, assuming the captain of the battle frigate didn't know who he was jumping on top of. The black-streaked starship slowly pulled in toward the mobile headquarters, crumpled wolf’s head angling down to give range to its full weapons deck. Nathen could feel the entire room holding its breath.
Though roughly the same tonnage as Haven Alpha, the weapons of the outdated Demolisher class battle frigate didn't hold a candle to the deceitfully deadly mobile headquarters. Still, the captain of the incoming frigate didn't seem to realize this, and continued to probe Haven with its short range tight beam, searching for its communication's room. Gordon glanced over his shoulder at Nathen with the veiled annoyance at having his cover blown by a friendly, and activated the short range-hailing channel, directing the transmission to the frigate.
“Identify yourself, Demolisher frigate.”
There was little more than two second's pause before the reply came back.
“Unidentified ship, this is the battle frigate Sledgefast. If you don't want a demonstration of our namesake, I would suggest you transmit your ID to us now.”
Gordon choked off the transmission and looked back at Nathen with an amused scoff.
“Plucky,” the Captain said. “What alias should I give him?”
Nathen thought about it, smirking humorlessly. “Let's go with Captain White.”
Gordon turned back around and switched the transmission back on. “This is Captain White of advanced recon frigate Julias II. We are transmitting our ID code now.”
Prime Alpha (Planetary Powers Book 1) Page 19