by Tim Marquitz
But she’d definitely rather kill, if she were honest with herself.
Taj chuckled at the thought, and the crew glanced at her, giving her strange looks for her sudden outburst. She shrugged, blowing it off.
“We can’t make it obvious we’re going after the seismic devices,” Taj explained, “so we need to make a bit of a mess in other areas and delay them finding out we’re hitting the machines for as long as possible.”
“I can make quite a mess,” Torbon assured her, grinning broadly.
“No argument here,” Lina muttered.
“I’ve been known to cause a bit of chaos now and again,” Krawg added.
“Mostly with the funk that wafts off his fur,” Torbon joked.
The hulking Ursite snarled at Torbon. “I can start the chaos off by shooting a certain cat.”
“I’m tempted to let you do it,” Taj told him, “but we need him right now. Maybe later?”
“I look forward to it,” Krawg answered, turning his toothy grin on Torbon.
“Nice of you to make plans for me, Taj,” Torbon complained.
“Don’t worry,” Lina told him, “I won’t let them kill you too badly.” She patted him on the arm.
“I feel better already.” He grunted, shaking his head.
“Let’s get this gackshow on the road,” Taj said.
As they’d planned, the crew separated, each member going to a different area of the outpost to wreak havoc. Taj and Dent stuck together, but Torbon, Lina, Krawg, and Cabe split up and made their way around the outpost to enter at different points.
Taj hated that everyone was going in on their own, but it was better to make a stealthy entry than form up and hit the Wyyvans hard.
Their efforts were more to unbalance the enemy; throw them off and confuse them rather than take out any significant number of the soldiers. There wasn’t much hope for a body count, and trying to pile one up would only make things worse for the workers stuck inside the outpost.
The Wyyvans had already determined that Taj and her people wanted to minimize collateral damage, so it only made sense that the next step in the Wyyvan tactical march would be to start using the workers as hostages against the Furlorians.
Taj wanted to get in and out before they made that choice. It was one thing to have them passively use the workers as shields, but it was something else entirely if the Wyyvans started actively leveraging the workers’ lives against Taj and her crew.
She and Dent clambered up the wall after watching the guards for a few minutes, making sure they could get in unseen.
The Wyyvans had upped security, but it was still pathetic given how low-tech their equipment was. Dent’s buried device continued to block transmissions from the outpost to the Wyyvan fleet, and with no spacecraft on the planet itself, there was nothing the lizards could do to detect the tiny trace movements of the sneaking crew.
And no matter how important the guards’ jobs were in theory, no matter what the species, it was almost a certainty that the guards would do a gack-poor job. It was simply too boring a task to stay alert for very long.
Sure enough, the guards made a show of working hard while hardly working.
Taj and Dent slipped inside with ease, and the others reported that they, too, had gotten into the mining complex without problems.
She wondered maybe if it had been too easy, but she could see the efforts of the soldiery as they went about their tasks. They were trying, however ineffectually, to protect the grand admiral’s investment on the planet, but it was clear that Galforin had been guiding the project from above.
Now that he had been cut off from his soldiers, there was a clear lack of organization above and beyond the day-to-day norm. The head had been cut off, and the limbs had begun to wither.
Taj grinned at the lesson she’d learned from Vort and his soldiers, especially from the blind Wyyvan, S’thlor, who they’d left on Corzant.
The Wyyvan leaders didn’t trust the soldiers, and the soldiers didn’t trust the leaders.
Their entire system was built upon fear and consequences, not discipline or respect. When the soldiers were left to their own devices, they practically shut down out of fear of doing something that might come back to bite them in the tail.
They did what they were told to do and avoided overthinking anything.
Well, they avoided thinking about anything, let alone overthinking. It simply wasn’t safe to be independent or an individual.
And that was how the Wyyvans in the outpost were going about their tasks: by rote. They were doing what had been drilled into them and nothing more.
So when the explosions started erupting across the outpost, the expected chaos broke loose.
Cabe struck the northeastern corner, targeting one of the artillery units, and Lina and Torbon and Krawg had chosen random sections of the outpost to do the same.
The crew had rigged small explosive devices made of the Toradium-42 that was abundant all over the planet. The rebels had a small stash of it in the abandoned mining tunnels they’d made their home in, so it was easy to create small bombs.
While the mineral was surprisingly stable, Dent had determined how best to trigger the release of its energy and harness it explosively. That had been what they’d used to blast the desert and set off the seismic devices.
With it being so plentiful, it only made sense to take advantage of it.
The irony of using it to take out Wyyvans, considering that Toradium-42 was what had started all this, wasn’t lost on Taj.
It made the idea far more appealing.
She and Dent made their way through the outpost’s streets, dodging the automated vehicles and the soldiers darting about, doing their best to cope with what was going on.
It wasn’t long before they reached the small building that contained the seismic devices and the small group of soldiers stationed there to protect and operate them.
Two Wyyvan guards stood outside, clearly grateful to have a defined purpose. Their masks filtered moisture and bubbled with every breath as Taj and Dent surveyed the scene, the two having circled around opposite sides of the building.
