Star Force: Ghostblade (SF67)

by Jyr, Aer-ki

Paul adjusted the holograph telepathically, bringing up a list in V’kit’no’sat script along with a galactic map. “These are essentially bounties that were active at the time of the last update, citing races deemed for extermination that they knew had at least partially escaped their grasp. Those ships they’d tagged were still at large, including some seda-like colony ships. It seems that if you run, and run hard, you have a chance of getting away from them, and the Elarioni are living proof of that.”

  “But you eventually have to settle down somewhere,” Jason pointed out, “and when you do you risk being discovered.”

  “Which is why you have to stay ghosts, living in the anonymity that the galaxy is cloaked with. Always a rebel with no real territory…at least none that you can’t live without.”

  “You’re thinking about fighting them in the here and now, not the future?”

  “Surviving in the here and now. Other than some very low ground conflicts we can’t stand up to their weaponry for even a short while…but running is running, and I’d rather have the option now and not need it than keep hoping to go unnoticed while we continue learning from the database.”

  “Your logic is sound, I just don’t think Clan Saber is the Clan to do it.”

  “Who then?”

  “I think we all should, piecemeal. That way a part of us could survive even if they came back tomorrow and live to rebuild the rest of the Clan. We need to be empires, not just fleets of roaming ships, but with that backup plan if things come to pass not in our favor. The Sangheili will help you develop this tech, for I think it’s worthwhile, and I’m guessing others will as well, but if we’re going to have a Clan go all-in and convert 100% to this methodology then I think it’d be best to start from scratch with zero population and build it up one ship at a time.”

  Paul turned and glared at Jason. “You backstabbing bastard.”

  “Am I wrong?” he asked innocently.

  Paul squeezed his eyes shut, trying to think of a reason to disagree. “There’s a freedom to the strategy that is very appealing, and I want it for all of Clan Saber.”

  “Is it worth losing your industrial muscle?”

  “Depends.”

  “We have the Tether colonies to fall back to. And even if we are invaded 10 years from now having a roaming Clan fleet of any size isn’t going to stop the carnage from ensuing. We need a Clan to pursue this as another page in the Star Force playbook, but Clan Saber is too important to other pages to focus on just this one.”

  “But it’s such a cool one,” Paul protested.

  “You can’t have two Clans, buddy,” Jason said, then did a double take as he thought through his own statement as Paul’s eyes widened a bit. “Or can you?”

  “No reason she has to stop being a Saber,” Paul said as he stood up, knowing that he’d just found his solution.

  “Where are you going?”

  “We must move quickly if the Jedi Order is to survive. You in or not?”

  “In for what exactly?”

  “Maintaining our duo dominance.”

  Jason grinned. “Always.”

  “We can discuss it on a run around the command deck. Then I’m leaving the system to get to work before anyone else can get the jump on us.”

  3 weeks later…

  Kara’s dropship set down inside Paul’s command ship with the trailblazer waiting for her at the foot of the ramp as it descended. She eyed him curiously, wondering exactly what the fuss was about concerning this secret summons. She’d been hunting lizards on the far side of the Achkor Region and had to abandon a war fleet she’d been tracking to come back to Star Force territory to rendezvous with him.

  “Now do you feel like telling me what the rush was?” she asked, stepping off onto the ship’s huge hangar deck.

  “Big shake up across Star Force. Everything is getting reworked.”

  “Yes, I know. Davis sent me a personal heads up.”

  “He did?”

  Kara nodded.

  “Well, we’re still finalizing plans but Davis is handling everything non-Clan with some input from us, which is why we haven’t made a public announcement. There’s a lot of behind the scenes retooling that has to be done and we’re expecting it to take no less than a year before he starts reorganizing the civies. The Clans are going to be reworked into Star Force’s highest caliber factions, with all maturias being transferred to Mainline facilities so that our populations will be totally merit driven entries and no natives.”

