“I haven’t been able to identify weapon systems as we don’t know what to look for at this point, and we may be too far away to pick up that kind of detail. We’ll know more later, but we assume there’s something at least on the platform. They’re all civilian, so they won’t do very well against the battering they’ll get from the imperial dreadnought and her sisters.” He zoomed in on the massive elevators that extended from the surface of the planet and into the orbiting path around the planet.
“The platforms seem to be space elevators. The planet itself looks to be a farm planet,” Eddie put in.
“All right, pass the information to the others and bring up any information we can find on those power plants.” I looked around. People started to move, sensing the dismissal in my tone.
We ran through scenarios, looking for the best landing sites, entrance points, and defensive formations. We tried to develop everything we might need to invade another planet, take over multiple power plants, and hold them for an unknown period of time.
Eddie looked over the planet’s hologram, picking out probable areas where he thought the machines to make the kill switch disablers would be located. As well as information centers. We were still critically low on information and we needed more to convince the humans in the fleet.
I didn’t know how many hours passed when we were sitting down. Our plan formed and set. There was no going back; changing it would take too much time. Time was not a luxury we had.
“All right people, make sure to get everyone rested and give them plenty of time dealing with their own personal issues. Take your people by groups to the mess so they get something in them. We’re going into combat possibly tomorrow so we need to be ready,” I said, wondering to myself where the time had gone as I’d rushed around the ship.
“You’ve made me proud to serve with you. Hopefully we can find out what we need to know and figure out a plan of what to do afterward,” I said, catching Min Hae in my peripherals.
“I’m going to grab some food, and then some sleep.” I slapped my gauntleted hands against my legs. With that, we broke apart for the night. People grouped together, work still on their minds. I got into a rack and took off my armor. I liked the comfort it gave me while wearing it, but I didn’t want to be sore and chafed from the un-adjusted soft points, which I numbly adjusted. I didn’t realize how much training and planning tired someone out. I wandered to the mess. Everyone seemed a little nervous around me, but thankfully didn’t stop me as I got some of the same old slop. What I would do for a steak, or just something to put my teeth into!
I looked around the room, scanning for a seat. I saw Yasu saying good-bye to a couple she knew as she went to sit by herself. For once I felt sorry for her as she sat alone—isolated, eating her food, a sad expression on her face. Cowards wait for fate. I walked over, not really understanding why I did.
She looked at me with a surprised look as I ate my goop.
“Why are you eating with me?” she said in such a way that made it sound as if I was the one disgusted with her.
This was probably one of the dumber ideas I’d had.
“Why not?” I said with a light smile. Small steps, I reminded myself as I continued eating. I smiled into my bowl as she looked into her own bowl. I thought I saw her lips quiver upward for a millisecond before she relaxed minutely and continued eating.
We ate in companionable silence, both thinking over our own issues before we left together. I used the head first and promptly passed out on my pillow on the floor. I was too tired from running around the ship to deal with the thought that Yasu would kill me in my sleep. I had bigger things to worry about and even that would have to wait till after we took the power plants on the planet.
I awoke in a cold sweat. I felt as if I was going to throw up and I was more scared than I’d been in my entire life. I flexed my forearms, trying to feel the control I at least had over my own body. What I hadn’t been worrying about while I was awake hit me like a wave. I saw all the ways that what I was doing could go wrong and it could affect all of the members of MT—hell, all of the twenty thousand humans who were a part of this fleet. There were so many variables, so many unknowns.
I picked myself up, trying to tide over my anxiousness as I looked at Yasu, sleeping. I was going to turn away but the look of peace on her face made me pause. I studied the sheets, which were all that separated us—and well, my battle suit.
Her long legs were drawn up to her, framed by the sheet as well as her side, and her delicate-looking but strong arms. Her face drew me in. Her heart-shaped face framed her eyes and mouth, which was fuller than I thought as she wasn’t pressing them together in an angry expression. I leaned on the edge of the bed, studying her hair she’d left free, making a halo around her head but not taking away from her beauty.
I thought of the small glimmer of a smile I’d seen in the mess. My mouth turned into a soft smile as I looked at her. She is beautiful. She might’ve trained to be a fighter her entire life but there was something soft in her.
I forgot about war, the possibility of death or the dark thoughts I had about going on. “I wish I could see you smile before I die,” I said softly. A sad smile came to my face and my eyes watered.
“You big softie,” I admonished myself as sadness overwhelmed me at the possibility of never seeing that.
“Hopefully, someone somewhere will be able to smile because of what we do today,” I said to myself, happy at that possibility, even if I was no longer alive to see it.
Soberly, I walked out of my room and into the mess. I found a lot of people who had been having a hard time sleeping. I nodded to them, content to be in my own world as I got a squeeze bottle of goop and continued down to the armory.
“Report?” I said, any nervousness I had gone as the person on watch came over to me, giving me a data pad.
“We’ve continued our current course. We’ll be in range in five hours.”
“All right. Start waking people up in three if they aren’t already.” I got into my own Mecha.
Shrift came in at that point, looking like death warmed over.
