Star Force: The Admiral

by Aer-ki Jyr

  It was 122 miles in diameter and egg-shaped, colored a pure gleaming white, with Olivia ordering it to reposition in such a way that it betrayed its engine strength…making it clear to those watching that it was not a seda, but a starship. And based on the excessive amount of weaponry covering it, it wasn’t a transport or support ship, but a full blown warship.

  And a warship that was slightly bigger than the J’gar Mach’nel that Star Force had captured, but the exact same shape. That had been on purpose, to make it look like it was the same ship rebuilt slightly larger to cover the Yeg’gor armor with an additional layer of Star Force design.

  But that was just a ruse, for that captured Mach’nel wasn’t here. Kamenor was safely tucked away far from here, spirited away from Earth after the first attack in what looked like a spider web of Cradle-class transport ships to give it the engine power that Star Force had torn out of it during its capture. They’d got it moved before the V’kit’no’sat returned and kept it hidden from them the entire time…and hopefully now they thought that Star Force had rebuilt it and was going to use it to counter the Brat’mar Mach’nel.

  The captured J’gar one was egg-shaped, but Brat’mar ships were discs and this one was no exception, though thicker than normal. It looked like a stack of coins but massed almost exactly the same as every other Mach’nel. The V’kit’no’sat liked parity, allowing each race to design their own vessels but keeping them to the same basic parameters regarding speed, armor, and weaponry.

  And if Star Force had a Mach’nel to use, this fight was going to take on a whole new dynamic.

  The V’kit’no’sat knew that too, with them immediately breaking from orbit. They couldn’t fight this new Mach’nel over the planet, so they had to meet it in deep space and Olivia got her fleet moving slowly so they wouldn’t fight at the jumppoint, with the last of her ships still coming through.

  She was outgunned, and even with Liam’s help she knew they couldn’t win this fight, at least not in terms of ships. She was here to get the Mach’nel, and Spaceball One was another trick Star Force had kept up its sleeve. It’d been developed as a counter to Mach’nel, but the surprise of it was going to be half the trick, and once the V’kit’no’sat learned what it truly was they wouldn’t be caught off guard again.

  But taking out a Mach’nel was worth it. Olivia just hoped they’d fall for it.

  Spaceball One wasn’t a fake. Its weapons were real, its shields were real, its engines were real, and it was by far the most kill power Oliva had in her fleet…which was why the V’kit’no’sat were going to go straight for it. On top of its obvious power, the V’kit’no’sat ego was not going to react well to the ‘heretics’ having a Mach’nel, even if it was rebuilt. Many races in the V’kit’no’sat were not permitted more than 1, and even the Oso’lon only had a handful. They were insanely hard to build, which was why Star Force had never tried to construct one of their own. There were two major problems, the first being the Yeg’gor armor.

  Star Force had the blueprints for it, but had never bothered to produce any. The elaborate process needed to create it just wasn’t worth it when you knew you were going to lose. The Yeg’gor was meant to be a fortification enhancement you put on ships or worlds you did not intend to lose, and even if Star Force had a pyramid defense station of their own on a planet, it would fall just like the one they’d inherited on Earth, so the most economical means Star Force had of defense was to create strong armor that could be mass produced, whereas the Yeg’gor could not.

  The second problem was the Tar’vem’jic. The weapon on the captured Mach’nel had been junked during combat, but they’d tried to put it back together over the years and barely succeeded. The components in it were so rare that they were harder to produce than the Yeg’gor, and had Star Force not had the pieces to start with they never would have bothered. Tar’vem’jic were a luxury of an empire with ample time and resources to construct, but useless in a war of attrition. That was why V’kit’no’sat ships didn’t have them, save for the Mach’nel, and not even the most fortified Star Force planets had one.

  Star Force was pursuing other technology beyond what the V’kit’no’sat had to achieve that range, so they weren’t forgoing the inherent advantage, but rather needing something more industry-friendly.

