by Aer-ki Jyr
“What’d they use to dig through the rock?” Kyler asked, frowning.
“I could barely fit into the hole in my armor, so it wasn’t anything big, but we couldn’t recover anything. I’d guess they took their time and set up the tunnel well before the attack.”
“How many got in?” Eaton asked, leaning forward so far on the table that his arms dipped into the hologram a bit.
“Six with det packs and another 40 or so escorts. We couldn’t find the ship that brought them, so it must have bugged out as soon as it dropped them off.”
“Damn suicide run,” Cryson bit out.
“Not atypical of them,” Kyler commented, rubbing his smooth chin where his stubble used to be as he thought. It was a habit that he hadn’t broken yet, despite the fact that his facial hair follicles had been deactivated years ago. “But they had no chance of destroying the entire facility with only six det packs?”
“Not even close,” Vander answered his glance. “Maybe they thought they could hit the power core and cause a chain reaction, but they’ve got to have better intel on our tech than that. My guess is they just wanted to cause damage and slow down our growth rate.”
“We’re the stronger here,” Kyler reminded them. “In the past that hasn’t been the case. I think we’re starting to see a shift in tactics, not unlike what they’ve used against the Kvash in space…save there’s more opportunity to slink about down here than in vacuum.”
“We need a bigger sensor grid,” Eaton insisted, referencing the sensor limitations that had the stealthy lizard aquatics hulls disappearing from view at a range of about 3-4 kilometers, with their biggest ships registering out to about 5-6km. Their infantry showed up first, in some cases, because they didn’t carry the armor that their craft did. Like their space navy, their aquatics forces became ghosts at range, despite the continually advancing Star Force detection capabilities.
“We can’t defend much more than we’ve got,” Cryson pointed out. “They’re already disabling the perimeter nodes.”
“Two ideas,” he countered. “One, we make mobile units and have them swim random paths. Two, we build larger units with defenses, linked into city or outpost control.”
“The second will require resources that we don’t have,” Kyler reminded him.
“If it saves us having to replace equipment they would otherwise have damaged, I’d say it could logistically be worth it.
“We need to go hunting,” Vander pressed. “That will take some of the pressure off of our defenses…and allow us to build what we need. If they keep us on the defensive they’ll win the resource race, because the fleet isn’t able to keep their cruisers in orbit and it’s a big planet.”
Kyler looked at his fellow aquatics specialist. “Other than sending the battleships out, what are you suggesting?”
“They’ve got more shipyards out there than we’ve been able to locate. We need to find them.”
“If you have any suggestions as to how to do that?” Cryson implored.
“The assault fleet didn’t come in via air,” Vander reminded them, referring to the initial assault on the city. “That limits their range.”
“Unless they took their time getting here,” Eaton pointed out.
“No, he’s right,” Kyler said, looking down at the map. “There have been too many raids without air drop. They have to have at least a transitional base somewhere close. Any guesses?”
Vander looked down at the map, seeing the section of the planet where Star Force had set up the bulk of its operations. There were 3 main cities, each a huge independent colony identical to Manaan. They were spread out in a triangle approximately 3600 kilometers apart from one another. Around each were clusters of additional facilities, mining the seafloor for resources. Rail lines didn’t connect them, as was usual Star Force protocol, given that the lizards could easily disable them, though some of the closest facilities were connected via subsurface tunnels.
That tunnel network was expanding out slowly, leaving the bulk of the shipments having to occur either through air, point to point, or through the water via transports. Both were used, but the lizards had quickly started poaching the air transports, either by dropping fighters via cruiser and having them run them down, or by deploying them from aquatics craft and doing the same. Skeet escorts then had to be used, and the overall process essentially ground to a halt with Star Force shifting almost everything underwater where the fighters couldn’t go.
The result was large convoys traversing the grid of mining sites under heavy escort. Usually those weren’t hit, given the number and size of ships protecting them, but the lizards weren’t above putting ambush forces down in the rocky seafloor and trying to damage a freighter as they passed over with det packs or a torpedo salvo, chipping away at the freighters whenever they could get the chance.
The bulk of other production, aside from the mining sites, was located around the cities but inside the massive fences that protected them from direct assault. Those included bioharvest facilities, processing centers, shipyards, and the rest of the standard allotment of Star Force infrastructure that couldn’t be housed within the city itself as Kyler and the rest of the Archons continued to expand their production capability.
“I’d suspect somewhere here,” Vander said, jabbing a finger into the hologram about 300 kilometers to the east of Manaan, “but that’s just a gut feeling.”
“How do we check on your gut feeling?” Preston asked, crossing his arms over his chest. “That’s a lot of deep, dark ocean to search with a tiny sensor brush.”
“I know,” Vander agreed, “but we’ve got to do something. It’s been 3 years since we found and killed a lizard base…and no, I’m not counting those startups.”
“At this point,” Kyler interrupted, “I’m willing to concede that the lizards can out build us, but they seem concerned about stunting out growth as well, so I don’t think we have the same situation as we would if this was on land. Their aquatics are less robust, and I’m guessing the same goes for their underwater resource collection, otherwise they wouldn’t keep trying the resource drops from orbit.”