  “He said as much. Please tell me that’s not why you brought me all the way back here.”

  “No. I could have sent you a message with that,” he said, thumbing towards the exit. What we have to talk about has to be off the record.

  Go on, she replied telepathically so there would be no eavesdroppers.

  Everything is changing for the Clans and our powerbase is going to evaporate if we don’t adapt accordingly. Davis is offering up territorial prizes for a series of elite level challenges…that you won’t be a part of. No offense, but your…

  Is a cheat, I know.

  The territorial prizes are so large it’s going to tip the current power balances along with all the other changes that will be happening. Each Clan is gearing itself towards facing the V’kit’no’sat threat while Davis is going to focus on the here and now, and from what we’ve been discussing with each other there are going to be some wildly different strategies employed, all of which will be centered around an enhanced competition between the Clans to get us better prepped for going up against Zen’zat.

  Lizards don’t offer up much of a challenge, Kara agreed. Will that mean we’re pulling back on our combat assignments?

  The theory is that with so many Bsidd and Calavari troops available the Clans can pick and choose where we strike rather than carrying as much of the workload as we have been. We will be keeping a higher percentage of our forces in training and Trials but we’re still going to fighting, with an emphasis on the heavier engagements.

  Other than the maturias, what’s changing?”

  We’re amping up everything. People either keep up or wash out back to Mainline. We’re cutting the newbs and slackers out and making the Sabers top of the line. Where exactly the benchmarks will land I’m not sure yet. The harder we make them, the less people we’ll have.

  We’re kicking people out?

  No, I’m not. Those already Sabers will remain Sabers if they choose. The standards will apply to others going forward and I’ll reduce the transitional training wheels over time. Eventually we won’t have any true civilian population left. Everyone will be working to advance the Clan in some fashion or they’ll expire their membership.

  Sounds a bit harsh for some of the old timers.

  I’m going to make sure it’s not, but everyone has to get up to running speed. No more walkers.

  And what was important enough for you to come out and fill me in in person?

  Clan Saber is going to have a lot of new projects in the works going forward. Some I’m working on now, others I’ll come up with later. A few of them will be co-op ventures with other Clans, and Jason and I will be developing one in particular that we’ll share with all the Clans after we get it smoothed out and a decent head start. We’re going to design and build mobile infrastructure so that we can land it on a planet and get a functioning colony up and running within days rather than years. On the reverse end we’ll be able to evacuate the infrastructure instead of just the population if we come under serious attack.

  Isn’t that going to be ridiculously inefficient?

  Yes, which is why we’ve got a lot of work to do on it. The up side is we can move our infrastructure around where the enemy can’t find us. If we’re tied to one location the V’kit’no’sat can simply come in and stomp on us. We need to be able to run, hide, and ambush with more than just our fleet. We need our industrial muscle to do the same.

  For the entire Clan or just an addendum?

  An addendum as far as the othe
r Clans are concerned. I had considered moving Saber completely in that direction, but Jason and I have come up with something better. Instead of sacrificing our existing infrastructure in exchange for the transition, we’re going to build a mutual third Clan that will be entirely mobile. No sedas like Canderous. It’ll be all these new mobile structures and the warfleets they can build…and no one is going to know it exists. Everything we do from here on out is going to be geared to one day fighting the V’kit’no’sat, and if they can ever hack our computer systems this Clan isn’t going to be in them to find.

  Kara’s eyes widened. Are you saying what I think you’re saying?

  This new Clan is going to start with nothing more than an idea and have to be built from scratch. I’m overseeing it and working with Jason to develop the technology and methodology necessary. It will be comprised of Sabers and Sangheili, and on all records that will never change. This Clan doesn’t exist, and no one else will know about it. Not the other trailblazers. Not even Davis. But while me and Jason will be building it, I want you to run it.

  So you’re giving a fake trailblazer a fake Clan? Kara said, noting the irony.

