The ghosts of Bravo Command spread the impending Shadow of Vengeance and Death over their foes like an unseen net, without any knowledge or awareness among the invaders themselves.
Bravo and Shetanna prepared for another stunning series of lightning attacks.
All became poised and ready, while the heedless enemy celebrated their vile victories and atrocities.
Naero struggled to remain silent as she slipped in among the foe. Death and damnation to any invader who thought they could invade the human sectors with impunity, death, and cosmicide.
On every world, the invader needed to be taught that bloody lesson.
Naero strode right into the belly of the beast.
Alone.
Defiant.
By now she was supremely confident in her skills and abilities and all of her comrades depending on her and backing her up.
Her cloaked combat armor made her virtually invisible. The Ejjai could not even smell her.
She used her gravwing to slip into the most heavily guarded command and control bunker the enemy possessed. With her skill and her tek, she could crawl upside down on the ceilings like an unseen insect.
Her miniature vidcams and audio collectors fed data to Intel in real time, covering everything she saw.
Naero’s small contingent of cloaked Intel fixers and microdrones stayed close, ready to disrupt key enemy systems and communications, planting microbombs and detonation devices as they went.
The Invader High Command celebrated their latest triumph with what one might expect from them–a huge, decadent, disgusting feast–held within a shielded bunker.
They set up their victory celebration within a huge underground arena, probably used by the Tholosians for some kind of urban or regional sporting events.
Ejjai got drunk on stinking, fermented grog made from human blood. They shipped it in from the meatships by the tankerful.
Under the bright lights of the hi-tek arena, tens of thousands of Ejjai feasted and celebrated their latest victories. The enemy generals praised their troops and used the huge arena vidscreens to plot out their next attacks on the three nearest Tholosian cities.
On the center of the playing field, Ejjai transports and appropriated trucks had also hauled in and dumped huge piles of human corpses from the local population for their undefeated troops to feed on.
Piles of fresh and not-so-fresh meat, diverted from the enemy meatships to help sate the troops in large numbers.
One of the piles was all dead children and infants.
Even worse, to Naero’s horror, some of the bodies in the various meat piles were somehow still alive. They twitched or cried out in pain and terror. Some weakly attempted to crawl away despite broken or missing limbs.
The Ejjai quickly seized them and began tormenting them even further, laughing hysterically at the sport. They stabbed, cut, and skinned them alive–or otherwise got creative.
As Ejjai were wont to do.
Ejjai were among the vilest, most disgusting creatures Naero had even encountered.
She resisted the very strong impulse to cut loose on them right then and there.
But she couldn’t–not yet.
These monsters needed to die. Every single one of them.
And very soon, she would have a direct hand in launching the attack that would accomplish just that.
The timing had to be just right, so she steeled herself.
The generals. Reach the generals and stay ready.
Six Ejjai generals held court like warlords at huge tables overflowing with comconsoles, sensor stations, map screens, and piles of loot. And the bloody remains of horrific, eviscerated meals.
The bulk of all Ejjai clone troops remained predominantly female. Smaller male Ejjai concubines were kept around on leashes for fun, for the leaders. They even dressed them in human clothing and poorly fitting human lingerie.
As an oddity, one of the generals even had a human male dressed up as a concubine. But the poor guy apparently had to be kept in a heavily guarded pen off to one side–to keep all of the other Ejjai from devouring and murdering him, most likely in that order.
Naero circled around the generals and studied the arena, trying to devise the best way to take them all down.
She listened intently to the plans the enemy generals were making, feeding it all to Intel.
“So, are all of the atomics and genocide devices in place yet?”
Another general pulled up a mapscreen displaying all of their installation of such devices planetwide.
Naero instantly transmitted all of that data directly to Spacer Intel as well–priority alert.
Intel and Bravo Command were most likely already neutralizing the most vital elements of the enemy plot. These genocide devices could be scanned and located from orbit. But it was always good to be sure, and to know their exact locations.
The Ejjai generals scoffed. “We will be ready for anything the enemy can throw at us in less than a day,” one of the other Ejjai generals boasted.
“They won’t know what’s going to hit them until it’s too late.”
“Good, very good. Speed things up if you can. Get it all up and ready.”
“Don’t worry, sir. We will be more than ready to deal with their so-called Bravo Command–and their spack witch.”
All of the Ejjai generals had a good laugh and congratulated each other.
The lead general stepped up to a waiting podium and addressed the crowd.
“Great news, sisters! We have it on good authority that the spacks are sending their precious Bravo Command and their spack witch Shetanna against us.”
Lots of cursing and booing about that roared up.
Their lead general continued. “This time, we are more than ready for them!”
Huge rounds of applause to that.
“Let me just say that we have some heavy duty surprises of our own ready and waiting and in store for our enemies. We can’t wait for them to get here–and have them all for dinner!”
That brought an even bigger round of cheering, cursing, and applause.