“Hey, Shrift.” I studied his appearance.
“You owe me more beers—as you call it—than you can count.”
“So, you get it all done?”
“Got it all done? Did you understand what you asked us to do? We had to refit four thousand Mechas for people, as well as design and make enough damned stun rounds for everyone to have a load out for the entire battalion. We’re still making more in case they’re needed.”
“Hopefully we won’t need them. Go and get some sleep; you look like hell.”
“I feel like it too. I’m going to my quarters; ping me on the data pad if you need me.” His stare made it clear to not disturb him unless it was vitally important.
“Will do,” I said as he walked off through the hangar and to his waiting quarters in the inner layer of the ship with the other Kuruvians.
I turned back to the man on watch. “Tell Min Hae as soon as he’s awake to find me.”
“Yes, sir.”
I walked out with the Mecha, now taking off my gauntlets so I wouldn’t turn the squeeze bottle of goop into a colorful explosion from the enhanced Mecha’s power.
The hangar was quiet, as everyone had been ordered to rest. A few early risers were using their Mechas to apply resistance to their movements, allowing them to work out.
I joined them, moving in the Mecha to limber up and wake up as I squeezed my purple goop into my mouth.
“Commander Salchar?” I heard over my communication channel.
“Yes, Min Hae?”
“Will you meet with me in armory four?”
“Sure, see you there.” I squeezed the remainder of the goop into my mouth as I walked into the armory.
“What’s up?” I looked at Min Hae’s confused expression.
“Why aren’t we trying to break free of the Syndicate?”
“We don’t have people with
the skills to fill all of the positions needed. Say we take the ship. That, with our commandos skills, is questionable. Then what? We don’t have the people trained or proficient enough for us to control the ship. Sure, the Kuruvians can keep us afloat, but we will still need to learn everything. Right now we’re learning as much as possible so that our people can take over. Yet that is just three ships. Other than Rick and Bok Soo’s ship, no other has begun training their people to take over ship functions.
“If we take this ship and the other ships find out and we don’t know how to use the ship, then we will die. If we do know how to fight with the ship, then we kill all of the other humans with us. This means we have to convince the other ships of the threat and get them trained up as well. All of this takes time. If we attack now, we lose that advantage. Also, as we wait, we gain more information from the Syndicate crews on their activities and we know what the hell we’re getting ourselves into.”
“Yes, sir. I just hate not being able to do something. Plus, we’re doing the same thing to this planet that the Syndicate did to Earth.”
“I know your frustration, but we need to wait. We even need this battle to happen, just so that we can link up with other groups from other ships and pass on what we know and get them ready.”
“I...I understand,” he said, visibly deflating. “It’s just that people are going to die, both the people on the planet and our own, and we can’t do a thing!” He growled.
“I know.” I put my armored hand on his shoulder. I’m going to be sending these people in to battle when I could be taking this ship, but to do so would condemn us all to death. For us all to survive, a few must die. That is the most heartless saying I’ve ever heard.
I walked out of the armory, me and Min Hae with our own mental battles as we waited.
Three hours later, everyone was awake and our Sarenmenti officers were coming down from their areas.
“Henry, have individual squads attach themselves to an officer so we don’t have a breakdown in communication,” I said through a private communications channel.
“Understood, Commander.”
I saw Yasu moving with a squad. I fell into place quickly as I realized it was my own as we marched up to the officer.
“Formation, HALT!” I said as we came to a stop. Henry had worked through drill with the weapons skills to give him a tool to enlighten the Mechas to the errors of their ways. It had been a worthwhile training tool and I could see the pride in everyone’s faces, even as our feet came down, sounding like a wave instead of a solid noise. It was still damned good in the short time we’d had.
“Who in the hell are you?” the Sarenmenti officer demanded as we stood there for a few seconds.
“We’re your platoon,” I said.
The officer grunted with the hint of a Sarenmenti smile on his lips I could see through his visor.
“Well, not too bad. Looked good with that stomping thing you did there.” He pointed to me. “You will gather others to be my personal squad. Which means you will be the goddamn best! Line up for weapons, unless you’ve got any other surprises for me?”
“We have planned insertion points, objectives, and defensive perimeters from our thought objectives.”
His eyes seemed to go wide at this as he came close to me. “Show me.”
I took off a gauntlet, grabbing my data pad from my back pouch, and showed it to him as he came close.
He took off his helmet and gauntlets, taking the data pad from me and studying it.
“Damn, this is a better battle plan than the one we had. Who came up with this?”
“We worked together, sir,” I said.
He nodded in acceptance. “ All right, looks good. I think I’m going to push it higher. I know that I’ll feel better if more of my people have these plans. Especially the way that some always have an...internal battle plan, shall we say, that never fully forms.”
I nodded in agreement with a grin. I watched as he transmitted the information to his commander. My HUD traced the electronic tracker and recorder I’d put in the plan as it passed through the Golden Refuge’s communication array and onto the other ships that made up the fleet, being digested and used by over ninety percent of the Mecha troops.
