Homeworld

by Ben Winston

  Homeworld

  Bedouin's Travels - Part V

  By Ben Winston

  Copyright © 2016 Ben Winston

  Published by Blue Space Publications, LLC.

  Disclaimer

  All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means without the prior written permission of the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote brief passages in a review to be printed by a newspaper, magazine, or journal.

  All characters appearing in this work are fictitious. Any resemblance to real persons, living or dead, is purely coincidental.

  Bedouin’s Travels

  Twilight Earth – Book I

  A Long, Dark Night – Book II

  Terra Dawning – Book III

  New Day – Book IV

  Homeworld – Book V

  Unnamed - Book VI (TBA)

  Dedication

  Respectfully dedicated to all the people of the planet Earth.

  May we find harmony in our diversity,

  Compromise in our differences,

  And may we join together to finally reach for the stars, in peace.

  Table of Contents

  Homeworld

  Disclaimer

  Dedication

  Chapter One

  Chapter Two

  Chapter Three

  Chapter Four

  Chapter Five

  Chapter Six

  Chapter Seven

  Chapter Eight

  Chapter Nine

  About the Author

  Connect with the author or Blue Space Publications, LLC.

  Books Published by Blue Space Publications, LLC.

  Homeworld

  Chapter One

  Terran Marine Base Alpha

  Command and Control

  27 Apr. 10266 CE (AD)

  Sector 34871 - Great Inland Sea

  Earth, Sol System

  The Battle of Terra, which would become known as the first major land battle of the war, came down to two major conflict areas; the Aramic Plateau and the Planetary Capitol, Stardock.

  The fight at Aerie Argassi was intense, but short-lived. Once the troops that Gail sent arrived and deployed, the Ducal army forces were confronted with an enemy that they couldn't find and that could hunt them with impunity. In the end, the Ducal commander withdrew his troops and dropped artillery on the battle zone.

  Unknown to the enemy commander, the Terran troops simply moved with the enemy forces before the artillery began to fall. While the rockets destroyed the bridge leading to the main city and Aerie, Terran Marines captured the enemy command post and forced the Ducal army to surrender.

  The capture of the communications center at Argassi gave Gail the opportunity to broadcast a message to the remaining Ducal forces fighting on the planet. She told them that the Duke had been arrested by the Emperor for treason. Yolinar added that, on behalf of His Majesty, the Emperor, all Ducal forces were ordered to cease fire and surrender immediately.

  That effectively ended the fighting against the Ducal army, however, the Lizard 'Marines' did not use communications nor did they follow orders. At Stardock, a unique and difficult situation developed. The transports awaiting the fall of the city, as well as the troops they were waiting for surrendered. Terran drones and armed skippers had already begun attacking those ships and the drones had taken out their shields and forced them to land. At the same time, the ground forces had begun luring the Lizard marines toward them.

  Two of the six transports had been damaged to the point that they could not take off again, so the crews were evacuated to the still functioning ships and lifted off just as the lead elements of the Lizards arrived. However, the guard units for the transports had to fire on the advancing Lizards in order to give the crews time to finish getting to safety. Once the crews were safe, Gail asked about setting the ships to self-destruct, but Yolinar shook his head.

  "They are too close to the city. Self-destruct is setting the reactors on the ships to intentionally go out of control and explode. In effect, it is detonating a somewhat large nuclear weapon inside the ship. In space, or a heavy combat area, that would be the preferred tactic yielding a blast radius of ten to fifteen klicks. However, in the atmosphere of a planet, the area of damage can extend out to fifty or seventy-five klicks plus the radioactive fallout from the detonation. Stardock is twenty-three klicks northwest of their location. The heat of the explosion would kill everyone in the city."

  Gail nodded. "I thought as much. At least the Lizards are moving away from the city."

  "At least for the time being," Yolinar agreed. "It will buy us valuable time to further reduce their numbers. Now that the Ducal army has surrendered, this has become a war of attrition. We do have the advantage of air superiority though."

  "Mother, recall all but four of the antimatter armed drones and rearm them with standard weapons, then let me know when they are ready. Send the cargo shuttles to redeploy the ground drones from all southern aeries. Drop off ten more at Argassi, fifteen to Stardock and the rest on the Aramic Plateau. Please prepare to send humanitarian aid to Argassi and Stardock." She looked up at Yolinar. "If we can keep the Lizards at Stardock confined to the island and away from the city for another hour, we should be able to get all the former Ducal soldiers to safety."

  "General, the transport ships left on the ground have opened fire with their point defense weaponry! Someone is still down there!" an operator reported.

  "Fucking idiots! See if you can get me a comm to those ships!" Gail said.

  "Hello?" a voice said speaking Imperial common said.

  "What are you still doing there? You were supposed to evacuate with the crew?" Gail asked.

  "Uh, yeah, that isn't the way things work around here. Slaves are left behind when the order to abandon ship is given. Who are you not to know that?" an image of a human male opened in a small window in the holo-tank.

  "I'm General Gail Greenwold of Terra. Who are you and how many of you were left behind?" she asked.

