From the Black (Free Fleet Book 4)

by Michael Chatfield

  “Well we're going to need it,” I said

  ***

  It took a further three hours to go through everything from contracts with different planets, to transportation issues and new relay connections. Afterwards I felt drained, yet still there was that lump in my stomach that drove me.

  “James, you need to relax,” Rick said, concern filling his voice.

  I looked at the table, seeing Yasu, Bok Soo, Foshunti, and the thousands of Commandos I knew were fighting for me to sit there.

  “If you had allowed your people to go to a planet and possibly die for you, would you relax?” I asked, my voice hollow.

  “No,” Rick said, his turn to look at the table.

  I took a minute to pull myself together.

  “Time to wear the mask,” I said, my face lightening a bit as I looked like the concerned but ready Commander Salchar that everyone was used to.

  Rick stood, stopping me with a hand, and wrapping it around my back as we embraced.

  “We'll do it together brother,” he said, emotion filling his voice.

  “Thank you Rick,” I said, the mask cracking as tears fell down my cheeks.

  “Now you've got me crying you oaf,” Rick said, eliciting a small laugh from me.

  We tapped one another’s backs, letting go as we let out ragged breaths.

  “Let's do this, together,” I said, looking to Rick.

  “It would be my honour James,” he said, tapping his fingers to his head. I took strength from that, straightening myself out and walking out onto the Bridge. The mask of Commander Salchar descended.

  Chapter To find those lost

  Cheerleader's fleet was ready a few hours after the meeting. She was down to her own Battle cruiser, another called Bongo, three destroyers and seven corvettes. Soon she would be getting some extra support, in the way of twelve of the new Jump fighters from Felix.

  The Wormhole generators projected a tear through time-space as Cheerleader and her fleet went through it. Thirty-two merchant freighters followed.

  She looked at the organized mess of Parnmal. Salchar had kicked up one hell of a storm. Planetary forces were joining up by the Company. It seemed half of AIH had joined up as well. Their battle master had called them and they answered. Ships that were able to fly, no matter if they were going into the yard, or had just come out, they were sent to gather the planetary forces and start getting them acquainted with their positions.

  Cheerleader didn't know what Salchar's play was going to be, but she knew there was no one better to create one.

  ***

  “We're linked into the FTL relay,” Gogs said.

  “Upload my messages as soon as possible,” Min Hae replied.

  “Already on i... You're going to want to see this,” Gogs paused.

  “Get us to Parnmal,” Min Hae said, reading the titles of the multiple documents Gogs had sent him.

  “Yes Commander,” Chrys said, accelerating the Verslva to the next jump limit.

  “It looks like we're at war,” Min Hae said, his voice calm as he looked at the numbers and information from the first engagement with the Kalu, inside he was anything but.

  The systems looked to be doing fine except for the Kuruvians that had just dealt with a Syndicate raid. Based on the markings and the information that the Intelligence department had raised from the Empire and their contacts, it looked to be Lifendi's carrier. Though the heavy-handed way it had captured merchant freighters and shot anything it had seen. Lifendi had more finesse than that. He also had a crew and a fleet that did what he said. This fleet had attacked with abandon.

  Which led Min Hae to two thoughts, either Lifendi had been replaced, or Lady Fairgate had put him in a position that she thought he was more useful.

  “Gogs I have another message for Cheerleader and her scouts,” Min Hae typed out a quick message and sent it to his sidekick.

  “Sending,” Gogs said.

  ***

  “Fuck! Get those guns up again!” Yasu said, a power cell had been ruptured covering Yasu in dirt and wounding three Commandos.

  Yasu provided covering fire for those injured and the ones helping them.

  “I need support fire in front of my position,” she said to one of the combined arms operators.

  “Incoming,” they replied, sounding as tired as Yasu felt.

  The shells were being made from the materials mined out of the mountains now. There was a finite supply and they were only going down with time.

  “Yasu, I've just been informed that there is another Kalu fleet entering the system,” Bok Soo said.