“They’re used to stealing resources that they haven’t been able to do here,” Cryson added.
“A fair point,” Kyler offered, “but it’s more than that. I get the distinct feeling that they don’t want waterworlds…they just don’t want us to have them. Agree/disagree?”
“Possible,” Preston said.
“They wanted Ariel’s,” Cryson pointed out.
“She said they were learning a lot in the process,” Eaton added. “I agree with Kyler. This is putting them out of their element, but they are learning.”
“And they’re dangerously clever,” Vander finished. “Water or no water.”
“We can’t search the entire planet,” Kyler said, “and they’re not taking the land bait. So other than following what leads we get and waiting for them to come to us…”
The other four Archons were silent for a moment, until Preston finally spoke.
“I don’t know why, but I get the feeling like they’re starting to win. We don’t know how many ships they have, where they are, and they just knocked down a mark 5 defense tower on our front door. I think the only place we know they’re going to be is right here,” he said, pointing to the city under his feet. “We’ve got a weakness in our defenses that we can’t easily patch. This feels like a prelude to a larger assault. Now, we can track them through the atmosphere easier than we can underwater, so that’s where we should focus our detection efforts,” he said, nodding at Eaton.
“How?” Kyler asked.
“We need more forewarning,” Preston continued. “We have to push the sensor nodes out further.”
“They’ll pick them off, one by one,” Cryson warned.
“Do you still think they’re approaching along the seafloor?” Kyler asked Eaton.
“Yes.”
The trailblazer zoomed the holographic map in on Manaan and its s
atellite facilities, bringing up a more detailed topography of the region. “Best guesses.”
“We know they come in through here,” Vander said immediately, pointing to a curvy valley that ran south of the city, coming within 20 kilometers at the closest point with shallower veins running all the way up to within 3 kilometers. “I’ve personally seen two groups passing through there, and there have been other contacts noted.”
“I know what you’re thinking,” Cryson said, jumping ahead in the conversation, “but it’s the trench sensors they always take out first.”
“I wasn’t thinking sensors…I was thinking fence, plus sensors, plus towers. A quartet of mark 3s or a lot of 2s.”
“That’s a lot of resources we don’t have,” Eaton pointed out.
“And all it’ll do is cause them to make a detour,” Preston added. “If we had better sensor range it might be worth it, but their damn armor makes them ghosts outside of a few kilometers. I don’t see how a fence is going to be effective.”
“I do,” Vander countered, “but it’s over our heads right now. We need more battleships, and wasting resources on anything else is foolish.”
“Go back,” Preston urged. “How is a fence effective given the sensor limitations?”
“What’s the lizards’ sensor range?” Vander countered.
“25-30 kilometers for a midsized vessel,” Eaton answered. “As of 200 years ago.”
“And we know that because we captured their tech tree schematics,” Vander pointed out. “Do they know what our sensor range is?”
“They probably have a good guess by now.”
“Do they?” Kyler asked. “Aside from firing on them, how do they know? Given perfect water conditions our shield columns extend out almost to the edge of our effective sensor range.”
“You’re suggesting they don’t realize how blind we are?” Cryson asked.
“Why would they bother running trenches?” Vander pointed out.
“Even if you’re right, all that does is tell us they’re being extra careful about their movements.”
“It also tells us,” Kyler added, “that they’re worried about our speed. If we detect them 500 kilometers away we can get a battleship there in a blink of an eye, relatively speaking, and they know it. Their ships are pinned to the water, and therefore vulnerable, so they’re doing their best to stay hidden as they move around…they just don’t know that we can’t see them.”
“You think a fence across the trench will scare them off?” Preston asked.
“I think it might disrupt their routes, which is the point.”
Vander nodded. “If they’re using the terrain like roads, strategically placed fences could be useful in the long term.”
“But it’s still a bluff,” Cryson pointed out. “And I say we can’t be wasting resources on mind games.”
“He is right.”
Kyler looked behind him to the small pool of water built into the floor. “How long have you been there?”
The Elarioni smiled from just beneath the surface. “Long enough,” the computer translation said.
“Thank you,” Cryson said, walking around the display table so he could see Ariel more clearly. “How am I right?”
“The lizards are used to dealing with longer sensor ranges, so they are cautious. They do not know of your weakness, because their armor did not stop Elarioni sensors. They may suspect, but given our flying ships and the speed of our smaller ones they are reluctant to try. They will not remain reluctant forever. The more contact they have, the more they will learn. They do not learn today, for there were no survivors.”
“Actually there are 52 captives…so far,” Kyler pointed out.
“You will release them?” the mermaid-like alien asked.
“I’d like to, but where? Not going to drop them off in the middle of nowhere to starve to death.”
“They’ll be dead by the end of the day,” Vander guessed, reminding him of the lizards’ suicidal habits when taken prisoner.
“I ordered them sedated for the time being,” Kyler said off hand.
“Do not,” Ariel warned. “Give them no information from the battle to study.”
“Assuming they didn’t send telemetry out,” Vander noted.