  But as far as the V’kit’no’sat knew, Spaceball One had one, for a decoy had been produced with an appropriate aperture on the hull, though it could not fire anything more than a huge plasma beam…which in itself was dangerous, but would hopefully encourage the V’kit’no’sat to pursue when they saw that Star Force hadn’t had the technology to replace the one they’d broken.

  When the two fleets met up the drone swarm ignored the opposing Mach’nel, not that they could get to it in any large numbers. As expected the V’kit’no’sat were being very careful with this one, despite it being the largest and hardest ship to kill. The fact that they’d lost one to Star Force was a sting to their ego that had probably never worn off, and if it had it just got reanimated as Olivia formed a wedge of drones around Spaceball One to help protect it from the concentrated firepower of the V’kit’no’sat fleet as the two massive ships got closer and closer together.

  A break in the V’kit’no’sat formation allowed a Tar’vem’jic shot to get through, vaporizing the drones in between and then slamming into Spaceball One’s shields…which held. Star Force had built this ship with the strongest shields possible, layer after layer of them and in multiple varieties. It was going to survive to get to the Mach’nel and then some. Hopefully without the V’kit’no’sat chickening out.

  When the Star Force response came, it saw the massive plasma stream passing through a gap formed in the drone wall and hit a Kafcha, taking down its shields and cooking the upper side of its hull that the drone swarm then jumped on…but that seemed to only embolden the V’kit’no’sat as they focused more attention on getting to Spaceball One as Olivia’s drones had a temporary advantage, shooting at targets that weren’t firing back in some cases, as they targeted Spaceball One almost exclusively.

  The two giant Mach’nel closed on one another, with the Tar’vem’jic finally getting through after half a dozen shots, but per the design only a tiny section of the shield fell and allowed the beam to core into the armor…that it melted like tissue paper. That should have been a warning to the V’kit’no’sat, unless they thought they hit a hole in the Yeg’gor beneath it, but they kept attacking with a vengeance until the two ships were within a few hundred miles of one another and their backing fleets were mixed together in a giant hurricane of combat.

  But what the V’kit’no’sat did not know was that Spaceball One was not a Mach’nel, as well as the fact that it had been built as one massive drone. No one was onboard it and Oliva was personally flying it from the safety of her command ship as the real Mach’nel got into range and she activated the huge IDF generators that created an engine crippling field in front of Spaceball One.

  That field caught many V’kit’no’sat ships, keeping them on the trajectories they’d been on without being able to divert. Oliva had drones make the most of that as the Mach’nel was fully enclosed and drifting forward on its momentum as it continued to fire it’s weaponry, including the Tar’vem’jic, that poked yet another hole in the massive craft.

  “Alright bastards, let’s see you deal with this,” she said, causing Spaceball One to transform. It looked like a Voku conglomerate changing shape, but the technology was actually V’kit’no’sat based and very similar to the way their personal armor flowed over their bodies and reformed at will, except that the tiny pieces were dozens of meters wide and redundant, meaning that what the V’kit’no’sat were blowing up were not critical as the entire egg-like mass melted and reached out with tendrils of pure white material that appeared to tie the disc-shaped Mach’nel in place, though in reality it was the IDF field that covered everything except the back portion of Spaceball One, so the Star Force trapship could still maneuver while its tendril
s were inside the field.

  The transformation continued with the V’kit’no’sat ships abandoning the fight with the drones almost entirely as they fired on the white mass that was quickly covering the Mach’nel even as it shot holes through it with the Tar’vem’jic. Oliva poured half her drones into protecting it and the other half she released to Liam to use, taking easy shots at the V’kit’no’sat ships as the Mach’nel was completely covered. When that happened the remaining material that held the ‘engines’ of Spaceball One melted as well, pulling into the rest of the covered ‘coin’ and spreading out, shrinking its IDF down to the exact shape of the Mach’nel now captured inside it while leaving the entirety of Spaceball One with access to the system’s gravity field.

