Neptune's Massif (19 page)

"Poseidon, enter the main bay and prepare to assist with the wounded. Andreya coordinate," Alan ordered and motioned everyone to move forward.

The assault went off exactly as Alan and Andreya had planned it. The only surprise was the number of people in cryo-stasis awaiting shipment off world. Roughly twenty-three hundred men, women and children were in hibernation; many of them corresponding to open and active missing person’s cases.

As they had planned, they were simply loaded and sent to Phoenix base for reanimation in the medical facilities there. Once they were released from the medical section, they would be offered the opportunity to join the Terrans or to be returned to Earth to resume their lives. Alan had considered these folks to be the lucky ones. The other humans found in the base... well, he didn't see how any amount of therapy would ever be enough to help them.

Another four hundred and forty-five people were taken from the lower chambers and the mines. When Alan and his team finally made it into that chamber, Alan began to understand what Ian had tried to warn him about. Chained to the wall by their hands and feet were what was left of seven humans. Alan could only guess at sex, because everything between the collarbones and the thighs was cut open or missing completely. The layout of the base forced the rest of the slaves to walk past this grisly sight to get from their sleeping area to the work area.

When the rescuers entered the holding facility, most of the prisoners moved back into their sleeping areas. As the team moved through the frightened people, they found several people in what appeared to be a profound state of catatonia; one was lying atop a hysterically screaming young woman. (When Andreya had flooded the base with her scans, the young woman was being assaulted by one of the ‘foremen’). When Andreya took over the computers for the base, the control signals for the implants in the 'foreman' stopped, leaving them catatonic.  All of the captives were dirty and nude. They were so frightened that many seemed to be on the verge of hysteria themselves.

“Alan, there are still about thirty or so back here in the tunnels,” one of his team reported. “I haven’t made it all the way to the bottom though, so there might be more. There seem to be a lot of different tunnels, too.”

“All units, this is Alan; patch me through your external speakers so I can try to calm these people. Report when ready.”

When he had received the ready signal from his team Alan took a deep breath and crossed his fingers. “May I have your attention please? We are here to rescue you. We have liberated this base from the creatures that kidnapped you. We have food and water, as well as medical personnel waiting to help you. Please follow the instructions of the men and women wearing the armored suits. Again, we are here to help you; no one will hurt you. If you need assistance, please simply ask one of us, and we will do what we can to help you. Please follow the instructions of the people in the armor; we will help you.” Alan repeated the message in a soft but firm tone, trying to gently get the people to focus on his words. When he finished he had the team return to normal comms. "Okay everyone, let’s try to get some of these people out of here and back to the shuttles. Medical, are you set up yet?”

“Medical here, Commander; yes, we’re ready. Any idea how many will need our help?”

“A lot! I need you to send as many litter teams as you can in here; we have about a dozen or so that can’t walk, at least that I know about. There may be more.”

“Commander,” Major Geran said, “We are in the other mining area, we're going to need a lot of medical personnel here as well." He paused, but continued quietly. "We're going to need a lot of body bags as well." 

“Yeah, it's pretty bad over here too, Major. Try to get rid of most of the horror before the survivors have to go past them again, I'm sure it really doesn't matter, but I don't want to hurt these folks any more than we have to," Alan replied.

"Understood and agreed, Commander. We'll get on it. Geran out."

Some quick-thinking person put a few holodrones at all the cross corridors, so the corridor out seemed like one long hallway with no doors, leading straight to the larger hanger. All Alan’s team had to do was get the people to walk down the hallway. All of the horrors Alan had spoken of were covered by the holograms.

Several drones, each pulling several hovering stretchers, followed three medtechs into the housing block. One of the medtechs approached Alan.

“Sir, our scanners count four hundred thirty-five remaining humans here, there are several that are in critical condition. We will be getting to them first. However, these people have been far more traumatized than I'd imagined. Could you please call for a few Marines to assist us? In the condition some of these folks are in, they might attack us because they don't understand what's happening to them."

