Battleframe (The Mindwars Book 1)

  General Alban looked at the envelopes as if they were poisonous snakes and said, “I’ve given messages like them to wives and children too many times over the years. Whizzbang, you’re going to make it through this.”

  “All the same, we’d all appreciate it if you could forward them on.”

  “It would be an honour Commander. Let the others know that the messages will be sent through.” Glancing up at an instrument she said, “OK, we’re coming up to the drop point. You’d better get back there. I’ll look for the explosions and see you in a couple of hours.”

  “Good bye General.”

  “Good luck Commander.” Then awkwardly swinging around in her seat General Alban saluted Whizzbang with her two fingers to the chest and then to the sky. “You won’t ever be alone.”

  Whizzbang smiled, “Thank you General,” and then left to head down to the launch bay and the rest of his squad.

  Coming down the steps from the cockpit Whizzbang looked across at his son who was now a Lieutenant in the Concord. He had already seen and won more battles than most people had ever dreamed. Bosk and Elzetro were talking quietly together while DG and Kheldar were being their normal selves, cracking a few jokes with Pyro. Whizzbang was proud of these friends, and he prayed that nothing would happen to any of them.

  He cleared his throat and then chuckled at it being unnecessary. He thought, “Gentlemen, it’s time.”

  Five sets of eyes turned to meet his.

  “I just want to say that I’m proud to be leading you and…”

  “Would you shut up,” Bosk replied. “It sounds to me like you were about to give one of those movie speeches before a big battle where half the people don’t come back and the hero dies.”

  Everyone, including Whizzbang laughed, “Bosk, where would we be without you? You’ve known me way too long. Remember that we’re going to be stretching the glide so keep your height and follow my lead. What I would like to do is say a few words of prayer though, anything that will give us an edge.”

  Pyro thought, “Let me Dad.”

  Whizzbang nodded.

  “God, keep us safe, may we destroy the Barrier and take out this base. Amen.”

  “Well, that was short and sweet,” said Elzetro.

  Pyro replied defensively, “If I was God, I’d want prayers to be like battlespeak. So that makes it short and to the point.”

  “It was a good prayer son. We couldn’t want any more than that.”

  Everyone nodded in agreement. Just then the light indicating the jump point changed from red to green and Whizzbang went into rapport with the General, “We’re ready here, open the back door General and see you in a couple of hours if not sooner.”

  “CT Commander, good luck,” Alban replied.

  The back door to the drop ship slowly descended and the airframe shuddered a few times until the control surfaces compensated for the sudden disruption in the aerodynamics. Whizzbang and the squad reached up to the handholds dangling from the roof until the door had fully descended.

  Looking out the open back ramp-way, Whizzbang could see the squadron of drop ships following their lead. He sent out a questing thought to the other strike leaders, “Look after yourself and when we call, come down in speed.”

  Selfia answered on behalf of them all, “We’ll be there Commander. Take care of yourselves.”

  “Will do Self. See you on Alpha Three!”

  Whizzbang turned to his squad and thought, “Ready?”

  “G2G,” came five replies.

  Whizzbang had jumped off mountains and had even searched out the highest points on Alpha Three to extend his time in the air. Jumping out of a drop ship at thirty five thousand feet was like nothing he had experienced before. Once clear of the aircraft the jet stream, over this part of the world, slammed into him and tossed him about like a leaf hurtling down a flooded stream. When he finally energised his glider wings, the sudden deceleration threatened to squish him against his battleframe.

  He sent a thought to the squad, “All wings deployed?”

  “G2G” came five replies followed by Pyro saying, “Remind me to put some cushions in my battleframe the next time we do this Dad.”

  “Good advice Pyro,” Elzetro chimed in.

  “OK guys, on my six. We’ve got a long glide ahead.” Whizzbang ordered

  The six battleframes swung into a “V” formation and Whizzbang referred to his wrist-comp to ensure that they remained on course. The General had dropped them a long way out so that she would not be detected and a Scourge party be arranged in their honour upon arrival.