  But here’s the good part. We’re not contributing resources to building this Clan, or territory. It has to be mobile and exist in the shadows. Once we get the key pieces built it’ll have to survive and grow on its own, pulling volunteer personnel from both Clans as necessary, but all industry will have to be its own and be fed by raiding the lizards for resources.

  Hello.

  Figured you’d like that part. It’ll pretty much be you pulling solo missions to grab cargo ships or hit small expansion colonies along the periphery of their territory, probably taking you far away from the ADZ, but the more you steal the faster the Clan will grow. You’ll be able to continue missions against them with a direct impact on the Clan’s success, so no administrative duties. This would be a private triumvirate, but you’d be the one in the field while Jason and me work to develop the Clan while we also rework Saber and Sangheili. That is your mission, should you choose to accept it.

  Kara’s neutral face spread wide in a toothy grin. You had me at ‘raiding the lizards.’

  8

  July 30, 2812

  Solar System

  Earth

  Gavin walked in the conference room doors of the Clan Metal Gear command tower in their territorial slot in Antarctica with his local senior staff of Archons and a few administrators and techs already present. He’d alerted them to gather as soon as he’d left Atlantis, but his Marquis and other top Clan members were outside the system at present. He wasn’t going to wait for them to get here before he got to work, though he’d sent out a summons all the same with instructions to get their butts back to Earth ASAP.

  “What’s up?” a striker asked as the trailblazer walked over and slid onto one of the stools that surrounded the large flat worktable that already had a few holos sprouting from it, but when Gavin slid a datachip into a slot on the edge a whole forest of glowing data arose within the perimeter of the faces of those gathered.

  “Star Force 2.0,” he said evenly. “Davis is reworking just about everything and has an altered mandate for the Clans. While he remakes Star Force with present day threats in mind, the Clans will focus on preparing us for the V’kit’no’sat. He wants us to increase our standards and cut the slackers out of the population by whatever means we want, but as of now all maturias are going to be shut down and the younglings shifted to Mainline facilities. Inclusion in Clan Metal Gear will be by invitation only.”

  Another mage whistled, realizing just how big of a shift that was.

  “You have no idea what’s coming, and we have to get on this sooner rather than later. All the other Clans are going to be scrambling to grab up the talent pool in the rest of Star Force, so we’re going to have to give them something unique to offer. One thing I’ve decided is that we’re going to remain Human only and press that combat front. When the V’kit’no’sat come we won’t be going hand to hand with Era’tran, we’ll have to take them with mechs, so virtually all of the commando combat is going to be us vs. the Zen’zat, so that’s what Metal Gear is going to focus on. How close are we to getting the holo simulators?”

  All eyes went to the level 5 tech. “Not very, if you’re thinking what I’m thinking you’re thinking. The shield matrix is too weak to accommodate blows of even average intensity. We might be able to work up a useable training model for younglings, but not Archons. Our tech hasn’t caught up enough to their standards for us to even remotely copy their simulators.”

  “What about the programs themselves?” Gavin asked.

  “Copied and stored for future use. The processors will be the size of a room to compensate, but we can run them. It’s the holographic hardware that’s holding us back.”

  “Put a team together to push that angle as a priority 1 project. We have to be able to train against opponents that fight like them, and the only way we can do that is with their own procedures. We’re Archons, not Zen’zat, and we need to get to know our enemy’s quirks so we can compensate and exploit them.”

  “Even if we get matrix strength up to snuff, we’re not going to be able to simulate very many materials. It’ll be like punching glass, stone, or rubber every time.”

  “Never the less, I want us using their training simulators as soon as we can, even if it is in a reduced capacity. In the meantime we’re going to keep personnel in the pyramid continuously. As long as we have the real deal we’re going to make use of it, then those individuals will come back and use what they learn to teach others. Going forward I’m instituting a split between training and field work. We have to have a section of the Clan that is on permanent training duty pushing their limits while others are out kicking the crap out of the lizards. Davis wants us to pull back in that area so we can pursue other projects, but over my dead body are we letting Mainline do all the fighting.”

