Empire Burning (Emerilia Book 11)

by Michael Chatfield

  “On the Emerilian front, the people of Emerilia as well as the players of Emerilia have thrown their full weight behind the Terra Alliance, as well as the Pandora Initiative. We’ve evacuated some two million people to Ice Planet, as well as the various bases. The industrial complexes of the different entities within Emerilia have changed, with the tech and information from the Pandora Initiative speeding up things with them. Defenses are being laid down around the system. Which brings up the true matter of this meeting: the defense of Emerilia. Currently, it will take the Jukal some six weeks to reach Emerilia. They have a fleet of one hundred and seventy-nine ships heading our way while we’ve just got some seven Pandora fleets combat ready. We’re working to double that number as fast as possible but we can’t guarantee that they’ll be ready for the first engagements with the Jukal fleet.”

  “Why don’t we attack the Jukal home world?” one of the leaders from Emerilia asked.

  Dave’s eyebrows knit together as a pensive look spread across his face.

  Lucy looked to Sato, who gave Dave a deep look. Lucy looked to Dave as well.

  Dave took a few moments before he let out a heavy sigh. “Shard, map of the Jukal home system.”

  In front of everyone, a holographic representation of the Jukal home system appeared. There were five planets, hundreds of major stations, and thousands of ships moving.

  “The Jukal Empire was the most powerful war machine in all known existence. In their prime, they had a fleet that numbered close to two thousand warships. Now they have under one thousand and all of their defensive infrastructure. The Jukal created their empire some fifteen hundred years ago. They have been working on their defenses from the start. They’re an expansionistic species. However, they wish to control other people; they’ve never actually taken other planets or star systems other than their own. All of their industrial base has come back to their home system. With all of the Jukal in one system as the most powerful species in their empire, they’ve been focused on making their home safe. They’ve got remote platforms and sensor buoys that would tear through our sensors, avoiding magical coding simply because of its overlap. Entire stations have enough weapons to destroy one of the Pandora fleets. They’ve got ground-based batteries and planetary shields and that’s only what we know about. There’s no way to tell what they might have hidden on their various planets and homes.” As Dave talked, Shard highlighted the different items that he was talking about. It wasn’t long before the map was covered in different symbols and colors.

  “When we’re going into the Jukal system, we’re not up against just one hundred and fifty-two ships. That’s only their mobile forces. We’re up against the might of the Jukal Empire—their home, their base. We will not win the fight in the skies; we’re going to have to fight on the ground if we expect to win. We need to take the emperor’s palace with ground forces. It’s going to take everything we have to do that. We won’t be able to spare anything to leave on Emerilia.” Dave’s expression stayed the same throughout. They all knew of how Sol system had been destroyed, with the Jukal using a weapon to blow up its sun. Knowing this, they’d evacuated people to Ice Planet and were preparing their defense outside of the Emerilia system.

  If the Jukal got in, then there might not be an Emerilia system afterward.

  “What is the plan to deal with the Jukal fleet heading for Emerilia?” another leader asked.

  Dave looked to Admiral Adams and Forsyth. Forsyth turned to Adams for her to take the lead.

  “We sow the entire way to Emerilia with portals; then, at every chance we get, we hit them with attacks. We harass them, wear them down, break their ships. We use the teleportation abilities, the magical coding of our stealth systems. We tear them apart and call for their surrender the entire time,” Adams said. “When we defeat the Jukal fleet coming for Emerilia, then the Jukal home system is the only place that the Jukal can exert control over. If they try to have their fleet move to another system and attack us, or reassert their power, we come in through the portals and beat them back. Use their tactics against them. They’ll be pinned in the Jukal home system, without the rest of the empire to support them. While they’re sitting there, we can take our time, build up our forces and then when the time’s right, we hit them with everything we have.”