  Peering through his Charge riflescope Whizzbang could see an enormous wall surrounding a structure that would have been at least three times bigger than Central Command. Two massive towers stood on the far side of a domed structure in the centre of the compound. Enormous purple lightning bolts crackled up and down the towers in great pulsing waves of energy. Whizzbang thought to himself, “Those towers are big. Really big!”

  Whizzbang subconsciously tweaked his glide angle upwards to slow his descent and reduce the airspeed. He knew that behind him the rest of the squad would be doing likewise. If possible, it would be better to have a little bit of extra height when they made their final approach. The reduced speed would also give him additional time to survey the structure.

  “Bosk, you seeing this?”

  “I’m just looking at it now. It’s big isn’t it?”

  “Yep” Whizzbang thought back. “Do you think we can clear the wall in the glide?”

  “We should be fine. I think the right hand side is a little lower as the terrain dips down there.”

  Whizzbang glanced over his shoulder at the sinking sun. “That’s probably a good direction to come in from. Any Scourge sentries will be looking into the sun as we approach.”

  Whizzbang adjusted his direction slightly to the right and thought to the squad, “Gentlemen, we’re about to penetrate the Barrier. Stay on me.”

  Pyro could not resists sending back, “Locking X-foils into attack position.”

  Elzetro immediately replied, “Look at the size of that thing!”

  Kheldar laughed across the mental link at the movie parody and said, “Cut the chatter Elzetro. Remember to stay on target.”

  There were a few laughs as the tension gave way to comradery. “They are the best,” Whizzbang thought to himself. What the Scourge did not realise was ‘The StarBlade’ was not one but six and they were on their way.

  Hitting the Barrier at fifteen thousand feet did nothing to their glide slope. The now familiar tiny purple sparks fired off the length of their bodies for ten seconds and then everything was normal with a tinge of purple. Whizzbang turned off his local comnet as the Scourge jamming static became too distracting. Besides, with telepathy he did not need his headset anymore. Bringing his Charge riflescope up to his eye, he could just make out two sniper class Scourge sentries walking the top of the wall. Dropping into battlespeak he ordered, “Bosk, Sniper left, I’m right. On my mark.”

  “CT Whizz, Sniper left mine.”

  Coming in with the sun behind them, they would be almost invisible to the sentries on the wall but Whizzbang left nothing to chance and waited until the last possible moment before revealing themselves with a blue Charge rifle beam. Broadcasting to Bosk he said, “Three, two, one, mark.”

  On the word “mark” the two sentries quite literally lost their heads as both their skulls were punctured by two intense blue beams of energy. Whizzbang ignored the Snipers bodies and the squad silently glided over the wall into the compound below. Once landed they all scurried behind the cover of a huge industrial sized waste bin against the side of a building. Luckily, there did not appear to be any enemy in the huge compound.

  “Pyro, Elzetro, Bosk identify targets,” Whizzbang ordered.

  DG and Kheldar readied their weapons to guard the four telepaths as they went to work. During the skirmish in the boardroom, the Earthmen discovered that telepaths could sense thoug
hts and the physical location they came from. Whizzbang and the other telepaths sent a blanket of questing mental energy out from their position and together they began to build a picture of all of the living entities within the fortress.

  Whizzbang marked the three long structures to the east as barracks and he thought they could house around four thousand Scourge warriors. Presently they contained only several hundred different thought patterns. Thankfully, the expected reinforcements had not arrived yet, that was a relief. Along the wall, were around twenty sentries and another one hundred thought patterns were within the central command dome. A smattering of other thoughts emanated from the various other buildings and a group of eight distinct patterns were coming from within a building between the two Barrier towers.

