Empire Burning (Emerilia Book 11)

by Michael Chatfield

  “Well, what they hell else can we do? They want us to bring everything back but a third of our fleet. That isn’t even enough to support the Emerilians!” Sato slammed his hand into the table.

  “You give the word, Commander, my people will fight for humanity, even if the council isn’t ready to do it,” Admiral Adams said.

  Wong looked at Adams, shock on her face.

  “We’re fighting the good fight here, ma’am. My people will fight it and take the court-martial if they have to. I know the Emerilians would accept us with open arms,” Adams said, her eyes clear and filled with authority.

  “Well, it’s easy. We bankrupt the Deq’ual system,” Edwards said.

  “What?” Wong asked, even more shocked. Edwards was a civilian, after all, but now he was talking about going against the very government that led the system and pushing them so that they could do nothing but help the Emerilians.

  “What are you thinking?” Sato asked.

  “The alliance we have calls for the support of either party in defense. There are multiple stipulations on technology we’ve shared. It’s to be used in order to advance ourselves and make us ready for fighting. Well, if we go against that agreement, then we would be going against the treaty if we were to not destroy the technology that was developed with their help.” Edwards shrugged. It was clear that he didn’t want to do it, but it would put the council in a bad position.

  “You’re talking about destroying or removing all of the technology that was made with the aid of the Emerilians?” Wong said, shaken.

  “Yes, the technology that certain council members have been praising us for coming up with,” Edwards said with derision.

  “The Deq’ual system will not survive this way.” Sato opened up his interface and sent messages out.

  “What you’re talking about is rebelling against the council!” Wong said, as if she couldn’t believe what she was hearing.

  “We’re not rebelling against the council. We’re fighting for humanity, and Deq’ual is not the only human group. We fight together or we die apart.” Sato pushed his finger against a button on his interface.

  “What have you done?” Wong asked.

  “I’ve taken all of the messages, all of the information from the council, and shared it with everyone in the Deq’ual system. I’ve also included private conversations between the council members about various dirty dealings they’ve done in the past. I’ve also passed out information on how to call a new election,” Sato said, his smile cold. “I’ll leave it up to the people of Deq’ual to make the right decision. If they don’t, then we’ll just leave. I don’t wish to work for people who will leave our friends out there to fight a battle that we’re a part of.”

  Wong didn’t need to ask whether he was serious. She could see on all of their faces that the council had touched their weak spot.

  They were true allies to Emerilia, and they would take a court-martial if they had to in order to help them.

  Across the Deq’ual system, people were getting messages, and news networks got access to the documents Sato had prepared. In the space of ten minutes, emergency bulletins were going out. In twenty minutes, council members who had been taking bribes or were talking about backstabbing the Emerilians, taking their technology and such, were refusing to make a comment and others were being arrested.

  In just two hours, everyone in Deq’ual knew what the council members were doing and the reporters were doing their own digging, pulling up information that Sato didn’t even know of. The next day, elections were called and people were nominated by their peers for office. Council Leader Wong remained in charge and the people who were elected weren’t politicians: they were people who worked the asteroid mines, people who built ships, and looked after the growing areas. These were the people who kept the Deq’ual stations running.

  They threw their full support behind the military, leaving the matters up to them to win the war with the Jukal and assist the Emerilians as promised by the treaty.

  Sato felt relief. He didn’t want to leave Deq’ual, it was his home, but there were just some things he couldn’t agree with. If it was necessary, then he would have left, because it was the right thing to do.

  Chapter 10: A War on all Fronts

  “Ready to teleport,” one of Forsyth’s aides said.

  He looked over the plot that showed all seven fleets formed into a line of battle. His eyes fell on the Jukal that were strung out in a long line, heading for the edge of the system where they could employ their jump drives. “Weapon unlock and teleport,” Forsyth said.

  “Teleporting!” the same aide called out.

  The various ships all glowed along their repaired runic lines. Spell formations appeared around the ships before they disappeared from their position, reappearing off to the side of the Jukal fleet.

  “Flank speed!” Forsyth barked, holding onto the grab bars of his station.

  Battleships, destroyers, and missile boats reappeared. As soon as they did, the original spell formations behind their ships surged with power. Blue arcane fire lit up the void as those within the ships grunted against the new pressure as the inertia runes took a second to adjust.

  “Portals!” Forsyth called.

  Hangars opened across the fleet as portals that had been recharged since their last excursion snapped out to the end of their soul gem umbilicals. The umbilicals themselves started to glow with power, ready to connect to the range portals within the asteroid base.

  The range portals were simply a wall of weapons systems facing a portal. As the portal was connected to those floating or attached to the Pandora ships, they would unleash their spells, missiles, and cannon fire.

  “Time till intersect?” Forsyth asked. His body felt light once again as the engine’s thrust was negated.

  “Three minutes!” the aide from before said.

  “Fire control, take over,” Forsyth said, his commands passing down.

  The fire controllers worked with their nav, finding the best passage for them to follow and bring them into range of the Jukal.

  “Coming into missile range!” another aide called out.

