“If that ruler is even alive,” growled the Great Admiral. “We have no evidence that he is, and all indications to the contrary.”
“And we do not know that he is dead, either,” said the intelligence officer. “And we know enough about human ingenuity to believe he might have made it. And if he has, then we will have insight into his thinking processes.”
“I also did not like the way she was looking at Ben when she found he was the one who had betrayed her. I’m not sure it is such a good idea to put them together.”
“She is a female, and he is a male. What is the risk to him?”
“She is a modified female, and is much stronger and faster than he is,” said the Great Admiral. “And remember that females can be warriors among this species. She could probably kill him hand to hand without much of a problem.”
“Barbaric race, to make their females into warriors,” said the intelligence officer with an expression of distaste on his face.
“They are not the same as us,” said the Great Admiral, leaning over the table. “You must remember that if you are going to understand how they think. Even though they have an Empire, it is not the same as ours.” The Great Admiral leaned back and pushed a signal button on the table. In seconds a serving slave came running into the room. “The humans are more like her than us, though not the same at all. Remember that.” The Great Admiral made a waving motion with an upper hand and the slave left the room, keeping her eyes down. He almost laughed as he thought of the resentment of a slave who didn’t dare show it to one who had the power of life and death over them. Though that slave’s species was not eatable to Cacada, so she would only be killed, not that it would make much difference to her.
“It is so hard to wrap one's head around different ways of thought,” said the Intelligence Officer. “So much easier to believe that they have the same logical basis for planning that we have.”
And I wonder how much of that logical basis is true, thought the Grand Admiral, looking at a holo of the system on the wall for a moment. He looked back and met the eyes of the other Admiral. “Would you like a field command, instead of what you are doing? I could appoint another officer if that would be more satisfactory to you.”
“No, my Lord Great Admiral,” said the Intelligence Officer, a look of panic in his eyes. “I prefer the job I am doing, and will endeavor to do it to the best of my ability.”
The Great Admiral gave a head motion of acknowledgement while looking at his intelligence officer. He doesn’t have the nerve to fight in a front line position. It is best for all that we make use of his mind while not putting him in a position where his panicking might cause deaths to more worthy warriors. The Great Admiral thought back on the male’s record, remembering that he had been a battleship captain prior to being promoted to low admiral. A very successful captain, with a string of victories over species the race had conquered. But eventually even a successful officer could lose his nerve.
“Do not worry then, Admiral,” said the Great Admiral, putting his upper right hand on the male’s shoulder. “You shall be aboard my flag when we sail.” The most protected ship in the fleet, since I also value my own hide. “Go ahead with your plans to keep Ben and the female together. Just remember, if anything happens to either of them, it is your responsibility.”
The other male gave a head motion of acceptance, then saluted, upper right fist to his chest, and moved away. The Great Admiral walked into his office and past the outer chamber slave. In his own office he stopped in front of the portal to take a look at stars that were still unfamiliar to him, knowing that one day they would be the stars of his Empire.
Chapter Seven
The funny thing about people is that they prefer planets underfoot. We can build all the habitats we want, and people still want the open air of planets. And since we need a large population to survive as a species, we need lots of worlds for those populations to grow on. There is also something inherently defensible about a planet. They are hard to destroy, not impossible, but very difficult. And other species also want planets. Seems like anything that developed in that kind of environment, and we all did, wants to live and procreate in such a setting. They want those planets as well, and since destroying them does not get what they want, they have to take those planets away from the people dwelling on them. Colonel Janice Bellows, On War, Imperial Year 354.
SESTIUS SYSTEM, MARCH 23RD, 1000.
I’m almost there, thought Walborski, looking up the road from the edge of the wood line that ran along its side. He recognized the turnoff to the farm that was just before his. And then around the curve and he would see the entrance road to his own property. Deciding that at this point the road was covered better than the field he would have to traverse in a couple of moments, Walborski walked onto the paved surface that was covered by a canopy of trees He checked up and down the road carefully before moving forward, making sure he hadn’t missed anything that might be waiting for him..
The farmer knew that something was seriously wrong as he made that turn on the curve. There were trees down all over the road ahead. His entrance was about a hundred meters further down the road, and all of the trees had been knocked down at that point. With a sinking feeling in his stomach Cornelius took off at a run, fatigue and caution forgotten, jumping or weaving around downed trees. The sky was tinted orange ahead from the rising sun, giving the farmer more light than was generated by his night vision faceplate, but he still bumped his armored knees against some hard trunks, or stumbled over branches.
“No,” he cried out, not wanting to believe the sight that greeted his eyes. The entire field was flattened, even the fence posts gone. The ground was bare under the rising sun, crops burned or blown away. The barn was gone, and the most horrible sight of all, there was no house.
Cornelius looked up through tear streaked eyes at the cause of the destruction. A couple of hundred meters out from the boundary of the farm, where Sestius life took over, was the burned out hulk of one of the massive mobile shore defense guns. Probably the very one he had seen setting up there weeks before. Its gun was tilted over, and even the heavy turret that must have weighed two hundred tons was askew on the hull of the vehicle.
