Nowhere to Hide (30 page)

“Are you going to be able to stop them?”

Max slowly shook his head, “Probably not. However, we will make them pay a price for what they’re doing here.”

Max heard multiple explosions and saw Invader landers being blown out of the sky by Brad’s standard beams. “Max, I have Invader ground forces moving toward us from the west.”

The Commander heard the comment and looked to his left and saw the Invader vehicles moving up the long thoroughfare. He smiled and looked at his ten warriors, “Fan out and lay down a covering fire.” Max joined Lignen as they sprinted toward the vehicles rushing toward them. They started firing up the street and the Invaders fired a barrage of projectiles and beams at their location. Max was spun around off his feet and his shoulder felt like it had been hit by a bowling ball at high velocity. He looked at his armor and saw that it had not lost its integrity but knew his shoulder was going to hurt for weeks. He scrambled back up and rolled out from the corner of the building and fired the shoulder blaster from his good shoulder. He quickly rolled back as a massive barrage of beams arrived.

***

“Claire, Max has been shot down.”

“WHAT!”

“His ship was hit by ten beams and he was forced to crash land on a planet the Invaders are attacking.”

Claire hit her panel, “Sir, I request permission to assist Admiral Leland.”

Kregen looked at his panel and knew the attacks against the Invaders were going to be ended soon. He looked at the feed from the planet where Max had been shot down and decided it was time to do something to make a difference, “Admirals Fox and Newsome, take your ships and go see if you can stop an Invader invasion. I’ll be sending more ships as soon as they become available.” He looked at Claire, “Take your fleet and kick their butts.”

“Thank you, Sir!” Claire punched her panel, “Liz, get the coordinates out to the fleet and have them start jumping in now!”

***

Max leaned out and fired the heavy shoulder blaster up the wide street and blasted the first ten rows of close vehicles moving toward them. The Gralen Warriors had moved to the side streets and added their fire to the explosions taking place in the Invader’s ranks. Lignen pressed his communicator, “Move all our available warriors to my location. This is where the enemy is going to concentrate his forces.”

The streets around the theta became a huge killing ground. The Invaders saw the ship on the surface from space and were determined to capture it to learn what technology it possessed. Thousands of Gralen warriors rushed in to take their anger out on the enemy that attacked their home. The air was full of beams and projectiles as the Invader ground forces began to pile on and rush into the fire fight.

***

The Invasion Senior Father watched the fight from orbit and ordered landers from other cities to lift and join the fight to capture the enemy ship. The ten thousand Invader Battleships in orbit had gathered around the giant transports and were firing all their beams to prevent the small ships from breaking into their formations. He knew it was just a little bit longer before the defenders on the planet would be overwhelmed. Suddenly his ship was rocked by a violent blast and his ship was shoved into the force field of the ship next to his flagship. He jerked two eyestalks at the main display and saw thousands of small ships moving forward behind a massive missile barrage that had been launched by a fleet of large Green and Grey ships. That was his last view as his ship was hit by another neutron warhead and three missiles. It vanished in a huge blast.

None of the ships in orbit fired at the small ship on the ground. The last order of the Senior Father was to not damage it and anyone that violated the order would be executed. The battle over the planet took on an intensity that was best described as vicious. The numbers of small ships jumping in grew by the thousands and the Invader fleet was caught between fleeing for their lives and leaving the millions of troops on the planet or staying to defend them. When the giant transports started exploding like a string of giant firecrackers, the only possible decision left was to flee. No ships were available for the Invaders on the planet to flee; the Senior Grandfather had ordered all available ships to go to his location.

Less than three thousand Invader ships were able to jump away and avoid destruction. They had the misfortune to jump to the location of a fleet that was being attacked by Bang’s strike fleet and all three thousand were vaporized before they could organize and join their Family’s formations. The failure of the invasion went unreported.

***

Lignen listened to his communicator and ran over to Max’s position, “It appears the enemy ships in orbit are getting the broag kicked out of them by small ships.”

Max looked over with a furrowed brow, “Brad, what’s going on above the planet?”

“It appears your fiancé is not going to allow you to miss your wedding. Her fleet and the Freaks arrived and it appears the fight overhead is going our way at the moment.”