“We detected none,” Ariel countered.
“We can hold onto them indefinitely, though Vander is probably right about them killing themselves,” Kyler added.
“I have need of escort,” the Elarioni said bluntly.
Kyler and the other Archons frowned. “Where to?”
She swam to the side of the small pool and interfaced with an underwater console, altering the hologram above the table to match a small one inside the water, allowing her to confer with the Humans. Using that ability she zoomed in the regional map all the way down to the city, then highlighted the debris field, tagging one of the three dead lizard aquatics cruisers.
“I need to go there. Now.”
“What is it?” Kyler asked, having learned to trust her instincts.
“A hunch.”
“I’ll take you,” Cryson offered.
With barely a nod of recognition Ariel swam down to the bottom of the pool and disappeared into a water tunnel, heading elsewhere in the city through the personal transit system Star Force had built for her when she volunteered to help them fight the lizards on the frontier rather than be returned to the splinter group of her race in Nestafar space.
Cryson walked off, nodding at Kyler on the way out, leaving the other Archons to continue their now pointless discussion. Something was up, and they didn’t have a clue what it could be.
“I want a perimeter patrol around the debris,” Kyler said, tagging the area on the map and using it to send out the order. “Double lines.”
“I’ll head back out,” Vander said. “I want to see what she finds.”
“Might want to move the battleships out further,” Eaton suggested.
Kyler twitched his head, silently giving him the go ahead to send the order, leaving the trailblazer and Preston at the holographic table staring at the map.
“Ok, the fence was a stretch,” he admitted.
Preston smiled. “We have to do something. I just wish we knew what it was.”
6
Cryson slipped his streak through the large gaps in the fence surrounding Manaan, aiming for the square holes between the meters thick strands making up a narrow, inverted ‘V’ that ended just shy of the ocean surface, finishing the last bit of elevation with a single line of fencing that reached up to block the remaining waterways into the city’s perimeter. The gaps wouldn’t keep small craft out, but they would keep most of the lizards’ warships back from the infrastructure, forcing any battles to take place at a distance rather than directly over the city.
The fence itself comprised a huge mass of metal, stretching 1.4 miles in height with a circumference of 38 miles, but the investment of resources to build it and its two twins surrounding Ackbar and Seaquest had paid off given the number of raids it’d thwarted. The spiral design overlapped for a span of 3.2 miles, creating a corridor that all traffic had to travel through, and was just wide enough for a battleship to pass, though given their flight ability they had the option of just hopping over the fence on anti-grav.
The streak was one of a few Star Force craft narrow enough to shoot the gaps in the fence, with plenty of smaller defense towers inside the perimeter to deal with lizard craft of similar size that tried to get through without their larger cousins backing them up. They’d tried a few times, but had given up the attempt after city defense patrols kept intercepting them. This most recent assault had been the largest to date, and signaled a significant shift in tactics.
Cryson zipped his streak out the second side of the fence and accelerated over to the ruins of the defense tower, then altered course to the gap between it and the adjacent one that had come under attack, following the littering of ships like a trail of bread crumbs. When he eventually got near the second
he found the dead cruiser Ariel had indicated, having been killed before it could close range. Cryson lowered the streak in a spiral down to where it lay on the seafloor with the aft end sticking up at an angle and made two full rotations around the wreck looking for trouble before heading to ground.
Cryson parked well out from the cruiser as a number of squids and arrowheads circled around the area, making sure no one was going to get a shot off at their aquatics expert. The Archon pressed a button on the streak’s control board and the water-filled canopy opened to the ocean, allowing him in his armor to swim up and out as Ariel deftly pulled ahead of him, emerging from behind his seat in the cockpit. Her tiny form wriggled as she swam ahead, with Cryson using the propulsion units in his armor’s arms to keep pace behind her.
“Anything?” Cryson asked, tagging those personnel already scouring the ship in his comm choices.
“Ship is clear,” Vander reported. “They caught a few survivors hiding inside, but they didn’t last long. One was taken prisoner.”
“Stay sharp,” Cryson reminded him and the others listening in.
“We’ve got your back,” his fellow Archon promised.
Cryson switched to Ariel’s comm and highlighted it individually. “What are we looking for?” he asked as they swam towards the broken cruiser, which looked absolutely huge up close, and they were still more than 200 meters away.
“One of the tendrils on this cruiser is still intact. I need to examine the internal mechanics. Hopefully they are also still intact and accessible,” she said, speaking through a necklace that translated and transmitted her native language, otherwise she was completely naked, as was typical of her species, given this was her natural environment.
“Where are we going in?”
“Midsection breach.”
“Let me go first,” he prompted.
“Don’t make me slow down,” she teased.
Cryson smiled and kicked in his ankle jets, pulling up beside her and inching ahead. His armor was bulky by Archon standards, but in the water it felt extremely agile…aside from compared to the Elarioni, who could swim circles around him at will. On the back where a weapons rack and pack would normally have sat was a smooth flap extending from the shoulders down to his waist, underneath which he had a pair of ‘needlers’ stashed away, just in case.