  Looks like any hope we had of getting off this rock is gone, Yasu silently added.

  “The MEF's are being cleared for support roles,” Bok Soo finished.

  It seemed as if the fighters heard his words as they sprung from Talhalla. They flew up into the descending waves of Star Warriors, ripping through their ranks. PDS turned their fire onto the Kalu as they were trying to reach the trenches, five waves had already done so.

  A yell seemed to come from thousands of Kalu at once.

  “Brace!” Bok Soo and Yasu yelled at the same time. The ship's supporting fire increased as thousands of Kalu charged. Yasu drained her rifle, reloading it without thought and shooting into the oncoming black mass of Kalu.

  “Swords!” Bok Soo barked. “Ready reserves!”

  Yasu's rail gun barrel split as a laser caught it. Yasu dropped out of instinct as her hands dropped to her sword. She pulled it out, feeling the pounding of the Kalu, her sound cancelling helmet working at full, barely keeping out the blood lusting howls of the Kalu.

  She felt her breaths come, calm and cold, just as Takahashi had taught her.

  She closed her eyes for a second, seeing James.

  Rage boiled in her gut, these bastards wanted to keep her people from their loved ones. She might die today, if she did it would be to get them home to their loved ones. A Kalu tried to jump the trench. The blade mistress stabbed upwards, ripping them open she ran at the trenches back wall, using it like stepping stones to bring her above ground.

  “Let us welcome them to the black! On me Commandos!” She yelled, her Commando's answering with their own yells as she charged into the leading Kalu. She sliced the first one's claws off, spinning and cutting across one Kalu's face, then bringing it across the next beside it. She curved under a leaping Kalu, using her shoulder to bash their under-belly. She trusted her Commandos to deal with it as she brought her sword upwards and across her body catching the Kalu that had followed the one she shoulder checked. She swung to her right, catching the reaching paw of an attacker at her side. She twirled on a Kalu as it tried to run her over, sticking her sword out she cut into his mid-section, and sliced another attacker.

  She was the blade mistress, the warrior that had been trained from childhood to fight. She had been honed in Mecha Assault, then taught the truth of war and bloodied in it by the Free Fleet.

  She used one hand with her blade, grabbing a collection of grenades and throwing them into the Kalu ranks as she pulled a pistol free.

  War isn't fair, she thought in James' voice as her grenades exploded, killing tens of Kalu as she fired her rail pistol and slashed anything that got near.

  She saw a dense pack running together, a Kalu with some of the most battle-scarred armor moving in the middle.

  “VIP,” she said to the gunners in the hills and ships, tagging the Kalu. Rounds landed all around it moments later, the primes took the most hits as the scarred leader turned, and headed straight for Yasu.

  She locked eyes with its helmet. Cleaving through a number of Kalu.

  She didn't know what would happen if she killed the Kalu leader, but she hoped it would give them some relief.

  They were a bare hundred meters away when fighter's raked the area. A few dropped modified bombs into the ranks of Kalu. The charge was opened up in tens of places by the sudden attack. The tide of Kalu turned and Yasu found herself fighting tens of them
as the leader was turned by its forces and pushed back to the hills.

  “Pull back!” Yasu yelled. Her Commandos turned as one and rushed back towards the cover of the trenches, grabbing their wounded. Weapons up and down the trenches started firing. Yasu helped one of her people drag a wounded Chaleelian back to the lines. They jumped in, easing the Commando down and pressing the hellfire valve.

  “Medic!” The one that had been dragging the Commando yelled. Yasu tapped them on the shoulder, getting a nod as she turned and went in search of a replacement rifle.

  ***

  Xentar entered the system where clan leader Edvasho waged war on the planet. The Kalu fleet had decimated the enemies. The enemy had offered honourable battle and Edvasho had taken it. Xentar's chest swelled with pride at the way his leader led the clans to war on the ground. He was no Ashota that sat in his ship and told Edvasho to not get involved.

