Onslaught (Rise of the Empire Book 6) (12 page)

The station’s operators targeted one of the Shara Daim heavy cruisers, and Adrian watched as one of its ends suddenly crumpled in on itself in a bundle of twisted hull, and the ship exploded. Adrian checked to see how Anessa’s ship was doing and found it on the front of the Shara Daim formation, shielding the smaller ships from the drones’ attack. He resent the order for that ship to be left alone, unless it was a danger to the station that had people on it. Then he started giving orders to the drone control that would make the most of the situation.

Chapter Seventeen

Bloodbringer

Anessa had known that this had to have been a trap all along the moment those ships appeared and those platforms exited them. And she had been made certain of it the moment that that large station appeared behind the Legions, in a place where she knew it was always supposed to be. How had it not occurred to them that they could use their FTL technology to move such large stations? Adrian had allowed the Legions in; not only that, he had manipulated two empires, the Shara Daim and the Erasi, making them both think that their system was undefended. All those times when she had seen things that she wasn’t supposed to, had felt his emotions and thoughts slip past his blocks, all those had been planned. He had wanted them to attack his system before they had greater numbers.

The unmanned ships in front of the Legions fired thousands of kinetic shells. Anessa knew what those primitive weapons were; the Shara Daim had encountered a few races that used them, and all had perished against the Legions. Now those primitive weapons would shred the Legions; there was no space to maneuver. The platforms were firing energy beams that even her ship’s shields felt, and at the back of their formation was the massive defense station that was mauling anything that came close enough.

The kinetic shells hit the front of the formation. Her and Garaam’s Legions fared better; the two of them had their larger ships in front, and their shields could take the hail of fire. However, Narrasak had his destroyers and cruisers up front taking the kinetic fire, while his heavy warships were in the back being destroyed by the large station, and his ships were losing their shields rapidly, the platforms surrounding their formation picking off any ship without them.

She was losing ships fast. Already she had lost almost a quarter of her Legion, and the losses of the other two Legions were even worse. But they still had the numbers advantage, at least in heavy warships. If they reorganized and punched through, they might be able to escape this death trap and defeat the enemy.

Anessa ordered her cruisers and destroyers forward, away from the station at their back, but she knew that they had to do something; if they stayed on the defensive for any longer, they wouldn’t have the numbers to attempt anything. Then she noticed Narrasak’s ships tightening formation and moving ahead towards the unmanned drones. She checked the holo and saw that there had been no orders from the Ravager. She tried to open a channel, but Narrasak ignored her. She knew what he was doing; he was trying to push through the front and get to the planet. But she also knew that in the process he was going to lose a lot of ships.

Anessa opened a channel to Soulsworn. Garaam appeared her eyes determined.

“That idiot is going to kill us all,” Garaam said.

“Close the hole his fleet makes, and let’s move away from the station and towards the platforms. We should be able to break through while Narrasak keeps them busy,” Anessa said.

“So we are running,” Garaam said, her voice bitter.

“We can’t win, Garaam. With Narrasak, perhaps; without him, we would certainly lose almost everything, and if losing our Legions is the cost for taking this system, then I don’t want it,” Anessa said forcefully. She was angry—at Narrasak for going off on his own, at herself for hearing alien words in her mind, and at that alien for tricking her and proving his words true.

Garaam’s eyes flashed. “Alright, and I hope that they smash that moron to pieces. At least his idiocy might buy us enough time to get out of this.”

***

The Empire’s defense platforms fired dark green proton beams at the Shara Daim, even as they returned fire with their own versions, which painted the space around them in dark blue lines. The platforms were taking down Shara Daim missiles that were targeting them, but a few passed through their defensive fire only to impact against the platform’s shields. The drones were firing with their lasers and kinetic weapons, as they had expended their missiles.

Adrian noticed the Shara Daim ships changing formations. One of the Legions, the one in the central part of their formation, moved in front and set a direct course through his remaining drones. The other two were closing the hole that that Legion made, and changing course towards the wall of platforms, away from the station and the Legion trying to push through the drones. He saw Anessa’s ship among that formation, and sent out orders for the platforms closest to that formation to target the damaged and smaller ships of that formation. The rest of the platforms he pointed towards the foolish Legion that was trying to break through his drones.