  There was a fierce determination that seemed to be carved into her very features. Josh and those leaders of the player guilds and various nations nodded their heads in agreement. Dave could gauge their emotions, and see through most of them. All of them had been given information on the Jukal Empire, and knew much more than the basics that Bob had given out to everyone on Emerilia. Adams’s words might have sounded simple; however, it conflicted with all they had read. The empire was massive and powerful—to them, there should be no way that it could fall. This was only on the surface, the races that weren’t Jukal felt the pressure of being subjugated every day. Now that the tyrant that had controlled their lives had outnumbered the Deq’ual and Pandora fleets three to one, had failed, these races now had hope.

  It didn’t look as if what the Stone Raiders and the Pandora’s Initiative proposed was just a pipe dream.

  Dave clenched his teeth together. Already the different bases were exceeding what he had planned for, and still, he wanted to increase production even more. But he knew it wasn’t possible in such a tight time frame.

  Fighting the Jukal fleet headed for Emerilia wouldn’t just rely on overwhelming the enemy—they wouldn’t have the number of ships the Jukal had—but they would have to fight with everything they had, using any tactics possible to win.

  If the Jukal made it into the Emerilian system, then everything could be put into jeopardy. They might be able to break the shield around Emerilia and kill the people within the planet, or destroy the moonbase, or both. Or they might even employ a system killer—the same weapon used by the Jukal when they fought humanity in Sol, wiping out the entire solar system and destroying the planets and everything within it.

  Chapter 7: Eureka

  “New orders. We’re going to hit the Jukal fleet powering for Emerilia,” Captain Xiao aboard the battleship BloodHawk, the flagship for Pandora Fleet One, informed his crew and his fleet.

  “Navigation, I am sending you the coordinates for the rally point where we are going to meet up with three other Pandora fleets before heading to meet the Jukal. Be aware that the portal map has been updated as some ships with teleportation abilities were dispatched to lay down portals along the Jukal fleet’s path,” Xiao said.

  “Yes, sir,” Navigation said.

  “Fire control, with me. Second, you have the bridge.” Xiao stood and made his way off the bridge as Frank quickly transferred main fire control to his second and followed the captain off the bridge. They quickly reached the conference room, where a Mirror of Communication was waiting in the center of the table with connected mirrors embedded in the table.

  “We’re going to be meeting with Admirals Adams and Forsyth, as well as the other captains of the Pandora fleets that will be joining us and their fire controllers,” Xiao said. Even though Frank was technically less senior to Captain Xiao, he was the first player to be woken up and pave the way for the rest of them. He held a special position to all of the players who had been woken from the simulation.

  Frank nodded as Captain Xiao sat down at the table and placed his hand on a Mirror of Communication. His eyes closed, almost as if he were asleep except for his hand on the Mirror of Communication terminal. Frank did the same. It seemed as if he was in the exact same room as the one he had come from, except it was larger and now filled with more people.

  Frank nodded to a few people he knew; all of the fire controllers had worked together and shared memory crystals to get better at their positions. Working so close and basically sharing each other’s memories had led to them being a close group indeed.

  The captains similarly looked to one another with the same looks.

  Admiral Forsyth of the Pandora Initiat
ive cleared his throat. All of the focus in the room sharpened as the captains and their fire controllers waited on him.

  “All right, you ugly bastards get the luck of the draw. You’re going to be tip of the freaking spear when hitting the Jukal; and don’t worry, daddy Forsyth will be there with you.” Forsyth grinned. He was a bear of a man and although he demanded people perform to the best of their abilities, he was not one to badger them to death and instead let them do as they wanted as long as they met his standards. In most militaries, it wasn’t something that would stand; however, he was a gamer—as was everyone else. Some of them were used to schedules and being online at certain times for games. Even though gaming was a part of their life, they had other things they needed to do.

  When Forsyth asked for something, his people would jump at the opportunity to do what he asked; in the same breath, he relaxed with them and shot the shit.

  The captains chuckled at Forsyth’s words and a few of them showed hungry looks as their desire to meet with the Jukal lit a fire inside them.

