Star Force: Origin Series Box Set (25-28)

by Aer-ki Jyr

  “Are you physically ready for that?”

  “Well enough.”

  "Extraction options?”

  “48 hour window, then send for pickup. I’ll contact the dropship when it’s in range.”

  “I’d prefer if you took a transmitter with you, that way we can stay in 2-way contact.”

  Morgan shook her head. “If something important happens you keep me informed, and if need be you can send a ship early. I’m not going to have any vital intel to relay, and I don’t want to waste the space in my pack the transmitter would take up.”

  “Take a satchel with you and ditch it somewhere safe?”

  “Not for this mission,” Morgan said, a bit of anxiousness in her voice. “This is run and gun. No base camp.”

  “And you want the pack space for extra ammunition?”

  “As much as I can get.”

  “What about the walkers? Do want them taken out before you go in?”

  “No, don’t delay any other operations for mine. There are bigger engagements that need their touch.”

  “Understood,” Wilkinson said, though there was a hint of displeasure in his voice.

  Morgan put a hand on his shoulder and whispered in his ear. “I owe them.”

  “You could take some Knights with you,” he whispered back.

  “They’re too slow for what I have in mind.”

  Wilkinson sighed. “Good luck.”

  Morgan squeezed his shoulder then left the bridge, headed over to the sanctum’s armory.

  “We’re nearly at the target,” the pilot’s voice said through Morgan’s helmet commlink, “but we’ve got some enemy aircraft in the area. They haven’t noticed us yet, but I’m not sure how close I’ll be able to set you down.”

  “What type of aircraft?”

  “Looks like a pair of vipers strafing the city.”

  “Get some altitude. I’ll drop early and angle in.”

  “With what?”

  “I have a jump pack.”

  “Alright,” the pilot said hesitantly. “I’ll see if I can’t build you a parabolic trajectory. Which hatch are you going out?”

  “Aft is easiest.”

  “You do realize you have the aerodynamics of a falling brick, and that jump pack won’t slow your lateral momentum. If I don’t time this right you’re going to be a smear mark on the side of some building.”

  “This isn’t the first time I’ve jumped. Just make sure you don’t get too close to the fighters.”

  “I doubt they’ll be able to hit you once you fall.”

  “I meant for your sake. You’re the bigger target.”

  “I’m well aware of that. Hold onto something, not sure how much turbulence you’re going to get back there.”

  Morgan reached down to one of the seats in the hold of the Eagle-class dropship and grabbed a safety restraint with her left hand. “I’m good.”

  Without another word the aft hatch opened and a maelstrom of wind shot in as the horizon moved upwards and was eclipsed by the top of the dropship’s interior as the winged transport arced up. Morgan didn’t feel the gravity change directions, for she was still within the hold and the inertial dampening nulled it out. The artificial gravity field held her in place as she looked out the rear of the dropship on almost a vertical line straight down to the surface with the city outskirts coming into view.

  “Go,” the pilot instructed, and Morgan didn’t hesitate. She ran out the back and felt the gravity shift instantly, pulling her into freefall straight ahead but oddly with no wind impacting her front side. Her momentum, carried over from the dropship, was still moving her upwards and towards the center of the city.

  “I’m out,” she said so the pilot knew he could go evasive. From her rotating position she caught sight of one of the fighters pulling up from the streets and gaining altitude. “Get moving, you’ve got a tail.”

  “I’ll lose it…good luck.”

  “Thanks,” Morgan acknowledge as the dropship punched its anti-grav and rocketed up into the sky.

  As gravity eventually won the tug of war with her momentum, Morgan topped off her parabolic arc and began to fall, spreading her arms out as she did to level her body and give her some limited maneuvering capability. Once she stabilized she had quite the view, enough to spot the other viper strafing Calavari on the city streets and the walkers working their way through the southwest quadrant.

  That wasn’t where she wanted to land, so she steered herself towards the northwest where the infantry fighting was the heaviest, leaving the walkers to the Calavari troops and their few remaining hovertanks. As she dropped closer Morgan activated her jump pack at minimal power, adding a bit of upward thrust to the friction dragging on her body and brought her speed down a bit.

  Her ability to steer diminished with her speed, but she was already north of the walkers and coming down on the tulip-shaped Calavari structures when she finally had to use most of her jump pack’s charge to stall her fall. She missed the street and landed on the angled ‘roof’ of one of the buildings, sliding across and down it and using the brief footing to kill some of her lateral momentum. The rest dumped her off the side and she coasted across the street and into the side of the nearby building before the jump pack completely stalled her out.

  She drifted sideways out into the street, then cut power and half fell down to the white stone surface, goosing it in one burst to cushion her footfall. Morgan crunched down onto her ankles from the weight of her armor and pack, but managed to stay on her feet as a pair of Nestafar infantry flew over to her between the red/orange buildings, at the base of which several groups of Calavari were taking cover under the gentle overhang.

  Morgan reached back, pulling off her plasma rifle and powering it up as a few red plasma blasts came her way. She faked left, then angled right, throwing off their aim before she put a beautiful blue streak directly into the closest one’s chest, dropping it out of the air and down to crunch on the white stone.