“We will engage the spacks in a matter of days, and with our increased numbers and new weapons–I say we’re going to kick their asses and stomp them bloody. We will gut them! I want all my girls out there to feast on spack Marine flesh until you puke!”
Further rounds of cheering and vile responses.
“We will ferment their blood in our huge vats and get drunk on it!”
More horrendous rounds of cheering and applause.
“And once we have captured their filthy spack witch, all of you will watch as I personally cut her up and rape her with red-hot knives, and torture her to death over the course of an entire week. She’ll sing to all of us with her screams. Then I myself will feast upon her guts, and eat her heart while the light in her eyes fades. I’ll crack her skull open and eat her brains!”
The Ejjai went crazy.
“Wait until we post that on the webnets for the spacks and the skinners to watch! I promise you victory. We cannot be defeated. And we will sweep the human skinners and all the other inferior races into our meatships and out of all existence. They are our prey! Yet another galaxy that shall fall to us and our mighty masters!”
More about their mysterious masters. Interesting.
Furious cheering continued in waves.
“So, my warriors. Feast on meat until you vomit, and then feast some more. Then prepare for battle as we crush our foes and ravage the rest of this world. We shall drown it all in blood and swim in it! Prepare for our ultimate victory! Our time has come. None can stand against us!”
They erupted in an orgy of celebration and vile gluttony.
Fights broke out among the meat piles, and the Ejjai fought with and murdered each other in their frenzy.
The lead general returned to the others, rubbing her claws together eagerly in the midst of the chaos.
“My sisters, I have a special treat that I’ve saved just for us, at thi
s exact moment. Please, enjoy my precious gifts to you all.” She motioned to a large knot of troops off to one side among some gravtanks.
A full squad of Ejjai in heavy battle armor led out six terrified human women, all of them naked and extremely pregnant.
None of them had a mark on them. Yet.
But from the looks on their pale faces, they all knew very well what the enemy generals intended to do with them. Each of them was heavy with child, in the later stages of pregnancy.
That they had remained unspoiled and unharmed up until now would quickly change for the worse–the worst fate imaginable.
Although they were unbound, there was no chance for any of these captives to break free or escape on their own against so many foes.
The generals each glared at them and gloated. The Ejjai generals slavered and drooled, snapping jaws and smacking lips.
Each general had a set of rusty, bloodstained butchering tools that they began to place out in front of them in heady, eager anticipation of their coming feast.
Then the squad of Ejjai troops guarding the six women suddenly staggered a few feet away as if drunk.
Some melted into slag where they stood.
Other Ejjai troops exploded.
The six human captives looked around in confusion.
The next instant, they all vanished.
The six Ejjai generals shot to their feet in stunned surprise.
They couldn’t even speak, but a few flung cleavers and knives at the spot where the captives had stood.
Their weapons fell harmlessly to the ground.
All of this was captured and displayed on the big arena screens, and slowly attracted the attention of the astonished crowds.
Then Shetanna appeared as if by magic, right before the lead Ejjai general, resplendent in her full Angel of Death mode. She was all dressed in black, shining black hair flowing in the wind, violet eyes burning above her mask.
Twin bloodred katanas crackled and hissed in the damp air, at the ready in either hand.
Every eye fixed on her–while the mini-gravpods from her fixers whisked the six cloaked, female captives away to safety.
Naero only had to buy few more seconds for them to make it out. Fierce Marines waited nearby to take charge of them and keep them safe.
With the six captives out of the way, at last Shetanna could go to work.
“I have come for you, filthy Ejjai cowards. I am Shetanna!” she cried.
She rammed both of her swords through the lead general’s eyes and out the back of the Ejjai’s scorched skull.
Two of the generals tried to run.
The other three tried to attack her.
It did not matter.
Bolts of scarlet lighting tore forth from both her blades, ripping and blasting the other five into charred pieces of meat and bone.
Naero cloaked and shot away as the area around the tables was engulfed in torrents of enemy weapon fire the very next instant.
Then the gravtanks, gunships, transports, and other vehicles lined up nearby began to explode.
Naero projected multiple holos of herself all over the arena and in the in the air, drawing fire in all directions.
She used the voice, her words booming and echoing from several directions.
“Ejjai filth. Prepare to meet Death. For Shetanna is The Dark Angel of Death, and has no fear of murdering cowards.”
The Ejjai fired in panic from so many angles that they cut down each other by the hundreds–just as Naero planned.
Fear began to infect them.
Gouts of red lightning lashed into the arena stands from several directions like gigantic whips of destruction. The devastation flung dead and dying Ejjai everywhere in a cyclone of slaughter, adding to the total chaos and confusion.
“No mercy, Ejjai scum. No escape. Fear is my mother, Death my sire, and I their daughter! You cannot harm me. There is no escape for you!”
Just as the enemy started to figure out they were shooting at holos and murdering each other wholesale, Naero merged with one of her mirror images in the midst of hundreds of Ejjai in the arena stands.