  “We’ve tested out the stealth magical coding, which is pretty damn good. Now it’s time that we put it to use. We’re going to be entering the same system as the Jukal, then we use stealth and coding to get close to them, then we hammer them with everything we have. When they get their shit together, we drop out again. In the meantime, Dave’s made us some cool new tools.” Forsyth sent a message and a few moments later, Dave Grahslagg himself appeared. He was almost legendary among the players who had been woken up and on Emerilia. His fingerprints were on everything that had gone on in the last couple of months.

  “Forsyth said he wants me to talk about the new tech. Simply put, we’ve got two new things. One, barrier disruptors. We’ve figured out the coding for the Jukal shields and made a grand working shell that has a roughly sixty percent chance of disrupting the Jukal spell formation. It’ll take their shields down for maybe thirty seconds, but that’s plenty of time to lay in some pain. Also, Ela-Dorn is close to the ship teleportation array. Which sounds confusing as hell. As you all know, your ships are constantly relaying information via Mirror of Communication back to us. We can take that information, use it to pinpoint locations and then teleport things there. We’re working with the portal at the moonbase to see if we can’t make it not just portal to another location but tear a hole through to a different spot. Power consumption is huge, but it means we can drop ships in close to the enemy, or allow them to escape. They can’t come out right in the midst of fighting; their shields and everything needs to come back online because they’ll be largely unprotected,” Dave said.

  The others around the table nodded. Having the ability to teleport items to any location was incredibly powerful. They had their onboard portals, but they weren’t capable of pushing out more ships through that.

  Frank raised his hand. Dave’s eyes fell on him as he indicated for Frank to speak up.

  “What kind of ordinance can we teleport?” Frank asked.

  Dave’s tired face went blank for a moment. “Good of you to ask that, because I didn’t even consider it.” Dave’s eyes darted to the table. No one said anything as Dave stroked his beard, looking at the table. A pen and paper appeared at his right hand; he started to write things down, not even looking at it, as if trying to capture the stream of thought.

  “I’ve been going about this all wrong. I was thinking too simply. Hah, I gave them a chance! Beware, the master of space, time and gravitational anomalies! Stupid Jukal!” Dave muttered to himself, an inspired look on his face.

  He slapped the table and laughed to himself as he put down the pen. He stared at the sheet for a few minutes after he’d finished writing, as if to eke out any remaining bit of inspiration. He waved his hands, clearly preparing to leave the Mirror of Communication.

  “Dave, do you have an answer?” Adams asked.

  “Nope, but I will.” Dave held his hand in mid-air and then snapped his fingers, his eyes bright as a smile spread across his face, before turning to a frown.

  “Looks like I’m going to need to redesign the ships again.” Dave looked off into space, before looking to the people in the room, as if remembering they were still there. “Send me a report on the blind spots of your different ships. If you would want more firepower in one place, where would it be? Actually, just send me all of your...” Dave’s eyes went wide. “Holy shit, could that work? The power consumption would be massive, resources needed would just be ridiculous, wouldn’t need to be manned, sensors would have to be awesome. Doesn’t need different quarters, just five layers.” Dave drew circles surrounding one another as well as jotted down bullet points, chasing inspiration.

  By the time he was done, he was panting.

  “That being said, we wouldn’t be able to make them in time for the offensive if we made them properly. If we were to take out the armor panels, make it from an asteroid? Thickness doesn’t matter and as long as it’s strong enough then it should be good. Then just pack with soul gem constructs and power plants. This thing’s going to be just feeding off power. The usage—wait, we don’t really need to have more than a few power plants inside. We can supplement it all remotely! Holy shit, this, well, I think it’s a possibility! We didn’t use asteroids because they were so damn heavy and we needed thinner and stronger. Power can be supplied easily. We can put out a shit ton of thrust as it’s not relying on its own engines! Hell, it won’t have engines—all it’s going to have is shields and a thick ass asteroid for armor!” Dave laughed and punched his fist in the air, twirling around on a spinny chair.