  When it fell other Nestafar appeared, coming out from around the bulbous midsections of several of the tall, stalk-like buildings at the sounds of weaponsfire. Undeterred, Morgan shot her previous foe then ran forward evasively and began picking off the others, taking as few hits to her armor as she could. At first it wasn’t difficult, but as more and more flooded in she found herself faced with a greater challenge.

  All the better. The more attention she drew to herself the less there’d be for the Calavari to deal with.

  She picked one of the thin buildings that didn’t have Calavari hiding underneath the curved shaft and ran towards it, eclipsing half of growing opposition and forcing them to come down lower to shoot around the middle-set bulge of the building. The Archon held close to the base of the tower-like structure and began running around it in circles, shooting those ahead of her and forcing the others to follow.

  She wound her way around twice before they got wise to the tactic, then most of them held position, flapping their wings furiously so they could hover in place and target the area where she was going to appear next.

  Morgan obliged them for another round, shooting the stationary targets but taking several hits to her armor in the process…then she backtracked and reversed her course, catching many of them off guard as she swung around the opposite side. As she did a few golden streaks began popping up in her peripheral vision, as did the Nestafar they were sniping out of the air. Combined with her growing kill count a ring of Nestafar bodies began stacking up around the building, leaving a clear inner ring for Morgan to continue running around as the building’s bulge provided her with an angled roof that kept her footing clear.

  Knowing that she was getting predictable, Morgan darted off across the street to another building and repeated the process, making a pair of loops before figure-8ing her way over to another. This one had a threesome of what looked like battle-weary Calavari hunkered up against the base in a defensive huddle and the closest one almost shot her as she came into view. Fortunate
ly he held off just long enough for her to pass by, eliciting confused looks from all three, then the Calavari’s Y-shaped rifles lit up the Nestafar that followed her around the bend of the building, dropping half a dozen before they got wise to the impromptu ambush.

  A few moments later the green-armored Human appeared again, having run all the way around the building and dragging a few more dimwitted adversaries to the Calavari even as she continued to take down others in the air with her pinpoint accuracy…on the run, no less. The moment she passed them by she dumped a load of expended plasma shells onto the white stone surface, shoving them via momentum towards the base of the building. One of the Calavari just caught a glimpse of her reaching back into her pack for more ammunition in his peripheral vision before she disappeared and he suddenly had a plethora of targets to deal with.

  The Calavari threesome took a few hits, which their combat shields soaked up, and thinned her pursuit enough that the survivors wisely decided to retreat back up above the building bulge and out of the firing line. The four-armed soldiers held their position, taking shots at any Nestafar that came within sight, but the Human didn’t return. Eventually they received new orders to redeploy to another location and got an update on the rogue warrior who was knocking down so many of the enemy that the Calavari were beginning to get the upper hand in this sector.

  The tired threesome moved off cautiously, fatigued from multiple days of bitter and pointless fighting as they had gradually lost territory to the enemy, but now with a new spark of hope as they saw other surviving clusters of troops coming out of cover and joining them in the redeployment to the river walkway that the Nestafar had taken two days ago. Before that it had been a dividing line that they’d been holding, and eventually lost to an onslaught of infantry coupled with aerial strikes.

  Now there were Nestafar bodies clogging the center of the streets…and quite a few dropping down on the walkway as a cloud of enemy infantry followed a green dot from cover to cover chasing the Human. The Calavari soldiers quickly took up preferred defensive positions, carving out a foothold in what had just been a key Nestafar defensive line. Even now more enemy troops were flying in from across the river and from the south, but a dozen or so imbedded troops were thinning their numbers from afar as the Human distracted the rest further to the north.

  “What is that?” one of the Calavari asked, motioning off in the distance down the walkway.

  “A Human,” another commented, intoning a deep respect to the term.

  “We’ve been reinforced?!”

  “Command isn’t sure. The Humans aren’t coordinating their assault. Just make sure you don’t shoot them on accident. We need as much help as we can get.”

  “I didn’t even know there were any on the planet,” another Calavari commented between rifle shots.

  “Their fleet arrived 3 days ago and prevented the Nestafar dropships from landing any more troops. Beyond that I don’t know what’s going on.”

  “I thought the Kvash did that,” another Calavari said from further down the line as more small groups kept coming in and joining the cluster.

  “Joint effort,” another one said. “How many Humans have you seen?”

  “Just a green one…or maybe several. Hard to say, they were moving around so much.”

  “Anyone see two Humans in the same place?”

  No one had, eliciting a confused look between the talkative pair.

  “They sent one?”

  “Could be more elsewhere in the city.”

  “They deploy singly?”

  “If they’re that tough, why not?” another, older Calavari said, readjusting his aim to the right as the swarm of Nestafar started coming back their way as Morgan darted from point to point beneath them, dropping a few with each maneuver. “He’s bringing them back our way…let’s give him some help.”

  Rifle barrels all throughout the group started tracking to the right, with a few Calavari coming up out of cover to redeploy into better firing positions as others kept a back guard on the other enemy troops moving about.