  Oliva poured the drones into a wedge ahead of it, fighting a hole that the massive ship now moved through with its pinned captive shooting its brilliant orange Tar’vem’jic helplessly. It could kill the piece of ship above it, but with the rest so close it couldn’t aim and soon that hole got as big as it could while others smaller ones began to open up over top of other weaponry, but the ship had no center, no bridge, no engine core, and even if it lost half its mass it could still accomplish its purpose.

  It took a lot of effort to fight their way clear of the V’kit’no’sat fleet, and Oliva was losing a lot of drones in the process, but with some ramming and a high degree of skill, Spaceball One broke free and made a microjump towards the star as Oliva broke off combat. Her drones ran away like scared bees in every direction as her command ship and jumpships kept their distance while staying close enough to decrease signal lag. She gave Liam control over everything else and focused exclusively on flying the trapship with its Mach’nel prey inside.

  The rest of the V’kit’no’sat fleet didn’t chase them, instead pursuing the captured Mach’nel towards the star…but Spaceball One didn’t stop there and, while slowing, continued down into the star’s upper layers as it used its extensive shielding to produce a different type useless in combat but similar to those used by the Star Forge to protect against the intense stellar radiation that could actually use it to fuel the shields, strengthening them against the constant stings from the ship captured inside as it changed in shape again, thickening in strands that stretched between the largest weaponry and leaving massive holes over them that the star began to eat into, slowing diminishing the Mach’nel’s shield strength as Spaceball One’s protection got stronger and stronger as it fed off the star.

  “Attention V’kit’no’sat fleet,” Oliva said, sending an open comm to all of their ships, not sure how well the reception would be in the Mach’nel, so she had Spaceball One operate as a relay to boost her transmission signal as it sunk a little deeper into the star while the other ships shot down into it and made a few weak hits against it, disrupting its absorption shields momentarily.

  “Our ship is equipped to survive the star, your Mach’nel is not. You have fallen into our trap and now I am waiting to negotiate terms for your surrender. While the Mach’nel will survive for quite a while thanks to its defenses, it will not survive indefinitely. If you do not come to terms we will let it sit and cook in the star until everyone onboard is dead, but that is not our goal. You are not getting the Mach’nel back, but we are willing to negotiate for the lives of the crew. I await your response.”

  Olivia mentally summoned a chair to form underneath her feat in the command nexus, with her leaning back to sit in it as it rose, then she put her feet up on the control board and crossed her hands behind her head around her red/green/white ponytail and waited with a smirk on her face, although she was well aware of the ground combat continuing on Requiem and the fact that Star Force was losing, but she’d just compromised the most important asset in their arsenal.

  And to be honest, she wasn’t sure how they were going to respond, but at the minimum they were going to lose the Mach’nel, and probably their commander with it unless they were willing to negotiate. And while their fleet was here they weren’t adding to the ground fight with orbital bombardment, so all things being said she was in a good position, but unless they relented she and Liam were still going to lose Requiem.

  Olivia updated her status and sent it out via relay so other fleets moving about would know their status, then did something trailblazers did not like doing…waiting. She got a quick ‘good job’ message from Liam then he was off to planetary orbit to help organize the ground defenses and evacuation efforts while she continued to hold personal control over Spaceball One.

  “Admiral, you mind getting me something to drink. I’m a little thirsty.”

  “Gladly, Olivia,” the Protovic said on the other side of the wall, his eyes gleaming from more than his bioluminosity. “What would you like?”

  16

  November 4, 4813

  Jennizeren System (Star Force Front)

  Ennvor

  It was the second day since Paul had gotten here and he was already getting the Era’tran to dance to his tune…the problem was they had a significant ship advantage and that ruled out most of his combat options. He had to preserve his own ships enough to protect the 3 planets that hadn’t been breached yet, so any large cancelation battles had to be avoided.