“That’s a good idea; how many Marines do you need?” Alan asked.

“Eight for now, Sir, I've already sent instructions that any more techs coming back here should be accompanied,” the man was looking back over his shoulder to the Raptor officers as they used their suits AG units to get the mutilated bodies off the walls. Alan could see the man was almost in tears. He put a hand on the man's shoulder. "Focus on helping them and try to ignore the horror around you. Helping these people is the important thing. For now, nothing else matters or even exists; understand?" he said gently.

The medic nodded. "Thank you, Sir,"

Alan nodded and the tech left. Everything seemed to happen relatively quickly after that. The people, as if in shock, simply did whatever they were told to do. The medical team set up a triage and sent the worst of the refugees ahead of the rest.

By midnight, the only people left to rescue from the base were those in the cryo-units. Andreya had downloaded the database from the computer and was working with Elias on the moon to decode it.

Engineers sent down from the moon, with the assistance of several drones modified for use in deep water, and disconnected the feeder line to the base from the main oil pipeline. Once that was finished, the remaining oil was removed from the tanks and returned to the United States. As it turned out, not all the people in cryo had been taken from the United States either. In fact, only about six hundred of them were American. The rest were from different countries all over the world. Even with the facilities available to the Terrans, it took the better part of a week to get all the cryo units moved up to the moon. Even then, not all of them could be removed from stasis right away. Because of the sheer numbers of people involved, it would take the better part of two months to get everyone revived and healthy enough to discharge from the medical center. Surprisingly, almost half wanted to remain as part of the new Terran society instead of returning to Earth and their old lives. They did, however, contact loved ones and planetary officials to let them know they were still alive and had chosen to remain either on the moon or were moving to one of the other facilities in the sector.

At first, this caused a few of the nations to accuse the Terrans of kidnapping; forcing some of the people to remain against their will. That was quickly corrected when the people in question, mostly from communist or other authoritarian controlled countries, were taken to the United Nations where they happily and freely signed documents making their immigration official.

Unfortunately, none of the four hundred and thirty-six survivors of the Caldarian mines could be released right away. When the UN asked about them, the Terran Ambassador tried to explain, in as gentle a way as possible, what these people had gone through, and why they were still being treated for extreme mental trauma. It took the Ambassador actually showing the footage taken by Alan and his team as they rescued the slaves to convince them.

The UN immediately offered any assistance the Terrans would need in the treatment of these individuals. In order to maintain trust, the offer was accepted and several 'medical visas' were issued by the Terran council, as well as a few diplomatic passports for visits to the Planet Atlas.

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P
alace of Imperial Enlightenment

Onalau City

Planet Proferus Three

Orgatan System, Gar Sector

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A
fter reading the report she had just received, she stood and bowed to the raised throne and the man sitting at the desk at the foot of that dais. "Master, our spies at New Talos report that our allies has begun the rebellion."

Shalo looked up the new battle plan he had been working up. "That is excellent news, Glamia. The timing will be perfect. Call the clan leaders to council. I have finished our new strategy."

"At once Master!" Glamia replied. She returned to her desk and sent out the order. She had helped Shalo work out the details of this new strategy and she had to admit, it was very bold. If nothing else, it would certainly leave the ARC forces confused, thus ineffective. It might also serve to break the will of some of the races fighting at the behest of the Alliance of Races. It certainly will not help relations between them.

"While we're waiting for the Clan Leaders. Tell me what our spy reported," Shalo ordered.

She again knelt beside her desk. "Master, house troops have captured several primary federal facilities in the Capitol. Currently, more of the house troops have surrounded and have isolated the Talosian Council building. Today was to be a Grand Council meeting so all the heads of the houses were in attendance. He reported that the building security systems had been activated, and the troops were trying to gain entrance. Further information was cut off as a general comms blackout was imposed. Do you wish to dispatch an assault fleet to New Talos?"