  Xentar's eyes flashed as he saw the creature's craft on his scanners.

  Ashota had supported Edvasho from the shadows, but the creature was of no use on the battlefield. He had been denied a warriors death, and had become a plague on the Kalu clans. Though Xentar had a plan to give him a proper death and give Edvasho the freedom to lead them into honourable battle.

  “Take us towards the planet so that we might join the battle,” Xentar said, his crew following his orders as his Star destroyers moved in towards the planet.

  They were not like the Star Warriors in their singular attack. Ashota had given the Kalu one great advancement, it was copying the Carriers that the Union had used. The Destroyers were four kilometers big and two wide, they could put out hundreds of fighters which worked in unison. Like Kalu on a battlefield they naturally worked together through instinct. They moved like a swarm, using their numbers as a shield so they could pile together and drive into their enemy. The Destroyers had been used once before against a Kalu clan that defied Edvasho time and time again.

  There was not a descendent left to tell their war-tales.

  “Request that I be given audience with Clan leader Edvasho,” Xentar said.

  A few moments later the great clan leader growled into existence.

  “I see that you have come to join our battle Xentar. I applaud you at your speed. I only wish that Orshpa was also here to join in on our first truly great battle,” Edvasho said.

  “He will be along shortly, he is gathering the last of the war-capable Kalu,” Xentar said.

  “These creatures offer us valiant battle but the Kalu shall win,” Edvasho said, clearly proud of his people.

  “I hope only that there is enough that I might be engaged in battle,” Xentar replied.

  Edvasho laughed, the noise like a tree chipper being fed metal.

  “We shall be battle brothers, it is not a question in my mind,” Edvasho said. I must try to get rid of the Ashota while I can.

  “Ashota is making it clear that he desires you to leave the battlefield for the safety of your Star Warrior. I hope that his desires do not come true,” Xentar said.

  “Ashota seems to have become concerned with my safety, to the point it seems that he wishes me to survive every battle that I am in. This kind of thought I do not agree with.”

  “It is known that he talks with your voice. If he keeps pronouncing these things I believe that the other leaders and lords will start thinking that your sentiment is to leave the battlefield and merely watch it as a spectator.”

  “Watch what you say,” Edvasho said, his growl telling Xentar to be careful.

  “I am sorry great Clan Leader Edvasho. I am only telling you the sentiment that some of those I have talked to are feeling,” Xentar said.

  Edvasho was quiet for a long time.

  “I feel that Ashota while he means well, is too long for this world. His time spent watching battle and not participating in it, has made him a creature of peace,” Edvasho said, spitting the last word, his voice sad.

  Xentar knew as soon as Edvasho had said that Ashota was a peaceful creature, Ashota's fate was assured.

  “Surely not,” Xentar said, hiding how he trembled in victory. He would be the one to free the great commander of the limiting factor of Ashota.

  “I must admit that he is. I must ask you a favor my battle brother,” Edvasho said, Xentar shaking himself in pride. The great Edvasho that survived the first teaching war in order to bring these creature's battle again has called me his battle brother!

  “You may ask anything of me battle brother, I will do anything you request of me,” Xentar said, bowing his head unconsciously.

  “I cannot bear to send him to the planet of the peaceful. I ask that you guide him to the gates of the silent clans through battle,” Edvasho said.

  Xentar tore into his Destroyer's deck.

  “It would be my honour,” Xentar said.

  “I will send him many more offerings from the ground,” Edvasho said. “Thank you battle brother. Next time we speak I hope for you to be on the ground,” the channel ended.

  “We are to send Ashota to the gates of the silent clans. Edvasho has ordered it so, he believes that Ashota has become one of the peaceful,” Xentar said. “I want all Destroyers to join the Star Warriors around the planet, we will hit Ashota as he watches the battle.”

  His orders were passed throughout the fleet while his ships moved towards their destination.