  “Jukal are firing!”

  “Eject missiles, have them ready. Interceptor modules, through the portals!” Forsyth called.

  Portals connected and interceptor modules could be seen on the other side. They were linked through Mirrors of Communication to the sensor spells that were constantly being cast by the ships.

  The tiny explosive grand working shells tore through the portals and out into the darkness of the void to meet the Jukal missiles. The barrage was staggered, showing limited fire control.

  If they wanted to inundate our defenses with missiles, they would have launched them all at the same time. Forsyth was analyzing them as their engines calmed down. Now they had built up enough speed, they slowed down. Hitting missiles while accelerating so much could cause instability and lead to injuries—injuries Forsyth and the other ships did not want to deal with in the middle of battle.

  He checked the plot. The missile tubes were firing constantly. As the missiles were ejected, they did not use their main arcane fire drive; instead, they used the stealthed drives of Air spell formations that were nearly impossible to detect.

  They dropped below the fleet and surged above it, the lead missiles slower to allow those coming behind them to gather in increased numbers.

  Forsyth looked at the Jukal missiles. They were all coming straight on. Looks like my hunch was right. Forsyth’s face filled with contempt. They only shoot their missiles straight on.

  The remaining two minutes seemed to pass in the blink of an eye but also stretch for eternity.

  Jukal missiles impacted the Pandora ships’ shields. The Pandora fleet who were coming in on a ninety-degree angle to the Jukal fleet were facing the Jukal fleet’s broadsides, allowing them to bring incredible power to bear.

  Light cannons discharged. A few were stopped here and there, but they had adapted t
o the disrupting spells of the interceptor modules. Mana barriers flared angrily in the light of the light cannons’ force.

  “Portal shields,” Forsyth said. A cold calm fell over him as he listened to the information coming in and watched the different screens. To many observers, the information was hard to digest; but to Forsyth, they were the nerves that linked him to the rest of the fleet. With but a glance, he looked over his fleet and was connected to them; with an order, they would react, an extension of his will and might.

  Portals that had been grown on the front of the battleships lit up as the battleships rushed forward. A beam of light rushed out of the portal, shaking space itself; waves of energy rippled off the beam of light. The beams stopped a mile in front of the battleships. Spell formations formed as the energy from the beams shot outward; missiles and laser cannons hit the edge of this energy, slowing its progress but not stopping it.

  The sheet of energy spread out, connecting to the other sheets of energy and creating a shield formed into the shape of a bubble that faced the Jukal straight on. The massive shield shone with a faint blue light. The Jukal unleashed all they had on the shield. It shook and ripples formed on it, but it held. The Pandora fleet couldn’t shoot at all. Unlike Mana barriers, shields couldn’t be penetrated by those on either side.

  Forsyth felt a heat building through his muscles, energy just waiting to be unleashed. He hid his panting as his eyes started to turn red. His eyes shot to a plot that showed a cloud of hundreds of missiles around the edges of the shield, hidden from the Jukal’s sight.

  With the items of holding, they could store hundreds of missiles aboard each and every ship, allowing them to saturate the void as they had.

  The Jukal were still firing their missiles right into the shields that were being powered by the massive power reserves of the asteroid base.

  “Prepare to switch to disrupting spells! Nalheim formation,” Forsyth called. His blood boiled with bloodlust as he continued to look calmly at his screens, forcing down his desire to join the battle to clash with the Jukal face-to-face, instead using that desire to make him look for any way to cause more damage to the Jukal and protect his people.

  He wouldn’t let his desires take over and harm his people.

  “One minute till intercept!” the aide watching the navigation plots said, not looking up.

  “We’ll go at thirty seconds. Inform the fire controllers.” Forsyth seemed serene, a man looking at a tempest of chaos without reservations or worries. His actions and manner only made his people respect him more—their fear, their anxiousness covered over by the focused rage and anger that had been tempered by constant training.

  Forsyth looked at them and felt an upwelling of pride in his people. Courage is not facing possible death without fear; it’s taking that fear and turning it into action.

  “Thirty seconds!” As the navigation aide’s words fell, the universe seemed to change.

  The shield collapsed and the portals that hadn’t been supporting the shield activated simultaneously across the armada.

  Spell formations appeared above the ships. From the spell formations, massive Nalheim, thirty meters tall, appeared. They were formed from magical runes that covered their bodies. These giants stood above the Pandora fleet, looking upon the Jukal as if they were deities that could control fate by turning their hand.

  The Nalheim were formed into ranks above the Pandora fleet. As one, all of the Nalheim warriors pushed their right foot back, lowering their bodies as they showed their spears. They opened their two mouths in a war cry and stabbed forward. Sound wasn’t transmitted through space, making it all the more terrifying.

  As their spears shot forward, they glowed with power. The runes that made up their bodies rotated and glowed with destructive power that rushed down their spears. Their bodies dissipated as all that was left was their spears that shot forward, spell formations appearing in front of the spears.

  The Nalheim’s terrifying disruption magic shot through the void, two hundred beams, all of them at least thirty meters wide.