“You’ve just become this platoon’s commander as I won’t have time to hold your hand, having to coordinate with higher and other platoons. That also means you will be my second-in-command on the field, no matter what the other officers say. Now, go and grab your weapons. We’ll be one of the first shuttles down.” He raised his voice to make sure everyone could hear.
“Right turn!” I said as we all turned our feet, thumping into the ground in synchronization.
“Forward, march!” Again we moved off toward the armory. We split into our team, filing through and grabbing weapons as they were handed out of the now open armories.
I secured my weapons and ammunition as I had with the raid before, running back over to where Turek was waiting.
“All right, you know your people better than I do so help me to pick out their officers.”
“We prefer commanders, sir.”
“Very well—doesn’t matter to me. I just want to know who I punish when their group doesn’t perform as ordered.”
He took me by three groups as I told him on a private channel who the best commanders would be, keeping the commanders we’d previously had in their positions.
“Very well, back to your squad.” He paused and looked at me. “What is your name?”
“Salchar, sir.”
“Very well. Back to your squad, Salchar.”
“Yes, sir.” I ran back to the shuttle my squad was loaded on. Everyone had their magazines loaded without their rifles cocked, yet still pointed down as to minimize the damage if their weapons went off. I checked, making sure that none of them were actually readied with a bolt in the chamber. The training had done its job.
I watched on my HUD as the other squads were quickly gathered and put on their own shuttles. Now, with nothing to do but wait, the nerves were setting in.
I looked at Yasu beside me, wearing her Mecha, her face now set. She concentrated on a part of the ground as she gripped her rifle.
Butterflies filled my stomach as I, too, concentrated on my rifle, trying to distract me from what was going to happen.
I saw the pilots as they boarded. One looked like the creature I’d seen that had declared we were going to be recruited. The other was scaly-looking but with the same bipedal structure humans had.
They walked into the cockpit, which sealed and locked behind them. A few minutes later, I could feel the power come alive as the doors shut and sealed before the thrusters and main engines fired. We meandered forward. The view screens showed the massive hangar doors opening before the shuttle.
We were going to the first planet that wasn’t located in our solar system. Armed to the teeth with technology we barely knew ourselves and here I was, my nervousness turning to excitement. Sure, there was a high possibility I could die, but I’d traveled through star systems, I’d been in a starship, and I was about to step on another planet that supported life tens of light-years from my home planet. Adrenaline filled me as I couldn’t stop grinning. The hangar doors finished opening as I looked at the beautiful marble that hung amid darkness, a perfect balance of just the right things that had somehow come together to make something stunning, one of a kind and damned right awesome.
This is what space travel is about. Seeing the incredible. The rest of the shuttle, the ship, and the universe left me as I admired that planet, stuck in a moment of peace. The shuttle rose, jarring me and ending that moment as I checked my gear. The time for reflection was over; the time for surviving had descended.
We accelerated out of the hangar doors. To one side, we saw the planet from the hologram and then back to the Syndicate ships, which were belching fire. The platforms at the top of the elevators that reached into space were halos of fire, striking out at the Syndicate ships in silence.
The shuttle in front of us exploded as one of the streams of fire plowed into it, catching the engines. Already a hundred humans were dead.
Then the pilots turned our world into a roller coaster. The world seemed to stop, as it did on a roller coaster, just before the drop. Then, you drop, your body and mind sure you’re going to die as adrenaline floods your system.
My stomach plummeted as the shuttle did things that I didn’t think possible, with the floor, ceiling, and walls becoming each other as acceleration and gravities assaulted my body. Then we entered atmosphere. Our previous moving felt like a light kiss as we were hurled against our harnesses. It didn’t seem they thought we’d had enough. They added in jinks, swerves, and dives as we were thrown across the sky to get away from incoming fire.
“We’re taking incoming,” the pilots said a little too late as the telltale pings announced the incoming fire from the ground. Thankfully nothing punctured as another series of moves took us out of the line of fire.
With re-entry, it wouldn’t take much to rip our shuttle, and us inside it, apart. I saw with other shuttles that got rounds in the wrong place and split into sections, turning into fireballs and shrapnel.
I looked at the sensor tied-in displays. I could see the small groupings of ground troops with their portable launchers as well as more than a few cannon emplacements.
Here I was thinking that they’d clear the ground. Annoyed, I activated my magnetic clamps in my boots as I hit my harness, standing up as it retracted.
“I’m going to need this.” I took a man’s crew serviced bead cannon and a magazine, handing him my rifle in exchange as I opened a channel to support weapon teams.
“One support team to each air lock—triple team to main ramp. Brace yourselves and fire at targets to warn them off.”
I changed to Yasu’s channel. “Hold me.”
“This isn’t the time—”
“Just get over here.” I punched the emergency open on the inner air locks, checking I was secured with my boots. She came up behind me as I jacked a round into the bead cannon’s chamber and hit the outer air lock’s release. The wind howled as I grinned freely. Only the Mecha’s power allowed me to lean out of the air lock, the high-speed air buffeting me.
Free Fleet Box Set 1 Page 22