  “That’s right, Human. You’re a smart one, aren’t you? Get them out of position and angry following you, then lead them right back to us. You’re one ally worth keeping alive,” he said, squeezing off his first golden plasma lance into the flying infantry swarm.

  3

  March 3, 2405

  Brokal System

  Sri’ka

  “Ah, good,” the regional Calavari commander said as one of his subordinates walked into the improvised command center set up in the lobby of one of the hundreds of tulip-shaped buildings popping up from the stone surface across the city. “I assume the explosives were useful?”

  The gold-clad four-armed alien nodded as he came up and put his lower set of arms down on the table, leaning on his fists. “They were. The Human was able to place them at the base of the walker’s neck. They disabled the primary power line and took out its main cannon.”

  “It’s still partially operational then?”

  “No, we finished it off.”

  “With what?”

  “Upended it with a combat sled and the pilot fled. We disabled it from the inside after that.”

  “Good work. Now if we can just take out the last one we’ll be in tenable position to hold off their reinforced infantry.”

  The other Calavari frowned. “More arrived?”

  “Several transports worth, I’m afraid, but no heavy equipment. I’d guess they’ve got their hands full elsewhere and can’t spare any more walkers.”

  “But they’ve got plenty of bodies to throw at us?”

  “It seems so.”

  “At the rate the Human is taking them down it’s either send more or admit defeat…and I’d hoped for the later.”

  “A few more Human soldiers and we could run them right out of the city,” the commander commented, overly pleased with the help they were getting from the lone Archon. “Assuming we can take out that walker. I’ve requested additional arms, but there’s no way of telling when or if they’ll arrive, and I’d rather not have to count on them getting here. Do you have any suggestions?”

  “No more explosives available?”

  The commander shook his head in the negative.

  “I suppose we’re down to picking at it with the combat sleds.”

  “We’ve only got four left, and two of those are damaged. That’s not enough to take down a long-neck.”

  “No Valerie support?”

  “Tied up in other engagements.”

  The Calavari rubbed his chin with his left upper hand. “I don’t know. Small arms can’t scratch that armor, unless we have something more powerful to throw at it the best we can hope for is to snipe the pilot when he comes out. They can’t stay inside forever.”

  “It keeps cycling back through their base camp, so I’d assume any crew transfers take place there…and there’s no way to get a team that deep into their lines. Even with the Human’s help,” he added before the other Calavari made the suggestion.

  “I don’t know what to do then, other than keep out of its way.”

  “Neither do I, so that’s what we do for now. Focus on whittling down their infantry and see if you can entice the walker in a new direction with the sleds. Don’t engage with clear firing lines, but get its attention enough to keep it away from the more populated areas if possible.”

  “Where do we stand on the evac?”

  “Less than 10% have gotten out, the rest have been relocated within more secure sections of the city.”

  “Ten! We’ve had over a week and that’s all they’ve managed to get out?”

  “We don’t have the transport sleds. Their damn vipers picked off most of the civilian ones and we’re barely getting any supply shipments coming in as it is.”

  “You’d think we would have been more prepared than this.”

  “This city isn’t critical to the war effort, so available assets have to be distributed to protect the vital areas.” />
  “Is that what command told you?”

  “Word for word.”

  “Damn them then…”

  “I share your sentiment, but if our major fortifications fall it won’t be long before the enemy here gets stronger reinforcements. Heavy fighting elsewhere is helping us as much as it is hurting us.”

  “One squadron to take down one walker…that’s all we need. We can handle the infantry with the Human’s help.”

  “We don’t have it, so we have to make do…also Command’s words.”

  “Fancy talk for ‘shut up and die.’”

  The commander shook his head adamantly. “We’re not dead yet. I’m still hoping there’s something in this city that we can scrounge into another explosive. Until we find it, keep doing what you can.”

  “Always,” the Calavari said, walking over to a wall rack and grabbing an extra ammunition pack for his rifle.

  Morgan sat on her ankles at the base of a low wall, facing out as she took a moment to gather some intel on the enemy’s movements. Her position had a good view of a park-like area that bordered the river, as well as good vision for protecting her flank against interlopers. So far the Nestafar infantry hadn’t bothered her, and it appeared the reason why was because they were regrouping into at least three sections about to make another push to recross the river.

  The Calavari had the untenable position of not only having to defend the bridges, but the entire line given that the Nestafar could fly over at will. That said, the area of the river was the most wide open in the thick of the city, offering their snipers ample range to shoot the Nestafar down as they crossed. From the looks of it, the enemy had either received another batch of reinforcements or had redeployed infantry from other areas, because she hadn’t seen any dropships arriving…though she’d been busy enough not to have noticed before.

  Their lone walker wasn’t among those assembling in front of her, tucked behind cover so the Calavari couldn’t see. Morgan had taken time to pull back and flank the enemy, swimming across the river now that her jump pack was trashed. It’d taken a plasma hit so she’d discarded it, making her a bit lighter but no longer able to move around as she’d like. Still, she’d managed to get in behind the enemy and was in prime position to cause a ruckus if needed, but her ammunition was nearly gone and she needed to scout out the most logical position to make a dent in their forces before she had to start relying on captured weapons.