Unfortunately, all the Legions had moved out of the range of the station’s gravity weapon, and were on the edge of the range of its proton beams. However, the station had already exacted a terrible price to those ships that had been in its range; hundreds of burned or crushed hulls floated in front of it. The enemy ships were still in the missile range, so he ordered the station commander to send his missiles towards the single Legion and allow the two that were trying to push through the platforms to get away.

He focused all the firepower he had available at the single Legion. Its commander was putting its smaller ships in front and sacrificing them to the kinetics of his drones, but Adrian’s platforms and missiles from the station were wreaking havoc on them from all sides.

Adrian focused the platforms on the Legion’s super battleships, even as he moved the drones to prevent their passage. The Legion commander must’ve realized what Adrian was doing, but it was too late, his ships were already on intercept courses.

The first drone sped up and smashed into one of the Shara Daim ships, a cruiser, the resulting explosion blowing pieces of it into the other ships. The Shara Daim ships died from the fire of the station and the platforms, the debris field in front of it damaged any ship that tried to pass, and the platforms around the planet finished them. Whoever was in command of that Legion hadn’t realized that his ships were drones and that he could use their hulls as weapons too, that they were expendable—or else the commander was willing to sacrifice his ships just for a chance to get to the planet.

But even through all that fire, six ships—two super battleships and four battleships—limped close enough to the planet and fired their missiles at the stations and platforms in orbit. Shuttles left their ships on the way to the planet.

Olympus Mons’s defenses activated. All around the mountain, turrets lifted out of the ground and started taking down missiles and shuttles. Nevertheless, out of hundreds of shuttles, one managed to pass through the fire and crash land on Olympus Mons, just as the last super battleship died in orbit. Adrian commed Aileen to take care of the intruders—if any had survived the crash—as he focused on the remaining two Legions that had just escaped his trap.

***

Aileen ran through the corridors of Olympus Mons as her armor closed around her. She had spent the battle in the command hub watching as Adrian commanded. Now they had Shara Daim troops on the ground and inside the complex. They had managed to crash their shuttle through the ‘front door,’ so to speak. Atlas had reported nine hostiles, and Aileen knew that if they had even half the strength of their former prisoner, they could make a lot of trouble. Behind her ran a ten-man team of Warpath warrior adepts dressed in combat armor and carrying plasma rifles.

“Atlas, where are they?” Aileen asked the Olympus Mons AI over the comms.

“Second level, they are just passing the elevators.”

Aileen nodded and took a turn left, entering the stairs that led down. “What about our people?” Aileen asked.

“Our people are following your advice and are engaging from afar, and retreating before the enemy can close the distance. Their weapons don’t appear to do any damage to their armor,” Atlas said as her HUD split and a small window appeared with a direct link from the cameras on level two.

The Shara Daim wore the same kind of armor as Anessa, which seemed resistant to the weapons that the adepts engaging them used. But thankfully Aileen carried weapons that she knew could get through their armor.

Aileen and her team arrived just as the Shara Daim closed on the nine soldiers. One of the Warpath adepts was lifted off the ground and a bolt of white hit him right in the chest, throwing him against a wall.

Aileen raised her weapon and opened fire across the room; a moment later, people behind her did the same. They caught the Shara Daim in the open, plasma bolts hitting them on their armor. The Shara Daim were obviously aware of the danger, as they tried to evade and fire from their forearm-mounted weapons.

Aileen felt a buildup of Sha from one of the Shara Daim, and immediately ordered everyone to focus fire on him, using her own Sha to disrupt whatever the enemy attempted. She grabbed his legs telekinetically and held him for barely a moment, but in that time more than fifteen plasma bolts hit his armor and burned through, killing him. Suddenly she felt three others build up the Sha, and she yelled for everyone to get clear. Her team jumped towards the adepts, where they were hiding behind a short wall.