  Whizzbang focused on the tower building to confirm there were still only eight thought patterns within it. He then suddenly received a surprise. By focusing his thoughts, he was able see exactly what was inside each structure. He swung his newfound perception around to each of the other buildings. With a little effort, he received a complete mental picture of exactly what was within each of them.

  “Dad, how did you do that?”

  In his excitement at having perfect intelligence, he had forgotten he had been in rapport with the squad. “I wish we had more time to work out what we can do now. Try this.” He excitedly instructed them on how to tap into their new perception.

  “This is incredible,” Bosk, answered in awe, “It’s like an enhanced way of seeing whatever we want. Check this out, we can even look around as if it’s broad daylight, even though the sun is just about set behind the mountains. Having ultra-vision like this means we can literally see around walls. It’s a completely new ballgame!”

  In a few minutes, each of them tested out what Bosk was talking about and it was not long before ultra-vision became as natural to them as seeing with their own eyes.

  Whizzbang ordered, “Pyro, keep a mental eye on the barracks, Elzetro, the out buildings and wall, Bosk, you concentrate on the central dome. I’ll broadcast what’s happening in the building between the towers. As soon as you notice a change let us all know. Make sure you’re sharing this squad wide and that DG and Kheldar are kept in the loop.”

  “CT” came three mental responses.

  Whizzbang mentally mapped out the plan to the squad, “Our first objective is to take out the Barrier towers so that the cavalry up top can swoop in. This means that we’ll have to remove the threats in the control room.” He marked the control room off on the mental picture. “We then need to place the explosives at the base of each tower and to be doubly sure, inside the control room as well.” Once again, he indicated the precise locations for each explosive. “If we take out these columns at the base of the towers then the towers should fall to either side of the command dome. If we can create any more mayhem that’s well and good but let’s not get the ant nest too excited until we’re long gone and we can call in additional support.”

  From his crouched position, Whizzbang watched the shadows lengthen and deepen as the sun finally set behind the wall over which they had just glided. They would leave in a few minutes and with any luck, the two bodies on top of the wall would not be discovered before the mission was completed.

  Elzetro sent a thought towards the squad, “I think we have a problem.”

  “What do you mean?” Whizzbang asked.

  “Take a look at that dish over there,” Elzetro mentally pointed out a communications array on the other side of the command dome.

  “What about it Elzetro?”

  “I can be corrected but I believe that the big one is an interstellar dish which means that this base is in communication with someone else.”

  Chapter 13

  More to do

  Whizzbang let out a mental expletive and thought, “Thanks for the heads up Elzetro.” After a brief pause to think through the ramifications of Elzetro’s intelligence he continued, “Guys, this isn’t going to be a smash and grab after all. We need to know where and whom this command dome is speaking. If we don’t take this opportunity here and now then we’ll never be able to truly free Earth and the Concord.”

  “What do we have to do?” DG asked.

  “We need to continue with the mission to take out the Barrier towers but we also need to find out who’s pulling the strings here. Let’s get the explosives set by first taking out the team in the control room. Once that’s completed we’ll tackle the command dome itself.”

  Bosk thought to the group, “Let me understand this Whizz. We take out the control room, plant the explosives at the base of the towers and then quietly sneak up on the hundred Scourge in the command dome. We do all this while the Scourge in the barracks sit all nice and tucked into their beds, no one notices the dead sentries on top of the wall or hears us take out the eight Scourge in the control room.”

  “As usual Bosk, you’ve summarised the situation nicely.”

  “Whizz, just one thing.” Bosk said.

  “What’s that?”

  “How in the frap are we going to do all of this and get out of here?”

  Whizzbang smiled at his friend and thought, “I’ve no idea but let’s take one step at a time. First, the control room.”

  It was a testimonial to the strength of resolve in the Earthmen to see a task fulfilled and the confidence they had in each other that they quickly encompassed this new objective. With their new capabilities, Whizzbang’s squad was actually the best of the best and they simply went about the business of actioning what needed doing.

  “OK, it’s time to go,” Whizzbang thought to his squad.