  “Percentages?” another mage asked.

  “We’re going 30 field, 70 training and will hold to approximately that number through swapouts, but I want a core of at least 20% that are permanently training like our advanced training group here. We can’t have everyone taking turns. We need some to lead the way, and as much as I hate being a shut in, I’m volunteering myself for that. I’m the best we have, and if we’re going to pull the rest of the Clan up ahead of the others then I have to be the one kicking your asses to provide a greater challenge.”

  “You’re giving up field work?” Jen-475 asked, who was the Clan’s third highest ranking Archon.

  “I am. I know that’s something the others won’t do, so it’ll give Metal Gear an advantage. I’ll be training with the Clan mostly, and jumping in with the advanced training group time to time to learn from them, but eventually I want our core to be on par with that, if not better. Doing that across the board will be almost impossible, so I want to skew our training towards non-psionic hand to hand and press that hard. To that end, I also want to build and recruit the strongest Knight core in the Clans and work on using them in numbers rather than their typical unit support role. Zen’zat are going to be their size, so we need to get used to fighting teams of them. There are bound to be advantages we haven’t probed yet in that area, and I want us to find them.”

  “Arc Knights?” a Baron asked.

  “No. Others will want them badly, but we’re focusing on non-psionic combat. I want our Knight training core to be just that. Arc Knights have to split their time like Archons do, and I want them with a singular purpose. Get them strong and fast enough and the Archons will have to work hard to catch up while multitasking. We have to apply as much motivational pressure as we can to the training group, so much so that we’ll have people leaving the Clan because they can’t handle the stress. They’ll go back to Mainline and take the skills they’ve learned with us with them, so they won’t be washouts and I never want to hear you refer to them as such. I want Metal Gear to be tops in terms of commando intensity. T
hat will help with our recruitment, though it will lower our numbers greatly at the outset.”

  “If we have no younglings of our own,” the Baron asked, “we’re going to have to be recruiting our civilian population as well?”

  “Yes, and though others are giving their current populations immunity we’re not. We’re going to institute a transitional period to give our current slackers and retiries a chance to get back in shape, but if they can’t pass muster they’re going to Mainline with everyone else. This is a train that ain’t stopping for no one. You keep up or you fall off.”

  Gavin raised a finger in caveat. “However, I want our commando division to be the insanely hard one. The rest of our Clan will be amped up, but not to such a level. I don’t want to weed out a large number of our techs and reduce our industrial capability. We’re just going to get rid of the freeloaders there without much of a boost in standards. We’ll tweak it a bit, but I want that to be much more relaxed. Hand to hand is going to be our pressure cooker.”

  “And Naval?” Jen asked.

  “Same as always,” he scoffed. “Look at what Paul, Liam, and Roger are doing and see what we want to copy.”

  When Morgan left Earth she took a warship directly to the nearby Sirius System in the Core Region where Clan Ninja Monkey had located its capitol, sharing the world of Everlast with a Mainline colony. Her Marquis was there, along with a handful of other high ranking Ninja Monkey Archons, though most of her Clan was spread out through numerous systems and deployed on active missions, whether they be Clan business or overseeing Mainline or other fleets.

  Morgan called those present together in Marquis Falconi’s office for an informal chit chat, during which she began to give them a summary of what the trailblazers and Davis had decided on Earth and how it was going to affect Star Force and their Clan in particular.

  “Also,” she continued, “all adepts and acolytes are going to be Clanless and coming out of basic they’ll be transitioning into a new program we’re developing, which we’re loosely referring to as ‘Null Clan.’ It will function the same way ours do with regard to the Archons, a lot of training and Trials mixed in with a bit of field work, but will be overseen by appointments the same way we assign Archons to the Mainline fleet. The catch is, we don’t get to draft any of them when they make ranger. We have to recruit them.”