  ***

  Ashota felt sadness. Edvasho had finally given into the other leaders that said killing him was better than letting him live. They saw him as a cripple that could bring nothing to battle.

  Only those that mindlessly went to war were 'proper' Kalu in the eyes of those leaders.

  Ashota pushed that pain away, he didn't have the time to grieve at the loss of his relationship with his blood-brother.

  Ashota pressed a button, alerting those in his crew loyal to him. Another button set off explosives inside the armor of Orshpa and Xentar's warriors.

  “Where shall we go to Ashota?” The pilot asked.

  We could go to the planet of the peaceful, yet then we will be able to do nothing to stop the Kalu. I thought that I could change their minds, what a fool was I. No we must attack them force with force. We will give the enemy help so that we might free ourselves and the Universe of fools that wish to see it burn, he thought with a burning desire.

  He snarled, a new fire filling him.

  “We go to Parnmal, we shall see what this Free Fleet is made of, and see if we can put an end to this violence,” Ashota said. Moments later his ship moved away from Heija.

  When we next meet battle brother, it will not be me that falls to the silent clans.

  ***

  Commander Boot had headed in the direction of Flor, and it looked as if he had found it.

  “Bring the Fleet to readiness. I see some Syndicate bastards that seemed to have strayed into the wrong place,” Boot said, alarms sounding as drills were executed.

  “There seems to be a small craft waiting on the edge of the system. It matches no known designs,” Sensors called out.

  “Well hopefully it will stay out of our way,” Boot said. Not wanting to deal with another party wading in on his battle.

  “It has started moving, its rate of acceleration is unlike anything I've ever seen,” Sensor's said in awe. Boot looked at the main plot, it was already moving as fast as a corvette would after five minutes of acceleration, in twenty seconds.

  “It disappeared!” Sensors said.

  “Wormhole three thousand kilometres out!” A sensor operator announced as the small craft appeared, having made a wormhole and crossed to within a few hundred thousand kilometers of Boot's fleet.

  “It is sending a message, text only. Its codes match with Cheerleader's, it seems to be a scout of some kind,” Communications said.

  “What is the message?” Boot asked, his voice gruff with the time it was taking comms to relay.

  “It says that Cheerleader is looking for us. She will be here in a matter of hours,” Communic
ations said.

  “I want ship numbers and specifics, we will continue into the system to engage the Syndicate fleet,” Boot said.

  “Specifics coming in on your screens,” Communications said. Boot reviewed it. She had less ships, but all of them were upgraded and could do some serious damage.

  “The Syndicate ships are moving away from the planet and turning to engage us. There is one carrier, listed as Lifendi's, five Battle cruisers, nine Destroyers and nineteen corvettes,” Sensors said.

  “Very well. Conical formation. I want PDS on missiles and fighter defence. When we reach firing range I want to rotate and present our sides to their fronts we will take them with our guns. I will call out movements as I decide them.”

  “The Jump fighter says that it has the ability to attack in close, it can gather at least four more ships and attack the carrier before it can deploy its forces,” Comms said.

  Boot thought of how the little ship could wormhole in so close and the speeds it could travel at in real space.

  “They are authorized to do so, only when they have at least four other ships, the surprise will only work once,” Boot said, his tone warning.

  “Yes commander.”

  A few minutes later the Jump fighter created a wormhole and disappeared. Boot shook his head at how the small craft was so easily able to create wormholes.

  There was hour left to go before Boot and the Syndicate fleet were in range to fire their missiles when sensors picked up Cheerleader and her fleet.

  Twenty minutes later nine scout craft appeared around the Syndicate fleet.

  They accelerated even faster than Boot had seen the single Jump fighter go. Missiles spat out from their internal racks.

  The missiles split and hit the carrier from multiple angles. The syndicate ships were trying to hit the small ships, but they were already learning why the Union's big laser PDS systems were practically ineffective against the Kalu. The Kalu, like these Jump fighters, moved so fast, and could change their direction so easily, that these big lumbering lasers were completely ineffective.