  But Paul was still working the problem, bit by bit whittling away at the edges of the V’kit’no’sat fleets surrounding the three contested planets. News from the ground was bad, with the V’kit’no’sat steamrolling across the planet due to the high concentration of troops they’d devoted to the assaults. More than in the past, and all the tricks Star Force had learned to slow and kill them were not being given time to play out. It was like the V’kit’no’sat had finally upped their game and viewed Star Force as a worthy opponent, and the displays of dominance associated with using a small number of troops to destroy a larger, inferior group were now shelved.

  They were interested in winning, plain and simple, and had brought enough troops to do it on the ground so long as their fleets got them a foothold. That meant these three planets were lost, or would be unless something changed, but there were three more planets that could be saved and a lot of people on the others to evacuate.

  Paul wasn’t able to do the latter for more than a few daring runs, due to the V’kit’no’sat being very prudent with hunting down ascending ships. Paul couldn’t get more than a fraction of the evac ships from the surface out, but the V’kit’no’sat had to spread in order to prevent it and that gave Paul some greater openings. He was picking off some of their smaller ships and wounding the larger ones, but he needed a lot more time than the planets had. The V’kit’no’sat weren’t interested in taking and holding any region of the planets, and Ennvor was the worst. They were slashing and burning specific locations and bypassing even a lot of the anti-ground weaponry as if they were in a hurry.

  Normally the V’kit’no’sat took great care to kill every ‘heretic’ in their path, but not this time. They were probably going to take the planet as fast as possible then bombard the hell out of it afterwards. The thing of it was, using this technique on the ground was meaning they had to run or fly past fixed emplacements that were causing their ground troops a lot of damage.

  It felt like they were on the clock, but there was no way they could know about the reinforcements Paul had called. No, his gut told him this was something else…and he had a distinct sense that the assaults that had occurred so far were just the opening act. The one possibility that he did not want to entertain was that there was a second wave of ships coming across the Devastation Zone, but the more he watched how this Rovo’kor handled his fleet and the troops on the ground…assuming he was overseeing them as well, as most naval commanders did…it suggested a need for speed overriding the preservation of his units.

  If this was going to be a long campaign moving from system to system they needed to go slower and lose less personnel and equipment. If they feared Paul’s reinforcements coming and they were trying to work fast, that would imply fear rather than prudence and the V’kit’
no’sat did not fight that way under circumstances of their own choosing. They had picked these assaults carefully, so if it wasn’t fear it either meant stupidity…which he ruled out immediately…or the availability of replacements.

  The V’kit’no’sat were in a rush and Paul was having to fight in a way to lengthen the timetable…not a good situation for him, but it was what it was and every ship he destroyed was one less they could use later even if these worlds fell. Actually Paul and the others had gotten used to this type of warfare and had an unbelievable amount of experience in it as the ADZ and surrounding regions were methodically trashed, but now their weaponry, shields, and most important their industry was about on par with the V’kit’no’sat had previously sent their way.

  The time they’d bought had paid off, but now it seemed like the V’kit’no’sat were not going to let them reap the rewards of it and actually hold off a planetary assault.

  Others would have been disheartened, or disillusioned, and wanted to run away and hide but Paul and the other trailblazers were not. This was where they belonged, and so long as Paul had a ship to use and an opportunity to do damage he was going to throw himself into play and see how this worked out. Star Force might not have any planetary victories against the V’kit’no’sat, but they did have naval ones, and that was enough to keep Paul from getting mentally depressed. What he was doing was having an effect, and that’s all he needed.

  People and planets dying weren’t going to throw off his focus as they once had. He’d learned how to numb it out temporarily as he became the task at hand, saving the impact for later when he had a break to process it all…but he was better at that too now, so even as the situation continued to get worse he was effectively immune to morale issues and his fleet keyed off of him, which was a small part of why they were racking up ship tonnage kills faster than the enemy fleet...and the enemy commander knew it.