  As the beams of disruption struck Jukal missiles, you could see pinpricks of exploded ordinance. Laser cannon fire was ripped apart as if they were made of glass. The disrupting attacks were weakened, but they continued on their path of death. Jukal shields that were at full strength were shaken by the outpouring of power. One ship in the path of three beams was stripped of its shield and its hull started to disintegrate.

  As the third beam passed it, the ship shattered, its parts being torn apart by the power unleashed onto it.

  Drones that had been moving around the Jukal carriers were unable to stop the beam, but weakened it before it hit the carriers behind them.

  Jukal shields failed across the fleet from the single immense attack.

  The missile cloud that had been unleashed for the last three minutes activated the next attack stage and raced ahead of the Pandora fleet; it now lit up the Jukal’s sensor screens, their arcane drives coming online.

  The Pandora fleet came alive like some ancient beast. Missile salvos rushed from their tubes, turning them into tridents as missiles rushed to meet up with those that had been released earlier.

  Hundreds of missiles appeared around the Jukal, as the Nalheim attack was still savaging the Jukal fleet, giving them no time to react and cutting down the Jukal’s defenses.

  Spell formations flared to life as light cut through space. Plasma cannon spells fueled by grand working warheads tore through armor plating and threw their destructive power against the ship’s shields.

  Pillars of light and cutting blades of dark corruption savaged ships that lay in their path.

  All of this happened in barely ten seconds.

  The Pandora fleet’s portals were now under the fire controllers’ orders. Cannon fire shot ahead of them; missiles and spell formations only added to the destruction. Four of the Jukal ships fell before the Pandora fleet reached them.

  They were hitting one section of the massive Jukal fleet; as such, there were many ships to the right and left of their heading that were fully functional and able to unleash their attacks.

  Missiles and lasers cut at the Pandora fleet in response. The ships on the edges of the Pandora fleet were taking heavy fire. They moved their portals to face them and once again shields appeared to protect them.

  However, maneuvering the portals into place took time. Their Mana barriers took heavy damage and their hulls were even holed in places on more than one ship.

  “Tell the flanks to teleport as soon as we cross the Jukal fleet,” Forsyth said. His heart ached at losing their firepower, but bringing them into battle, it was likely that they wouldn’t be able to take too many hits before they were knocked out of action.

  He was not willing to put their lives at risk for defeating possibly only two or three more Jukal ships.

  It was only a few moments later that the other Jukal ships could no longer fire on them for fear of hitting their own people.

  Spell formations appeared around the battered ships. In a moment, they had lost eight ships. It was telling to the Jukal’s firepower; without the Mana shields, the Pandora fleet wouldn’t have been able to survive even this long.

  As they entered the Jukal fleet, the cannons opened up and the portals were turned. Instead of facing forward, they moved to face the sides.

  Six Jukal ships were unable to stop the destruction that descended upon them. They were torn apart and left as wreckage in the Jukal fleet’s path.

  Drones came in, unleashing their attacks on the Pandora fleet in wave after wave.

  The Mana barriers shook as the Pandora fleet unleashed everything they had, once again overclocking their magical coding.

  The Jukal were now the ones who had to deal with their enemies’ broadsides. Only their engines and bows faced them.

  The Jukal started to move erratically, trying to bring their weapons to bear. Even as they did, they were washed over by the spells, cannons, and missiles of t
he Pandora fleet.

  Drones’ missiles and light cannons attacked the Pandora fleet in passing where they could bring them to bear.

  “Tell the nav of those ships to jump out as soon as their Mana barriers go down!” Forsyth barked as a Pandora fleet ship that had lost its Mana barrier shook as a Jukal missile exploded next to it.

  The Pandora missile boat listed off to the side. Its runic lining failed and tried to rebuild itself as it looked like a chunk had been bitten out of its side.

  “The Marauder has lost the ability to teleport,” an aide said, talking about the missile boat.

  “Get them to use the portal and evacuate. Put the ship on AI only,” Forsyth said without pause.

  It was only a few moments later that the Jukal drones that were now crossing through the Pandora fleet moved to the hapless missile boat. The ships around the missile boat tried to help out as much as possible but the missile boat was already weak, its Mana barrier gone and its hull open to the void.

  Missile armories of holding were flushed out. Missiles poured out from them as they shot off to fight the drones, but these drones didn’t care about surviving; they were simply computer programs given orders by the Jukal.

  Shield orbs were ejected, trying to buy the ship more time as their teleportation runes started to light up.

  The drones rushed the spread of missiles and fired upon the missile boat’s new shields. The Mana barrier of the orbs lasted for a few moments but it wasn’t enough time for the teleportation spell formation to activate. The Mana barrier broke and the missile boat shuddered under the attacks as people inside rushed out of their escape portal linked to the asteroid base.

  The boat shuddered as a drone smashed into it, making it wheel away, leaving a path of debris and ejected gases, its decks open to space.

  Another drone fired right into an opening in the missile boat. One second, it was drifting, still trying to fire out missiles; the next, the space it was in was filled with an explosion.