The enemy kept firing at them, holding them pinned behind the wall. Aileen felt one of them try and grab one of her people from behind the wall with the Sha, and she peeked over and threw the strongest kinetic strike she could at them, disrupting whatever they were trying to do. It also dropped her to half of her reserves. She had nowhere near the level of skill and power that Adrian had, and was probably even inferior to her enemy.

From her HUD, she noticed that reinforcements were coming as she detected their imps, but it would take them at least two minutes. Olympus Mons was a large facility, and they had moved many people to Jupiter or to the fleets prior to them leaving for Ra’a’zani space.

Then she felt a wave of something through the Sha, and heard thumps from the positions of the Shara Daim. She stood up and looked over, seeing the Shara Daim writhing on the floor. Behind them stood ten Sowir, walking slowly towards them.

“You need to stun them; we can’t hold them for much longer,”
a voice said in her head, and Aileen immediately jumped over the wall and started giving out orders.

“Thank you,”
she sent to the Sowir. Her people moved towards the Shara Daim, beating them unconscious with their weapons and binding them. Aileen sent a request for the devices to drain their power. She sent an all-clear to Adrian and assembled a team to go and secure the crashed shuttle, and formed a few others to check the surroundings in case any other shuttles managed to drop down.

Chapter Eighteen

Olympus Mons

The two remaining Shara Daim forces punched through the wall of defense platforms. They were severely crippled; both of the Legions were down to perhaps half of their strength, with a combined number of 2389 ships. Most of their larger classes showed signs of damage, although few of the two Legions’ battleships and super battleships had actually been destroyed. But there were only a few ships of their smaller classes remaining. The Third Legion had been in the center of the attack, and had taken on the brunt of Sol’s defenses.

Adrian saw that Anessa’s ship was having trouble keeping its shields up, and there were a few scorch marks on its hull from the fire it took to shield the smaller ships. The force was speeding towards the hyperspace barrier in the opposite direction of Mars. Adrian sighed. He had sacrificed a lot of drones and new defense platforms to make a point, and now it was time for him to ram it through in such a way that even a Shara Daim could understand it.

Adrian disengaged the Watchtower interface and opened his eyes, seeing the holo in front of him showing the Shara Daim ships, and people working around him. He keyed his comms and opened a channel to a ship hiding behind Jupiter.

A hologram of Johanna Stern, Fleet Commander of the Second Fleet, appeared in front of him.

“It’s time,” Adrian said.

Johanna only nodded, and closed the comm. For several minutes, nothing happened, and then new signatures started appearing around the Shara Daim ships. Five of the Empire’s fleets exited their skims from their positions at the edges of the Sol system where they had been hiding behind planets or the Sun. Ten thousand warships kept pace with the running Shara Daim ships, outside the range of their energy weapons. No shield was raised, no weapon was powered; there were no threatening moves. Three fleets took positions around the Shara Daim’s sides, and the other two at the front and the back.

Adrian waited for a while, letting it sink in, and then he had his Communications Handler point a transmission at one of the Shara Daim ships.

***

Dai Sha Anessa of the First Legion watched the holo in disbelief as ships started appearing around her and Garaam’s Legions. She recognized some of the designs from what the Erasi had provided and what she had seen during her captivity, but the majority of their number were the same unmanned ships as those that had just dealt with Narrasak. And there were five ships that were larger than any that Anessa had ever seen. Her comms chimed and she answered immediately.

Garaam appeared, her eyes wide. “Anessa, we need to close the formation. We can get through if—”

“They don’t want to fight us,” Anessa interrupted through her teeth, barely keeping her voice level. She had realized what all this was about. Garaam stopped and looked at her as if she had lost her mind. Anessa glanced at the holo, then back to Garaam. “Their ships are outside the range of our energy weapons, and their shields are down.”

“It could be a trick,” Garaam said.

“Garaam, they could’ve brought these ships to the battle at any point; why did they do it now?” Anessa asked, seemingly uninterested in the answer.