  Leaving the temporary security of their position behind the industrial waste bin the squad darted from one shadow to another in the direction of the Barrier tower control room. There was a collective mental sigh from the group as a Scourge technician exited a building across from where they were hiding, walked by their position and around a corner. Finally, the squad reached the shadowed side of the control room. Their luck held and no alarm had sounded.

  “OK, ready? Remember what we’d planned. We can’t risk sounding the alarm.”

  While DG and Kheldar stood watch in the shadows, the four telepathic humans did what only a few days previously would have been impossible. They began unpicking the mental locks of four of the Scourge in the control room. After the experience in the boardroom with General Felesh those locks quickly sprung open revealing the Scourge intellect within. There was nothing particularly special or insightful about what those minds revealed. Their sole and singular purpose was to keep the Barrier towers operational.

  What each of those Scourge technicians did have at their waist was a pistol and as one, they pulled them out of their holsters and shot their four comrades other comrades in the back of the head. They then turned their weapons on each other and again pressed the firing stud. Eight bodies with neatly drilled holes in their heads slumped across consoles or lying sprawled along the plascrete floor. It was clean; it was efficient; and graphically displayed the power of psionic battleframe pilots.

  “All still clear?” Whizzbang asked.

  “Barracks, clear,” Pyro answered.

  “Outbuildings and wall normal,” Elzetro followed.

  “No activity from the command dome,” Bosk replied.

  Whizzbang lead the way into the Barrier tower control room. He wrinkled his nose as the smell of charred flesh greeted him. “Quickly, we’ve got to set the technicians up and get out of here,” he thought to the squad.

  While Bosk laid an explosive charge under a console, the rest of the squad cleaned up the Scourge corpses as best they could and sat them in various positions at their workstations. It was not likely to fool a close inspection but it may buy time if a guard was just flipping through security screens. In just under thirty seconds, the squad was in and out of the Barrier control room. Whizzbang then sent Bosk, Elzetro, and DG to the first tower while Kheldar, Pyro and he moved to the second.

 
Up close, the towers were immense structures with super-charged purple Barrier lightning crackling and snapping as it sprung between the two buildings. Each time a huge bolt of energy leapt from one tower to the other the hairs on the back of Whizzbang’s arms stood on end and small Barrier sparks would run up and down the length of his body. Miraculously, none of them felt any adverse effects from being so close to the source of the Concord’s prison on Alpha Three.

  “How the Barrier works is another mystery to solve,” Whizzbang thought to himself as the three of them began laying charges around the massive plasteel pillars that supported the towers above.

  General Grendig sat irritably on his raised commander’s throne in the centre of the command dome. He knew that something was wrong. Years of climbing the Scourge ranks by betraying superiors and eliminating ambitious underlings taught him when something was wrong. Even when he could not put his claw on the reason, he knew better than to ignore his instincts. Lord Zechlan’s warning, as crazy as it sounded, added to the fact that an inaudible alarm bell was ringing in his mind!

  The General had obeyed Lord Zechlan and recalled all the Scourge forces that remained on Alpha Three back to the fortress. The promised reinforcements arriving via troop transport were still a little over a week away. Until then, he busied himself with making his impregnable fortress even more impossible to assault.

  The General had personally inspected the backup systems that ensured the Barrier would pulse its waves of human killing energy across the world. Despite the implausibility of humans breaching the Barrier, he ordered pairs of sentries to patrol the outer wall and to ensure the command dome fully staffed at all times. From sun up until sun down Scourge warriors practiced their various disciplines in the training yard. It was a relief when the noise of beam and blaster fire ceased as the sun began to set and the warriors prepared for their rest cycle.

  Even with all of his preparations, General Grendig was in a foul mood as he absently flipped from one security camera to another on the giant screen positioned opposite him. The fortress had hundreds of cameras and it was going to take at least ten minutes to cycle through them all.