Mike's War: Sequel to Jesse's Starship

by Saxon Andrew

  The Commander heard a loud explosion followed by three others. After a moment the Pacifier Leader said, “They’ve just taken out my heavy blasters. They are using some kind of weapon that blows through our force fields. I’ll mass my surviving pacifiers and move on the complex momentarily.”

  The display went dark and the Support Leader shook his head, “Pacifiers are not really good at fighting.”

  The Commander nodded slightly, “That’s why they’re Pacifiers. Get the first Attack Group moving; we’re going there to assist them.”

  “Who is attacking?”

  The Commander looked at his panel and shook his head, “My scanning team has no idea. We need to go there and find out.”

  The giant Gracken Commander walked out of his quarters and watched the controlled mayhem that happens when a military unit is rushing to organize an attack. His two hundred thousand warriors were going to take some time but they should be on the way within two hours. He entered his personal vehicle and lifted above the thousands of warriors rushing below him. He smiled; his units were well trained. Whoever was stupid enough to attack them would be taught a lesson shortly.

  • • •

  Romanov looked at the radar display in his tank and saw more than a hundred and fifty aircraft were moving toward the city at three hundred miles an hour. He activated his visor and said, “Computer, assign the first of the enemy aircraft to my tanks and have them targeted. Make sure no more than one tank fires at any target.”

  Romanov waited and after a moment heard, “Targets are assigned, main guns are locking on designated aircraft.”

  Romanov hit the general tank frequency, “Gunners, hold your fire until the aircraft stop overhead. We will all fire simultaneously. After the first volley, choose another target that has not been laser designated by another tank. Standby….ready….FIRE!!!”

  • • •

  The Beamships arrived over the city and powered up their blasters to fire on the force field. Before their blaster coils could charge, thirty of the large aircraft exploded in huge blasts and rained debris down on the force field. The Commander of the airships was killed by one of the first shots and it took several seconds before the Gracken could respond. Thirty more Beamships exploded and the ranking Gracken yelled, “Get out of here!!!”

  The surviving aircraft accelerated away and Romanov yelled, “Cease fire! Cease fire! Our systems are not capable of hitting high speed aircraft.” Romanov pressed his console and yelled, “Lt. Nogama, what’s your status?”

  “My four tanks are moving at our fastest speed toward the force field Complex. The other companies have joined us and are moving with us through the city.”

  “What about the Gracken?”

  “They were moving over the tops of the surrounding buildings but the flyers forced them down to street level. Sir, they are incredibly fast. They will arrive at the complex a few minutes before us.”

  Gomez shook his head, “Bolton, are you copying this?”

  “I am; do you have a number coming my way?”

  “More than eight hundred.”

  “I have half that number to counter them. We’ll hold until you arrive, Nogama; just don’t take too long.”

  • • •

  Derek listened to the exchange and said, “Halley, stop your mortar platoon and have them lob some rounds into the streets leading to the complex.”

  “Yes Sir.” Halley stopped running with the other warriors and said over a frequency. “Naomi!”

  “Yes Sir.”

  “Stop your platoon and set up your mortars to lob some rounds into the streets leading to the complex.”

  Naomi stopped running and yelled, “PLATOON, STOP AND SET UP YOUR WEAPONS!” The forty warriors immediately stopped and began setting up their barrels. Naomi set up the control panel and began seeing the individual guns start logging in to her system. She linked the panel to the feed being sent from the Q ships in orbit and sent instructions to the computer’s software. The computer tracked the advancing Gracken and began issuing targets to the twenty mortars. The troops watched their barrels and when the light on the side turned green they dropped a round into the end of the barrel. There was a loud sound like a giant coughing and the shell was on the way. In another moment, nineteen more rounds were fired. The mortar barrels didn’t look much bigger than a shotgun barrel and only weighted ten pounds. The round it fired weighed a pound but delivered a devastating blast of slivers just before it hit the ground. The forty members of the platoon all carried twenty rounds each in their backpacks and they were being used at an incredible rate.

  • • •

  The initial mortar volley fell on the advancing Gracken and more than a hundred of them were blown apart by the rain of slivers. The next volleys were not as successful. The Gracken could hear the incoming shells and would jump just before they arrived and fly over the explosions. The shells were set to explode at fifteen feet above the ground but the Gracken could jump more than twenty five feet high. The slivers were blown toward the ground and the Gracken were avoiding them as they continued racing through the streets.

  • • •

  Naomi saw the issue but there wasn’t enough time to reprogram the shells before the Gracken arrived. She shook her head and entered new instructions as fast as she could type. The next six volleys launched twenty shells within a half a second of each other and they began exploding in a line. The Gracken could really jump…but they had to come down and now the mortar shells were exploding in a constant wave in front of them; another seventy Gracken Warriors were blown apart before they could make it to the complex.

  • • •

  Dave didn’t have to guess when the Gracken would arrive; he could hear them as they rushed closer, “You have your firing zones. There are four streets leading into this plaza and that’s where they’ll be coming. Every third warrior will keep the air clear of Gracken directly in front of their position.” The noise was loud and Dave shouted over the din, “WEAPONS FREE!”