The nearby streets were clear of soldiers, the majority of them running around attempting to bolster the defenses at the artillery units, so Taj and Dent barely bothered with subterfuge.
Taj stepped around the corner and dashed at the guard. He spun around, eyes wide behind his visor, and Taj drove her blade into his chest, twisting it for maximum effect.
The second guard went for his gun.
He never got his hands on it.
Dent came up behind him and snapped the lizard’s neck with a pop. The Wyyvan went stiff and dropped without a sound.
They’d decided ahead of time who would go through the door first, so Taj put her boot into it and kicked it open, rushing inside. Dent took a few seconds to collect the corpses of the two Wyyvan guards and drag them inside before shutting the door behind him.
Two more obvious guards stood just inside the room, guns in their hands, while three more Wyyvans stood around looking surprised as Dent dropped bodies on the floor.
Taj stepped in, swinging her blade to the left and nearly hacking off the head of the Wyyvan she hit. He stumbled back, clutching his throat as black blood spewed between his fingers.
Taj shot him then and turned the gun on the second guard. He’d managed to raise his weapon and go for the trigger, but Taj was faster. She double-tapped him in the chest, then popped him once in the head for good measure.
Dent stepped around her and shot the other three Wyyvans in turn, only the last of the group managing to cry out before he died.
Given the noise outside, Cabe and the others still tossing bombs at the artillery units, Taj was sure no one had heard him.
Before he hit the ground, Taj began dissecting the seismic machines.
She put her blade to work, slicing and chopping and slashing at the delicate electronics, carving each into tiny pieces that could never be reassembled no matter how
much effort the Wyyvans put into it.
Taj had worried that they might have spare devices, so Dent searched the room, finding one and a number of spare parts. He destroyed those quickly, and the pair returned to the door after making certain they’d left nothing behind.
“You think we got them all?” Taj asked.
Dent shrugged. “We can’t know if they have others elsewhere, but it’s not likely they do,” he answered. “We don’t have time to worry about it, regardless. We need to—”
The AI stiffened, eyes going wide.
“What is it?” she asked.
“The Gate is being accessed!”
Chapter Nine
“Gack it!” Taj growled as they slipped out of the seismic device room, having wedged the door shut behind them.
It would delay anyone determined to get inside, but Taj figured that if no one looked closely at the place or thought about it, they’d bought themselves a little more time to pull off her plan.
The arrival of Wyyvan reinforcements, however, hadn’t been part of that plan even though she had known it was a possibility.
Should have tried to take that damn Gate out to start with, Taj thought, snarling at herself for not having thought of it.
She had a long way to go before she become a true tactician.
Dent spent the race back to the tunnels tuned into the armada, registering what was being passed on to him. It wasn’t until after they’d made it inside the cavernous main room of the rebel headquarters that he seemed ready to reveal what was happening.
Jak looked at them worriedly as they arrived. “Did you get them all?” he asked.
“We did, but we’ve got bigger problems now,” Taj told him.
He groaned and ran a hand across his brow. “Such as?”
“Troop carriers are breaking through the Gate the Wyyvans opened above,” Dent explained. “Four of them have emerged so far, but sensors detect a half-dozen more preparing to come through.”
Taj slumped at hearing the specifics. “That has to be thousands of soldiers,” she said.
Dent didn’t confirm her assumption.
He also didn’t contradict it, she noticed.
“There is no way we can repel that many soldiers,” Malcolm spat. “We can’t even take out the ones who are here already.”
Taj agreed.
“Sic the armada on them, Dent,” she ordered. “We can’t let them get anywhere near the planet or we’re gacked!”
“Already on it,” he confirmed, “but the bulk of the enemy fleet is already advancing, pushing forward at a fast clip toward Krawlas.”
“At least it can’t get any worse,” Torbon stated as he and the others joined them.
Everyone groaned.
“Did you really just say that?” Taj asked. “Why didn’t you just ask Rowl to swat us down while you’re at it?”
“Uh…” Dent started, glancing at Torbon, then back at Taj. “Your god is feeling cruel today,” he said. “The advance of the Wyyvan fleet toward the planet has weakened my efforts to block their transmissions, and they’ve broken through. I’m picking up encrypted communications between the dreadnought and the outpost’s command unit.”
“Now it can’t get any worse,” Torbon said, smiling. “Right?”
“Bloody Rowl!” Taj muttered. “I hate you, Torbon. Stop cursing us!” She sighed, turning back to the AI. “What are they saying, Dent?”
“Grand Admiral Galforin has ordered a sweep of the area surrounding the outpost,” Dent answered. “Scorched ground. His forces will be pushing out almost in their entirety in a few moments.”
Taj growled and turned to face Jak. “Now would be a good time to get your people working,” she told him. “Might want to light a fire under their asses while you’re at it.”
Malcolm snarled and ran off, darting down a nearby tunnel.
The artillery fire shrieked in the distance and the ground rumbled at the impacts, motes of dust dancing down from the ceiling.
“They won’t find us anytime soon,” Jak said, clearly trying to sound more hopeful than his expression showed.
“Anytime is too soon,” Rat mumbled.