“I don’t know,” she said slowly, then asked, “Anessa, what is this about?”

Anessa opened her mouth to answer when her Do Sun spoke. “Dai Sha! We have an incoming communication request from the enemy; it’s directed at Bloodbringer.”

Anessa turned to Garaam. “We are about to find out,” she answered Garaam’s question.

“Open the channel,” Anessa said. Garaam’s hologram moved to the side, and another appeared in front of Anessa. Adrian sat in a chair very similar to Anessa’s. To his left stood a Nel with his tail bent and moving up and down to his side—Gotu, she believed he was called—and to his right sat the two beasts that always followed him. She heard a few gasps from those around her; they were aware of the Humans, but none had known about the Nel. Anessa had told that only to her higher-ranking people and the two other Dai Sha. Adrian looked directly at her; he couldn’t see anything else on her ship, only what she allowed. Garaam could see and hear everything.

“Anessa,” he said with a slow dip of his head, his eyes never leaving hers.

“Adrian,” she said slowly, and then without consciously doing it, her head dipped as well. She could see Garaam’s shock at that small gesture of respect she had allowed her enemy, but Anessa didn’t react.

“Do you remember the last thing I told you, that night when I showed you Earth?” Adrian said in her tongue, ensuring that all who were listening would understand his words.

Anessa did remember.
I will change your mind,
he had said.
I will show you who we are, and I will prove it to you that your people are wrong in thinking they can just roll over us
. Her mind supplied the memory, and she narrowed her eyes at him.

Adrian smiled. “I see that you do. Did I succeed?” he asked in a whisper.

Anessa’s expression hardened. She wanted to tell him no, to tell him that she was still right, that they were weak. But she couldn’t. The Shara Daim had never lost a full Legion, not in the two thousand years they had been in space. Now he had done it, all to convince her that she was wrong.

“Yes,” Anessa said finally.

Adrian kept his eyes locked on hers for a minute without responding.

Anessa was the first to break the silence. “And what happens now?”

He tilted his head. “Now, I ask you to come to Mars to speak with me before you and your ships leave Sol.”

“And if I refuse?” Anessa asked. She wasn’t really enamored with the idea of becoming a prisoner again, but Adrian had kept his promise to her once before.

“Then I order my fleets to destroy you all,” Adiran said simply. Anessa felt the anger in the room around her; she knew that they could not understand this. Shara Daim did not surrender, and they did not negotiate with their enemies.

Anessa closed her eyes for a moment, then looked at him. “I accept,” she said, and closed the link. She was met with outrage and shock from her own people and Garaam, who had watched the entire thing.

“Anessa, we don’t surrender,” Garaam said harshly.

“What do you want to do? To fight? We could, and we would lose. They defeated us with only unmanned ships and defense platforms, Garaam. Narrasak is dead, just like his entire Legion,” Anessa said.

“That’s why we must fight them! They killed a Dai Sha!” Garaam yelled.

“We would die a pointless death, not doing anything to further the Shara Daim!” Anessa yelled in return. “Narasak’s death was his own fault, he lost his mind at the first show of something he couldn’t handle easily! He died a pointless death, without even killing one enemy.” At her words, Garaam snapped back in shock. That had gotten through to her. To die a pointless death was the worst fate a Shara Daim could suffer.

“We don’t surrender, Anessa,” she said again, now more controlled.

“Then it’s good that we are not surrendering,” Anessa said.

Garaam looked her strangely. “You have a plan?”

“Yes, to do exactly what he asked of me.”

“But—” Garaam started, but Anessa interrupted.

“He didn’t ask for us to surrender, he asked to speak with me before we leave the system. And I want you with me when we go to meet with him,” Anessa said.

Garaam narrowed her eyes and glared at her, but then Anessa saw her relax. “Very well. I will do as you say, Anessa,” she said, and closed the connection. Anessa knew that if it had been any Dai Sha other than Garaam, they might not have agreed to follow Anessa’s lead, just as she knew that if she hadn’t chosen to come with the Legions, all who had entered this system would’ve now been dead.