  "Engineering slave Tarnis of Corvis Nine. You're human?" the man was surprised. "Uh, I've got nine people with me and I'm not sure how many are still frozen in the larder. Once we figured out what was going on, we got kind of busy here. The Stanis Dree should have about the same, I haven't had time to ask."

  "We'll send a ship back for you as soon as we can. What's your status?" Gail asked.

  "We got the ships closed up before the Lizards got here, so we're safe for the time being; it'll take them some time to tear through the armor. We see some weird devices out there killing the Lizards. Are they yours?" the man asked.

  Gail nodded. "Yes they are. Please don't shoot them."

  The man nodded. "We saw them killing the Lizards, so we set the guns for biological targets only. No one else has shown up to attack us yet, so we've been keeping our targets limited to the ground stuff."

  "Listen Tarnis, you are no longer a slave; you are a free citizen of the planet Terra. All of you are, even the people in the freezers. Hang in there, and we'll do everything we can to get you out of there safely," Gail replied.

  The man snorted. "Yeah, tell me another one! We'll be free until we get sent back to the Duke! Then we'll be served for dinner."

  Yolinar stepped into the pickup range of the camera. "Citizen Tarnis, I am Yolinar, the Commanding Admiral in charge of all Imperial forces. Duke Tammerain of Cassius has been arrested for treason. This planet has been officially recognized as the human homeworld, and all humans are now free citizens of this world unless they chose otherwise. What General Greenwold has told you is the truth. You will not be turned back over to the Lizards, ever."

  The man's eyes grew huge when he saw Yolinar and he bowed. "This is for real?
We have a home now?"

  Gail nodded at him. "Yes you do, currently, you are fighting to defend it against the Lizards. You should also know that, as of a few hours ago, a state of war now exists between the Lizards and the rest of the Empire." She looked at her aide. "George, I want the crews of those transports arrested and sequestered separately from the rest of the troops. I'm more than half tempted to have them taken back to the ships and dropped off outside!" She paused. "Also, search the remaining transports for humans; be sure to check the larders for humans as well."

  "By law, the crews of the ships remaining on the ground are guilty of using humans for food as well as keeping human slaves. Keeping slaves is punishable by incarceration, but using humans for a food source carries a death sentence," Yolinar replied. "Given the situation, I would not be surprised if they did not have an accident before they could be remanded for trial, if one was to even be held."

  Gail nodded. "It is a war out there. Our soldiers might not feel very forgiving once they discover the truth of the situation on those ships. I'm sure it'll happen, no matter what we try to do to prevent it."

  "Uh, excuse me, General, what would you like us to do? The Lizards that made it past the point defense guns are pounding on the hull," Tarnis asked.

  Gail nodded to him. "Hang in there as long as you can. You're doing great." She looked at her aide again. "See if we can get a couple of drones over closer to the ships to help keep the beasties at bay long enough for us to get a ship in there and rescue those people. Once that's done, the fucking Lizards can pound that ship into scrap for all I care."

  "General, I estimate roughly nine thousand Lizard marines remain at that location. If I adjust the attack pattern for the drones slightly, we should be able to use the situation to our advantage as well as rescue the people on those ships," Mother suggested.

  "Do it, what do you need us to do, Mother?" Gail asked.

  "The Nistian Dew is still involved in rescue operations at the Aramic Plateau. However, if we have Captain Coir jettison the launchers near Stardock, we could use the Bittertree to rescue the people on the transports," Mother replied.

  "Comms, I need to speak to Captain Elrond Coir on the Bittertree, please," Gail ordered.

  "This is the Bittertree, what's up Command?" Elrond asked.

  "I have a new mission for you, Captain. It's risky as hell, but it needs to be done," Gail replied.

  Elrond chuckled. "This is war, General; breathing is risky now. What do you need done?"

  "I need you to head for Stardock. Jettison the launchers into the sea near the city to clear out your holds. Then I need you to go rescue a bunch of folks currently under attack by Lizard marines. They're holding out on the downed transports near the city, but we don't know if we can kill all the Lizards before they breach the ships," Gail said. "Some of them are in stasis in the ship's pantry. These folks were slaves left behind when the crew evacuated."

  "Understood General, we're on it," Elrond replied grimly.

  Gail nodded. "I'll patch you into Engineer Tarnis: he's in charge of the group on one of the ships. We're not sure of the situation on the other ship. Be careful, we're doing what we can to help, but that area is literally crawling with Lizards."

  "We'll get them out of there, General." Elrond replied.

  "I have no doubt of that, Captain. Do what you need to do to get them out safely. We're not worried about the condition of the ships. Just make damn sure the reactors are shut down so they can't detonate; they're way too close to Stardock for that," Gail added.

  "Thanks for that; it'll make life a lot easier on us. Bittertree out," Elrond replied and signed off, taking Tarnis with him.

  "General Greenwold, Minister Carmichael is here to speak to you and the Admiral," one of the guards called over the comm from the door to the chamber.

  Gail looked up and saw Marcy standing with the guards, Marcy smiled and waved at her. Gail smiled back. "Please send her down Corporal."