Cornelius could see it in his mind, the gun firing at the enemy ships in orbit, which may have fired back with light amp or particle weapons. Then had come the kinetic penetrator, blazing in so fast it would have looked like a streak of light. It was probably a very near miss, generating enough energy to kill the vehicle as well as everything for a kilometer around. And kill Walborski’s dreams with it. The shadow of the gun had kept the damage down to a lesser degree on this side of the weapon. Still, enough force had been generated to take out the house and barn, both made of tough modern materials.
Katlyn was his next thought, and he ran across the open area as fast as his legs would take him, aiming for the flattened space where the house had stood, where the basement was still he hoped. Please God, let her have stayed in the basement like I told her to, he prayed silently. She should have, unless she was out with the dogs, letting them relieve themselves when the blast hit.
“Katlyn,” he cried as he bounded onto the hard surface that had been the floor of the house and the top of the basement. It was made of stronger material than the house, as the basement was to be the final shelter on the farm in case of storms or other disasters, though probably not an alien invasion. “Katlyn,” he yelled again, reaching for the handle to the door and seeing that it was missing.
He scraped for purchase, trying to find a way to raise the door, then pounded on it, yelling his wife’s name over and over. There was some noise coming up from below, and Cornelius thought it sounded like the dogs. But if something had happened to Katlyn they would not be able to open the door.
Cornelius was thinking about trying to shoot through the door, trying to take out the lock and allow him to raise the door. He was leery of trying that, as the round might go through the door and strike Katlyn or the d
ogs. Still, it might be worth the risk of there wasn’t anyone inside to raise the door. If Katlyn was injured already she might be in desperate need of help. He had brought the rifle to his shoulder and was steeling himself to fire when there was a fumbling sound at the door, then it lifted out.
“Cornelius,” cried Katlyn as she lifted the hatch and looked out. One of the dogs shouldered past her and out into the air, yelping and jumping as it saw Walborski. The other dogs were also yelping and trying to get out.
“I am so happy to see you,” said the farmer, setting his rifle down and reaching a hand into the opening for his wife to grab. He helped her out of the hole, then retracted his faceplate and placed his lips to hers, savoring the sensation that minutes before he thought he might have lost forever. He broke the connection and looked down into her face.
“I’m so happy to see you,” said Katlyn, tears in her eyes. “It sounded like the world had ended back there.”
“I bet it did,” said Cornelius, looking over at the knocked out shore battery gun. Katlyn followed his gaze.
“Oh. My God, just like you said.” The woman shook her head, as if the act could make the world she didn’t want to realize go away. She looked back at her husband with a shocked expression on her face. The dogs continued to cavort around them as if nothing else in the world mattered. A couple of the cats came up to the opening, looked out, and didn’t seem to like what they saw, disappearing back into the basement.
“Is it over?” asked his wife, a look of hope coming over her face. “Did we beat them? That’s why you’re back, isn’t it?”
“I wish it were, honey,” said Cornelius, shaking his head. “Frederick’s gone, or nearly was when I left there. The Cacas rolled over my unit like we were nothing. The Army did a bit better, but they’re outnumbered.”
“The militia didn’t do anything?”
“Oh, we did something,” said the man, standing a little bit straighter. “I killed at least one of the son of a bitches,” he said with pride. “Might have got more than that one, but it was hard to be sure. And for every one we killed they got five of us.”
“So what are you doing back here?” asked Katlyn, her voice dropping to almost a whisper. “You didn’t desert, did you? Oh honey, you know what they do to deserters during time of war.”
“Honey, in another twenty-four hours there won’t be any authority left on this planet worth a damn. At least nothing that will be interested in tracking down civilians.”
Cornelius started down the stairs into the basement, taking his wife’s hand in his and leading her down. His eyes took in the large room beneath the ground, almost as big as the house was, and filled with all kinds of things that might prove useful. “We need to take what we can carry and get out of here,” he said, walking over to a storage bin and pulling rations from it.
“Why can’t we stay here?” asked Katlyn, her voice whining. “We have what we need here, and we can stay hidden.”
“There won’t be any hiding from those bastards,” said her husband, pulling down a bag and putting things in it. “They’ll go to every habitation and make sure we’re gone. If not today or tomorrow, then next week or month. Now, I’m going to bury a lot of the stuff we can’t carry over in the woods a couple of klicks from here. You get together some packs with necessities like medical supplies, ammunition, and the dried rations.”
“What about the animals?” said Katlyn, picking up one of the cats, who had come out of hiding and was checking out what his humans were doing. “We can’t just leave them.”
Walborski thought about that for a moment. He loved the animals too, but this was no time for sentimentality. Their survival was at stake. “We’ll take the dogs,” he said, petting one of the big animals on the head. “They will give us security, and can mostly feed themselves.” Which is very true, he thought. The dogs had nanites that allowed them to process the native food. While the same was not true in the reverse, they could still be killed by the native wildlife that didn’t know better. “We’ll give them packs to carry, at least all but the two I want to scout for us.”
“And the poor cats?” asked his wife, hugging the tabby to her chest.