Multiple thin rods of red Chaos energy shot from her, fanning out in a diameter of thirty meters.
First she impaled hundreds of the shocked invaders.
When she spun, the red blades chopped them all into smaller gory chunks and pieces.
Torrents of unleashed Ejjai blood suddenly gathered and swept down the arena, carrying others away in a sudden red, rushing tide of gore.
Naero cloaked and flashed away again.
More enemy fire stormed and tore at her former position.
She took the place of another holo, and sent forth a sweeping hurricane of of Chaos bubbles and orbs of every shape and size into another section of the stands.
The explosions collapsed that entire section. Wreckage toppled inward.
Next she appeared on the field before the horrendous meat piles, in the midst of hundreds of more frantic enemies.
Half of them flung their weapons away and ran in terror before her as she raced toward them. So much for the valiant Ejjai.
“Stand and fight, scum!”
Naero surged and fought with the mob of foes, sweeping one way and then the other, cutting them down by dozens, by scores.
She moved among them so fast they could not focus their attacks.
Then she would abruptly change direction and sweep another way before they could hem her in.
She unleashed more scarlet lightning strikes.
She sent random Chaos blasts into packed pockets of foes.
At times she just whirled and passed through them with her swords fully extended, mowing them down in lines and bunches.
Once she had shattered them completely, she merely turned her back on them and began walking away quickly and with determination, toward the nearest exit.
Naero set her shield pod full-on.
Three enemy tanks roared at her, cannons blazing.
Naero dodged and deflected their blasts into the stands.
Two gravtanks she exploded with Chaos bombs.
She sliced the last in half with her swords and kept walking calmly, straight through the burning wreckage as the gravtank exploded directly behind her to either side.
She ignored all enemy fire directed at her, kept walking, and cut down anything stupid enough to attempt to stand before her.
She crackled with destroying red lightning as she passed into one of the exit tunnels, laying waste to anything before her.
The enemy regrouped and poured into the tunnel in hot pursuit.
Just as Naero hoped they would.
Another kill zone. How convenient of them to all bunch up for her.
She turned at bay, just before exiting, and focused all of her energies in an intense Chaos blast cone.
The massive detonation tore the tunnel apart and blasted shredded pieces of the packed invaders out the other end, right before a massive fireball that followed hard thereafter.
Naero cloaked, and called out over her secure link.
“You guys ready? I’ve got them primed, but I’m also almost out of juice.”
“We’re in place and ready to join the show, Shetanna. You okay? Do you need us to extract you?”
“Negative. I can finish my part. It just takes a lot of energy to sustain attacks at this level. You guys know that. Did Intel take care of those genocide devices?”
“Almost all accounted for.”
“All right, I’m setting up for my final show. They’ll take the bait, all right. You guys hit them hard when they do.”
“Hard as we can, Shetanna. You know us.”
“I sure do, and I can’t wait to watch it all go down–right from the front row. Copy that. Make the legends proud, Bravo.”
She took up her position in the center of the fallen city nearby, just outside of the shattered arena.
She formed a Chaos construct around her that duplicated her and her every move.
She stomped on a meatship and slashed at it until it exploded.
Then she attacked the cloneship factory next to it.
“Face me, cowards. Shetanna shows you her might. Show me yours. Face me and perish!”
Yet in actuality, her energies waned with each passing second.
It wasn’t like being back on Janosha where there was limitless Cosmic energy to tap into. Away from the Mystic Homeworlds, Naero’s energy levels and her abilities were not infinite or limitless. She made a good show of it, but even she could not sustain these levels of attack for very long.
The entire enemy invasion roared to life and locked on, bunching and sweeping her way, to engage her from all directions.
The Ejjai went insane with fury.
Up in the skies above and beyond Tholos-4, the Spacer navy sent the invader fleets spinning down in flames.
Thousands of Spacer Marines suddenly materialized out of the black at key points and positions.
Phantoms who owned the night.
The black was their domain, their element, and they surrendered it to no one.
Bravo Command unleashed a torrent of concentrated, interlocking fire against the bunched-up invaders. Veils of destroying fire, artillery, and ordnance rained down–a deluge of precisely timed destruction that no living thing could possibly survive.
Within a matter of minutes, a quarter of a million Ejjai invaders flashed and flared into a sweeping typhoon of white-hot death that overtook them.
Shetanna had done her job all too well.
Completely drained of all her Mystic energies for the moment, she could barely stand.
Even as she staggered away, a full platoon of gigantic Ejjai Sterodans in phaze armor appeared all around her.
They piled on and overwhelmed her with their greater mass and several shock charges that hit and rippled through both them and her. The shock charges rattled Naero’s teeth in her skull.
The Ejjai and their mysterious masters still wanted her and the KDM alive and intact, apparently.
Naero grinned.
Yet another trap, and she had stumbled right into it.
Naero's War: The Citation Series 2: The High Crusade Page 18