  "Aye, Ma'am," the guard replied, and Marcy nodded to him before heading down the steps.

  When she arrived, Gail introduced her to Yolinar. Marcy bowed respectfully to him before speaking. "I felt I needed to come down here to tell you both personally what we have discovered about the computer control systems on the Imperial ships. We can upgrade them. It won't be as easy as originally thought, but we can do it.

  "Right now, the only place we have to work on anything is the main bay here at the base. However, once we get one of the orbital docks set up and can train the teams, we should be able to start mass producing kits and getting them installed. The biggest issues we're going to run into is getting the people and getting them trained. Ben wants to keep a pretty tight security lid on this entire project so that is going to be another slowdown in getting our existing warships upgraded. But I do have a plan for all of this," Marcy explained.

  "That is indeed very good news, Minister Carmichael. I will order one of the shipyards moved here at once. I already have a division of Marines in the process of moving here. Once we finish securing the planet, you can use them to provide security," Yolinar replied smiling.

  "Thank you for that, Admiral." Marcy nodded to him. "I will wait to give you a full briefing on this project if you don't mind, both Ben, as well as His Majesty, are very serious about security on this. I can tell you that the shipyard, as with all the shipyards to be placed here, will be getting one of our AI installed on it."

  "Has a decision been reached about installing AI on the warships as well?" Gail asked.

  Marcy again nodded. "They will be getting an AI, but it has yet to be decided how powerful and what systems it will have control of. For example, the Ranger patrol boats will get a limited AI that will assist them in data analysis, in addition to navigation and weapons targeting assistance. The AI will also have some limited abilities in the engineering sections such as monitoring life support and power systems. In the larger ships, defensive weapons systems would also be included on that list." She paused. "But, I just wanted to let you both know that not only has the agreement been reached, but we also have been actively working on the planning for it."

  "We appreciate your coming over here just to speak to us about this, Minister Carmichael," Gail said. "Thank you."

  Marcy grinned. "I also wanted to tell you that we are currently upgrading the Dalphine now that she is back. We're using her as a template for creating an upgrade kit for patrol boats. Once we're finished, and the crew can take her out again, we'll have a better idea of how well the new systems will work, and any areas we might need to correct. We should be finished with it in a day or two."

  "I will look forward to seeing the report on how well it works once it is finished Minister," Yolinar added.

  Out at the landing site of the transports, ten of the armored drones began an intricate double figure eight pattern under and around the two grounded ships. They quickly killed any Lizard that broke from the ground cover and made a run for the ships.

  Between the city and the ships, the drones lured more and more Lizards in the direction of the two ships; killing a few and getting the remaining group to chase them, only to lose them and circle back around for more. Once they were close enough, the smell of their dead fellows served to draw them in to the kill zone set up near the ships.

  Two of the drones rose up and cleaned the almost mindless Lizards from the places on the hulls where they had climbed up, seeking a way into the ship. When the Bittertree arrived, the hulls of both ships were clear and the weapons systems had been shut down by the engineers. The Bittertree came down on the top of one of the transports and used breaching collars to cut holes through the hull.

  Elrond had worked it out with the people on board to go to the pantry and begin moving the stasis units to the upper holds to get the ready for loading. Twenty people in stasis were rescued; ten from each ship, plus an additional nineteen that had been awakened and had been serving as slaves to the former crew. All of the rescued people were taken to Stardo
ck’s Central Medical Center for treatment. However, four of the people in stasis would need replacement appendages. Three of the stasis units were sent directly to the morgue; the occupants were dead, but had been kept 'fresh' in stasis.

  Elrond was asked to transport several of the wounded from the hospital to other facilities, as the medical center was over capacity, and more wounded were being brought in all the time. After checking with Gail in the command center, Elrond agreed.

  The bodies of the fallen Lizards were piling up, so Mother slowly rotated the entire formation and used the shields from the drones to push the bodies, spreading them out. Once the survivors had been evacuated, (Elrond verified that with the scanners on the Bittertree,) Mother changed the formation to three concentric circles with heavily overlapping fields of fire that stretched out for a klick in either direction. It took almost three more hours of slaughter, but eventually the drones ran out of targets. Mother set them to scour the entire island to make sure that no Lizard remained.

  The city of Stardock heaved a sigh of stunned relief and began the process of caring for the wounded, recovering the dead, and rebuilding what was destroyed.

  On the Aramic Plateau, things did not go as smoothly. The archaeological settlement there had been overrun before the evacuation could be finished. Survivors had to literally be tracked down and recovered while running for their lives. Hundreds of civilians were dead, but there were very few wounded. Wounded people couldn't run as fast and were caught by the Lizards.

  Mother tried to place the drones between the fleeing civilians and the Lizard hoards, but the Lizards had the scent of blood and for the most part ignored the drones. The Aramic Plateau was located in what used to be southern Peru, Bolivia, Chile, and parts of Brazil. The area hadn't changed all that much. However, the location of the dig sites were on the western slopes of the Andes, which are desert like.