“We can’t take them,” said Cornelius, holding up his hand to stop his wife from protesting. “It wouldn’t be fair to them. They can’t keep up, and I’m pretty sure they would just wander away anyway.”
“We can’t just leave them to die,” complained Katlyn, holding the cat tighter..
“We’ll leave the basement open a crack,” said Cornelius, reaching over and running a hand over the cat’s soft fur, then putting his hand on top of Katlyn’s. “They’ll be able to get in and out, and hunt whenever they want.”
“You don’t think the Cacas will kill them?”
“Hell no,” said the farmer with a smile. “They only have the ass for us. Not our pets. Now let’s get to work.”
The sun was high in the sky by the time the farmer had buried what he wanted to hide, and was starting to go down by the time he had the packs ready. Tapping into the military communications net didn’t give him a lot of information, but from the snatches he heard he didn’t think the Cacas would get to his property before the day after tomorrow. He decided on that he allowed his wife to bed down until morning, instead of making her walk through the jungle at night.
The sun was barely over the horizon when they were into that jungle, the six dogs with them, sniffing everything, but smart enough to let their human master investigate before they stuck their noses in anything.
“Where are we going?” asked Katlyn, who was only carrying a small pack due to her pregnancy.
“There’s a place some people told me about when we were getting ready for the landing,” said Cornelius, keeping his eyes peeled for trouble. He smiled at Katlyn and noted with approval that she was carrying her rifle at the ready, though he thought she would start getting more careless as fatigue set in. As long as she’s ready to back me up.
“What kind of place?”
“Someplace that has a lot of cover, water and food,” said Cornelius, listening as the dogs huffed around them. “Some of the Marines knew about it, and thought it would make a good rendezvous point if everything went to hell. I’ve got the coordinates on my hand comp.”
Suddenly the dogs started to raise hell up ahead, and the ones with the pair started that way at a run. “Let’s go,” shouted Cornelius, lowering his faceplate and checking his rifle. He ran ahead, Katlyn struggling to catch up, keeping his pace down so she wouldn’t be left behind. When he caught up with the dogs he was glad that they both were armed.
* * *
Colonel Samuel Baggett recalled hearing about something call The Wilderness Campaign from the time of old Earth. He didn’t remember much about it, except it was during the North American Civil War of a prespace century. He was sure that whatever it involved it would not be anything like the wilderness that he had his back to.
All night the static in the atmosphere had been clearing as the enemy systematically eliminated the human electronic warfare assets. Some of those assets were too small and dispersed to be eliminated entirely in any time frame less than weeks. Still, the enemy was getting a better look at the ground from space at any time since he had arrived. That had spelled death for more of his forces, including the young Lt. Colonel who had come to his rescue the other day.
This kind of war was totally unlike anything he had experienced on Janaikasa, fighting the Lasharan rebels. Here he was the outnumbered and outgunned force. Here he needed to use stealth and guile to bleed the enemy, while keeping his force alive.
I still have more than six hundred effectives, thought the Colonel, looking over his HUD. Not a lot of heavy weapons, but enough to hit and run for weeks if necessary. And what then? He looked up at the sky, just as he did every morning, hoping to see Imperial assault shuttles landing reinforcements. And what then, he thought in a continuing train. We can’t be the only system these bastards are hitting. We’r
e probably low on the list of systems to relieve, if there even is such a list.
“All the civilians are into the forest,” said the voice of Sergeant Major Terry Zacharias over the com, bringing a smile to the Colonel’s face.
Zacharias had been in the thick of the fighting the whole way, and hadn’t suffered a scratch. The irrepressible little noncom was one tough and smart SOB, and Baggett was glad to still have him.
“We’ll start falling back to the forest in five mikes,” said the Colonel over the com. And with luck we’ll be under cover before the demon fuckers even realize we’re gone. Not sure how well the civilians are going to do in this here wilderness though, the Colonel thought as he envisioned the forest filled with all those huge carnivores, and even the herbivores that could be deadly just because of gigantic size. They’ll just have to do as well as they can. At least most of them are armed, and hopefully I can use some of them as guerillas.
“We have movement to our front, Colonel,” said the voice of one of the new company commanders, just a platoon leader the day before. “Sounds like rumbling, but different than the barrage.”
“Let me listen,” said Baggett, jacking the gain from his helmet earphones up to max. It was a sound that was unmistakable to one who knew what to listen for. The creaking of metal, crumbling of building fragments underneath. And there were several of them. Baggett looked at his HUD, which was transmitting what the officer saw, and cursed under his breath as he saw what looked like a long gun.
“Those are tanks, Lieutenant,” he said, checking the rest of the front and seeing more armored vehicles just out of easy detection range. They screwed that one up. Should have waited a little longer and just come on when they were ready.
Kinetic rounds started coming down from the sky, most into the farmlands in front of the Infantry positions. Some were falling into the wilderness, knocking down multiple square kilometers of trees at every strike. The ground rumbled underneath, and some cursing came over the com.
Exodus: Empires at War: Book 3: The Rising Storm Page 18