  The three hundred and seventy six infantry men raised their shoulder rifles and activated the small reactor that operated the magnets that fired the slivers. The hum of the reactors couldn’t be heard over the roar of the charging Gracken. One moment the plaza was empty and in the next it was filled with giant Gracken Warriors. The first eighty Gracken were killed as quickly as they entered the plaza. Bolton thought it was going to be easy to hold them off but the next Gracken rushing into the plaza grabbed one of the dead and held it up in front of them as they continued their advance. Dave was stunned that the Gracken could lift the more than five hundred pounds of their dead and continue to run forward. They were slowed down but the dead Gracken they were using as shields had to be blown apart before the one holding it could be stopped. The huge creatures were quickly advancing when Dave yelled over the command frequency, “AIM AT THE PAVEMENT; TAKE OUT THEIR LEGS!”

  The entire front of the Gracken advance was dropped as slivers blew through their feet. Some of those that were knocked to the ground were jerked up and used as a shield even though they weren’t dead. The Gracken began jumping with the dead they were holding. Dave found their strength incredible.

  Halley yelled, “Flyers, move in and open fire.”

  Three hundred warriors tilted their foils and came rushing in over the Gracken formation and opened fire. The Gracken charge stopped for a moment to open fire with their blasters at the small flying creatures over them. That pause proved to be deadly.

  Lt. Nokamura’s tanks arrived and he yelled, “OPEN FIRE.” The three Abrams and Leopard tanks fired an antipersonnel round into the Gracken that exploded into thousands of tungsten shards. The shards blew into the rear of the attacking Gracken and decimated their ranks. The shard was non-explosive but when it hit, it expanded into a mushroom shape and blew a huge wound channel into whatever was unfortunate enough to be in its path. The survivors of the other six companies stepped around the tanks and the Gracken were raked from the front and th
e rear. Even with the devastating fire, more than sixty Gracken made it into the lines of the four companies holding the complex and killed fifty three of the soldiers.

  • • •

  Derek and Halley arrived at the scene and Derek shook his head. He pressed his collar and said, “Where are those Alliance engineers?”

  Bolton looked at his visor and answered, “They’re still in the force field’s command center.”

  “Get them out of there now! Major Romanov, I want you to move all of your tanks to the beach beside the force field complex. I want all companies to meet the tanks and start getting ready to meet Gracken forces. All Company and Battalion Commanders report to me as soon as we arrive at the beach. Now, get moving!”

  Halley looked at Derek, “What’s going on?”

  “The Q ships have spotted more than two hundred thousand Gracken warriors forming up to come here. They’ll be here in less than two hours.”

  Halley shook her head, “What’s the news on getting our carriers down here?”

  “As long as those aircraft are operating, our carriers would be blasted before they could get close. Adams tells me that even their Q ships would be vaporized if more than fifty of those ships fired on them. It appears those ships have two Starship beams mounted on them. We’re grounded until a means of removing them is found.”

  Halley shook her head, turned, and began running toward her mortar platoon. They were going to be needed in the coming fight.

  Chapter Eleven

  Mike looked at Adams on the wall display in the Tactical and Operations Center at Fort Rome. “Are you certain you can’t go in and take those aircraft out.”

  Adams shook his head, “I’m not but my ship’s computer is. Tuffy says that we can withstand six of the Gracken heavy beams for about a minute. There are more than ninety of those aircraft close to the city that could all fire on us as soon as we jumped in. They are all armed with two Warship grade heavy blasters; we’d be blown away before we could get off a shot.”

  “What about the Raptors?”

  Jeanette said, “Mike, I was involved in the Raptors rebuilding and they are a compromise. They’re too small to install both a jump drive and our heaviest force field. They’re designed to jump in on a Gracken Starship, fire, and jump away. They can stand up to a single warship long enough to get off a shot, but just barely. We now know that since the Gracken ships aren’t armored they will do significant damage to those they hit but they would be blown away faster than the Q ships if they go to take on those aircraft.”

  Mike slammed his fist on the table, “So you’re telling me we don’t have anything in our inventory to counter those Beamships?”

  Jeanette said, “The Warthogs can take them on but none of them are armed to do it.”

  “For God’s sake, why not?”

  Jesse was listening in and said, “Mike, the A-10’s have been undergoing training to prepare the young pilots to fly them in combat conditions. All of them are currently armed with training weapons and it would take time to convert them to actual weaponry.”

  Mike looked at Jesse, “How long?”

  “I contacted the General in charge of their training and he tells me it would take at least three days to even start the conversion.”

  Mike lowered his head and said, “This is my fault.”

  The speaker on the wall activated and they heard General Dunlov say, “No it’s not.”

  Mike looked up at the speaker and said, “Alex?”

  “It’s not your fault. Even if we had the Hogs ready to go they wouldn’t have been sent. We didn’t know that Beamship existed. We’d be scrambling to find a way to get the Warthogs there in time and, since we’ve not developed how they will be transported, we’d still be in the same situation.”