  “Dave, what are you talking about?” Forsyth asked, poking his nose into Dave’s mind once again.

  “I’m talking about a portal bastion! I’ve got to get to work!” Dave moved once again to leave. “And send me those blind spots you’ve got! We could even use the portals to cover them,” Dave said, the last part more to himself than anyone else. His excitement built as he practically ran out of the room, leaving everyone looking at one another with confused looks.

  I have a feeling that the universe is going to be rocked once again by Dave’s ideas. Frank’s eyes rested on the chair that Dave had been sitting in, a profound feeling that he had just seen genius at work filling him.

  ***

  Dave practically jumped out of the Mirror of Communication chair, stunning a few of the people who weren’t in conference rooms, either leaving the massive room with Mirror of Communication terminals or entering it.

  “Jeeves! Get me everyone!” Dave yelled. Disappearing from the room, he teleported to the workshop he used on the asteroid base. He pulled up the notes he had created, expanding the interface and sticking it to a wall. There were three simple-looking lines, but to Dave they held earth-shattering insight and ideas.

  “Dave, could you specify everyone?” Jeeves asked.

  “Bob, Malsour, Ela-Dorn, anyone who works with portals, asteroid miners and refiners, sensor spell makers, magical coding leads, soul gem construct people, those who deal with fusion power plants and power systems.” Dave clicked his fingers, his eyes closed as if trying to get his brain to remember anyone else he might have forgotten. “Ahh, I’ll think of more later!”

  “Sending out messages,” Jeeves said.

  “Tell them to drop everything now!” Dave’s armor and cloak appeared around him. A mass of gray smoke filled the middle of the workshop, creating a massive sphere that was covered in dots that covered its surface.

  Malsour appeared a few moments later, teleporting into the room. “You called?”

  “Gotta finish this!” Dave said, ignoring Malsour and maintaining his focus on his project. “Get me a conjuration stability construct if you would, please.”

  Malsour pulled out a soul gem construct and put in the coding that would stabilize a conjured object so that it couldn’t be lost as long as the soul gem construct was given power. Malsour tossed it out underneath the conjured mass. It spread out, creating runic lines that connected into circles und
er the conjuration.

  More people quickly started to arrive, and Malsour indicated for them to hold their questions. Seeing the concentration on Dave’s face, they stayed silent, quickly standing off to the side. They read the wall covered with just three lines of text and the five circles with lines connected to them.

  Dave lowered his hands. In the middle of the room, the sphere was complete. It was covered in more circles than before. Dave came out of his reverie and looked to the people in the room. Everyone was now gathered. Dave clapped his hands together. Biting his lower lip and making a fist, he jabbed forward, his eyes burning with inspiration.

  “So, what did you want us for?” Malsour asked.

  “Okay, so I was talking with the Pandora fleets. Ah, I will probably need to talk to them again in the near future to get everything sorted out and tell them about the new things we need. Anyway. You know how we’ve been working on making the portals not only link to other portals but act like the teleportation array that we built in the original Pandora’s Box?” Dave asked.

  “Yes, where they can use the information from the linked ships to create a wormhole that other ships can move through and assist them.” Malsour waved his hand, stating the seemingly common knowledge.

  “Well, Frank Simmons went and asked me what kind of ordinance we could send through, which, when you think about it! Well, it makes complete sense—just take a grand working and then drop it on through in the middle of the Jukal, big boom. However, it only gets a limited area. You’d want to get something with more range. What if instead of putting ships through, or dropping out grand working bombs, we were shooting through? We get coordinates, then we open a wormhole, via a portal to the location, then we have a fleet of ships just shooting through a portal. An entire fleet’s worth of fire hitting ONE SPOT! It’s incredible! And they would never be in the same system as the Jukal! They could be in the moonbase and hitting them as they advance! Now this is incredible! We’ve been looking to make these wormholes stable enough so that they can push out ships with people on them. But if we’re shooting rounds through, we don’t need it to be all that stable! They’re not living—if there’s distortions, we lose a few rounds!