“Might be sooner than you think,” Cabe suggested. “They have to know we’re hiding somewhere underground.” He stared at the rocky ceiling. “And since they’ve had seismic devices to be sure you weren’t digging additional holes, it won’t take a huge leap of logic for them to start targeting old dig sites since you couldn’t have made many new holes out here.”
Jak stiffened. He apparently hadn’t thought of that until then.
“Judging by the way the landscape looks, that’s still a lot of places to cover,” Taj said, trying to reassure everyone.
“Way fewer than if they’re just taking random shots into the Plains,” he countered.
“A systematic sweep of the already-mined areas will bring them to us far quicker than is good for us,” Dent agreed.
“Wyyvan troops are spilling from the outpost,” Jadie reported. She’d gone with Kal and set up a watch while Taj and the others assaulted the devices. “There are a gacking lot of them.” Her voice quavered, even over the comm.
Taj stood there for a moment running scenarios through her head, wishing she had more experience to rely on. What she’d learned from Beaux was mostly how to slip away and hide, and how to avoid major confrontations to keep their people alive.
That had been the way of the Furlorians since Felinus 4.
That, however, wasn’t an option here.
“We need to step up the fight, then,” she decided, knowing she’d regret the words later. This wasn’t a situation where running away or spending time deliberating made any sense, though.
It was time to fight.
“We don’t exactly have an army,” Cabe offered, not looking all that excited by the prospect of taking on the Wyyvans directly.
“No, we don’t,” she replied, “but we have air support.”
“Which also happens to be our way off this planet,” Krawg argued. “We’d be sending them into a meat grinder with so many of those artillery units still in place.”
“He’s correct,” Dent stated. “The odds of our shuttles surviving are—”
Krawg shook his head, interrupting with a cough. “Never tell me the odds.”
Torbon chuckled. “That’d make a good line in a holovid. Someone should write that down.”
“Along with our eulogy?” Lina asked. “Hate being negative, but we’re risking an awful lot here. Between the enemy fleet closing in on our ships and the chance of our shuttles being destroyed, do you think this is a good move?”
Taj met the engineer’s gaze and tried to smile. “We only have a few choices, Lina,” she argued. She held up a finger. “We grab everyone, load them into the shuttles, and return to the armada, hoping we can get away without being wiped out.” Another finger rose. “We can pack into the shuttles and flee in them, not bothering with the Decimator and the other ships.” She lifted a third finger. “Or we can fight.” Taj lowered the first two fingers. “I vote for the last of the three.”
“I so don’t want to agree with you on this particular subject, but I’d rather go out fighting for our world than dying while trying to run away with my tail tucked between my legs,” Cabe said.
Torbon nodded. “Me too,” he agreed with a resigned sigh.
“We can always vote for number three until a fourth option arrives,” Krawg suggested.
“The Decimator reports that the battle is fierce,” Dent said. “Our ships are giving as good as they are receiving, but it’s a game of attrition at this point. We won’t win the numbers game.”
“Gacking Rowl!” Taj snarled. “Leave enough shuttles in reserve to get all of us out of here and send the rest after the ground troops,” she ordered. “I don’t have to ask you to try not to get them all blown to gack, do I?”
Dent chuckled. “No, that goes without saying.”
“Except that she said it,” Torb
on muttered. “And you guys say I make no sense.”
The cavern trembled as the artillery barrage moved closer.
Jak grunted. “I’ll get everyone ready.”
Taj shook her head. “No, you and your people stay here,” she told him.
His eyes narrowed in confusion. “And have the roof come down on us?”
“That’s why we’re going out,” Taj explained. “We’re going to draw their fire and keep them from getting to you and your people.”
Jak stared at her, head cocked to the side. “I don’t understand. Why would you do this?”
“Two reasons,” she answered. “The first is, we need your people to keep digging. We still want to get everyone out of the outpost if we can. The second reason is that our arrival brought this down on you. If we go out in a blaze of glory, Rowl forbid, and your people stay out of sight and out of the way, maybe things can go back to the way they were. Maybe you’ll have a chance.”
Jak continued to stare without saying anything.
“If nothing else, you can commandeer the remaining shuttles and make a break for it.”
Dent nodded. “I’ve set the access to allow you to board and take control of the shuttles should we perish.”
“I don’t know what to say,” Jak replied.
“Don’t say anything,” Taj answered. “Just get as many of your people out of here alive as you can if things go badly.” She glanced at Rat.
Rat waggled a finger her direction. “Don’t go looking at me, now,” she said. “I’m going with you.” She raised her rifle, grinning.
There wasn’t time to argue, so Taj nodded her reluctant approval and spun on a heel, racing off. She knew her crew would follow.
They had to get out of the tunnels and make a big enough show of force to draw as much of the Wyyvan force to them as possible if there was to be any chance of keeping the escaped workers safe.
She exited the tunnels just as the shuttles engaged the Wyyvan soldiers in the distance. Explosions filled the air, the screech of energy weapons drowning out almost everything else. The ships darted back and forth, strafing the ground and doing their best to avoid being shot down.
Taj saw one get blown away not more than a few seconds after the first engagement. It didn’t bode well, but there was nothing she could do about it from there. They had to get moving.