  Mike looked at Tilly and she said, “I started sending the feed on the operation out to all the forts as soon as the drop started.”

  “Why?”

  Tilly looked at Mike, “I was inundated with requests for information and it seems to me that we don’t have anything to hide from those that are going to go out and fight for the cause. I’ll stop it if you want but I believe it’s the right thing to do.”

  Mike took a deep breath and blew it out, “Alex, I should have waited until all of our assets were ready.”

  “If you did that, we’d never leave the planet. Your original idea was correct; we had to see what we were up against. Now we know and can plan accordingly.”

  Mike nodded and looked at Tilly, “Get General Daniels on the channel.”

  The troops at all the forts on Sparta were crowded into their armories listening and watching what was happening. They all saw their brothers were trapped on a planet with no escape. All of them refused to leave until the operation played out.

  • • •

  “General Daniels here.”

  “General, I don’t have good news. I have no way to get a carrier down to the planet to take out your command. My staff is looking at every possible contingency, but at the moment, we’ve not been able to find anything that would do it.”

  “Have any of the other regiments started training Fliers?” Mike shook his head. “If you’re confronted with this again, Commandant, you could leave a company of fliers in high atmosphere and have them drop in on those ships and take some out. Our fliers are on the ground now, so that is not an option. However, I am working on a way to save a portion of my command.”

  Mike looked up, “How are you going to do that?”

  “We have the thirty carriers that delivered the tanks. According to my readouts, as long as we don’t put more than ten people on them, they are as fast as the ships overhead. They will need a head start to stay out of range of the beams, but I think we can distract those ships long enough to give them a chance.”

  “What do you need from me?”

  “I need a transport in orbit waiting for them.”

  “We’re expecting a response from the Gracken Navy shortly.”

  “I understand and I’ll get them moving as quickly as possible; however, I want that transport waiting for them, Sir.”

  Mike stared at Derek and said, “It will be there, General.”

  • • •

  Derek ended the call and looked at Halley, who had been listening in, “I want you to assemble all the Fliers and have them get on the tank carriers. You should go with them.”

  Halley stared at Derek and said, “If any officer goes, it will be you.”

  “Halley, don’t make me order you to do this.”

  “I’ll ignore the order and appeal it to the Commandant; who do you think he’ll order to leave?”

  Derek was angry but knew Mike would force him to go with the transports. “I’ll not leave you behind, Halley.”

  Halley reached and hugged Derek, “We will live, or die, together.”

  Derek sighed and nodded, “How are we going to get the most important members of the regiment to leave?”

  Halley smiled, “There has to be a good reason for them to do it.”

  Mike stared at her and thought about who needed to go. After a moment he smiled and activated his combat computer, “Give me a list of the thirty best sharpshooters in the regiment.” The list appeared on both their visors and Mike nodded. “Major Romanov.”

  “Yes Sir.”

  “I want you to remove all the fifty caliber machine guns from your tank’s storage and have them mounted on the rear of the thirty carriers. Get moving.”

  “Yes Sir.”

  Mike activated the main channel and announced, “I am sending a list of personnel that are going to be manning the machineguns we’re installing on the carriers. Report to the carriers and get the guns ready to fire.”

  Derek looked at Halley and held up five fingers. He dropped one, then two, then three, and their communications channel erupted, “Sir, I will not leave my battalion.”

  “Nor will I; my place is here.”

  Derek allowed the shouts for five seconds a
nd said, “You will all shut up.” The thirty shooters never heard their commander speak to them in that tone and they instantly grew silent. Mike hit the general frequency so the entire regiment could hear what he was saying. “It looks like we are trapped on this planet and the Gracken are mobilizing more than two hundred thousand of their warriors to come and introduce themselves. We have looked at all the possible ways to save us but unfortunately, none have been found. My computer informs me that I can put eight hundred kilograms on each of those carriers and they should be able to match the speed of those ships overhead. The computer tells me that equates to five of our heavy infantry or ten of the fliers. I choose to save as many as possible. The Fliers are not as heavily armored as our standard warriors and won’t last long once the enemy opens fire. Our brothers back on Sparta need them to train new warriors how to fly their personal shields. The Fliers are ordered to report to the carriers and I expect you to train those that will come and avenge what happens here.” Derek paused, “Do not let me down.”

  The Fliers were all ready to disobey the order until Derek charged them with making the Gracken pay. They reluctantly moved out of ranks and started walking toward the carriers. Their comrades patted them on the shoulder and told them not to feel bad.

  Derek saw them start walking and said, “The thirty of you ordered to man the fifties were chosen due to your ability to fire a weapon. You are our best shooters. Check your computers if you doubt me. The fliers are going to have to remove their armor to lighten the load and you and the transports light force field will be their only defense against the ships giving chase. I also have three Alliance Engineers who are my guests and I am not going to allow them to be harmed if I can prevent it. I know most of you want to stay, but I need you to defend your brothers. Do a good job.”

  Majors Rizzo and Jennings walked up and Derek said, “Halley and I will take your commands and lead them in your place.”