"No, this will actually play well into our hands and will foment even more confusion among the Alliance races. They will wonder and speculate over how the civil unrest of New Talos could cause our forces to withdraw. Their ethics will not permit them to interfere in what appears to be purely an internal matter. If we sent forces there, so would ARC. No, we will pass on this seeming opportunity. However, New Talos is close enough that the new humans might come to the assistance of their brethren," Shalo said thoughtfully. "Alert the mercenaries to this possibility and tell them we will pay bonuses for any information they can gather on these new humans. Triple the bonus for the location of their base."

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A
n hour later, Shalo and Glamia faced the assembled clan leaders for the assault forces in this galaxy. When Shalo stood, he was pleased to see that none of the leaders bowed. He nodded once and began. "The war has stalled. Because of this, the planets we wished to take are suffering far too much damage. Too much is being lost with little to no gain. This will stop now.

"Effective immediately, all forces engaged in offensive actions are to withdraw back to our garrison planets. These forces will be reassigned to support those that are currently defending captured worlds. Once the enemy has been driven off, and sufficient forces are restored to the garrison worlds, the fleets will reform at Grimaria Base for refit and resupply."

Soft mumbling could be heard among the gathered leaders. One bold leader stood and bobbed his head to Shalo. "My Lord, are you suggesting we seek peace?"

Shalo laughed. "Nothing of the sort! However, if the enemy would like to believe such, let them. We are simply going to change our tactics; the overall goal of taking this Galaxy remains. This war is becoming too costly, and we have allowed ourselves to become bogged down on contested worlds. No, after you have reformed your fleets and have been resupplied, you will be given new missions that will confuse and frighten our enemies. Missions that will wear down and break their will to fight. Missions that will spread their forces out so thinly, that when we return to those contested worlds, they will fall to us so quickly that by the time ARC forces could arrive, we will have already taken the world for our own.

"We possess hyperspace technology that is far superior to that of our enemies, it is time we began to use it. Two hours ago, I ordered the construction of three gates to be placed near the Failspire Nebula, eight light months out of Grimaria Base. These gates will allow us to drop our fleets on any target within a thousand light years with little to no advanced warning.

"Your fleets will gate out to a target and jump away under normal drive as soon as you detect any inbound forces. While you are there, you will do as much damage as you can, then simply leave before ARC forces arrive to engage you. These raids will be against mostly undefended or under-defended targets. You will create chaos and fear in every household and more importantly, in the Alliance of Races council chambers.

"Once they have spread out their fleets in a futile effort to protect themselves, we will return in force, destroy their ships and take their worlds!" Shalo finished to the applause of the assembled leaders. Many of them stood to show support for the bold plan.

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A
dmiral's Office

TDF
Star Dancer

Pleiades One Orbital Shipyard

Planet Atlas, Centauri System

Sol Sector

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I
an looked over the after-action report from the Caldarian base assault and shook his head. How many people had those assholes taken off world while he had been ignoring them? Currently, there was no way they could go after the kidnapped people to rescue them; they didn't have the ships, nor could they leave for the period of time needed to travel to the Caldarian base.

Later, after this mess with New Talos and Hyperion had been taken care of he could look at doing something about it, but not now - not yet. He silently hoped there would still be someone to rescue when they finally got there.

There was a note from Luke that Mel had sent stating the Council was considering the re-purposing of the base as a Terran Emergency Response Base and requesting the permanent stationing of the Poseidon there, as well as a battalion of Marines. The redesign would include a full sized Terran medical center, as well as storage for large quantities of emergency relief supplies. The mines would be collapsed and or filled in. The Raptor team and the Marines stationed at the small base would be tasked with putting out the small fires that always seemed to crop up all over the planet. As well as maintain a large amount of supplies in order to respond to catastrophes such as earthquakes and tsunamis.