“See if you can get some air support in here.” There was a short delay and they heard, “The problem at the moment is that the attack ships don’t have a beam to use to attack the enemy on the surface and a boson missile would cause a nuclear explosion if it went off in the planet’s atmosphere. Claire has called for some Thetas but they haven’t arrived yet.”

Max shook his head, “We have got to resolve that issue.”

“This certainly adds weight to that proposition but for the moment, we can only do what we can.”

***

Claire screamed into her communicator, “WE MUST HAVE SOME THETAS NOW!!”

Marissa shook her head, “All the strike fleets are still tied down. We don’t have any available.”

Claire pounded her chair arm as hundreds of thousands of Invader troops rushed toward the city where Max was pinned down. There was nothing she could do with her missiles without causing a massive nuclear blast in the city where Max was fighting to survive. She put her head in her hands and knew he would die in a few more moments.

“Perhaps I can be of some assistance.”

Claire looked up and saw Admiral Drey Montgomery on her display. She looked at her tactical display and saw eight thousand Thetas from his personal bodyguard roaring into the planet’s atmosphere. “Thank God, You’re here!”

***

Max and Lignen couldn’t even lean out and fire a weapon at the oncoming Invader ground forces. The entire street ahead of them was one large beam that filled the street from side to side. Max looked to see if there was a route to retreat and saw all the streets leading to his location were filled with Invader beams. He shook his head and pressed his communicator, “Brad, don’t let them take you.”

***

Suddenly, a huge sonic boom rocked the buildings and a Theta roared in overhead firing a standard energy beam into the street ahead of them. That beam was used to kill starships and it blasted through the mass of oncoming Invaders, vaporizing the force fields around their armored vehicles and burning everything in its path. Five more sonic booms blasted through the buildings as more Thetas joined the first and blasted every Invader around the park where the Alliance ship had landed. Max looked at Lignen and smiled, “It appears you might have more time than I thought.”

Max’s communicator activated, “Admiral, you should be able to make an exit in a few minutes.”

“Thanks; what about the other cities on the planet?”

“Admiral Montgomery’s Thetas are spreading out and supporting the local defenders. I suspect they will be able to defeat those forces remaining on the ground.”

Lignen nodded, “We can handle them; the only thing that stopped us was being hit from space by their fleet in orbit.”

Max extended his hand and, after a moment, Lignen took it in his and the two different species shook them. Both of them knew the meaning of that gesture and Lignen said, “We thank you.”

“They might come back.”

Lignen looked up at the sky and said, “At least we have today. “

Max sighed and ran to his ship leaving the Commander to organize the attacks against the surviving Invader troops. “Brad, where are you in repairs?”

“The Higgs field is operational and the FTL drive will be completed as soon as we exit atmosphere. The jump drive is going to need a full maintenance facility to get it back online.”

“While you’re getting that done, I want some standard beams installed on the ships in my fleet.”

“Don’t worry about that; I’ll make sure it’s done. I’ve already contacted the facilities on El Dorado using your authority to get ready to make it happen.”

“How long before we can lift?”

“My scanners still show enemy missile launchers at the edge of the city; I prefer to wait until they aren’t an issue.”

Max leaned back and watched his sensor display showing the defenders systematically wiping out the Invader troops in the huge city. It was five minutes later that Claire appeared on his display in tears. “I thought I lost you.”

“But you didn’t. I’ve been given a reprieve and we have a wedding to attend.”

Claire forced a smile and said, “I’ll meet you after we clean up this mess on the planet. I love you, Max.”

The display went dark and Max smiled. Who knew how long either of them would survive this war; but for the moment, happiness needed to be taken when it was available.

T
he attacks finally ended and the Senior Grandfather recalled the High Council into session. The room was silent and the Grandfathers waited for the Senior to speak. He was furious at the slow response sending forces to defend his fleet but knew alienating the Council at this point was a good way to be removed from his position. He forced himself to relax and said, “What do we know about the enemy’s initial attack on the fleets organizing to invade?

The Senior Father assigned to the Council stood, “All four fleets were destroyed simultaneously.” There was a sudden breath taken by the Council and he continued, “The enemy has some kind of weapon that produces extreme blasts and radiation at levels we’re never witnessed. As soon as the blasts detonated, the enemy came in with millions of ships and destroyed any ship that survived the blast. There was nothing left of the four Families they attacked.”

A Councilor said, “No ships survived?”

“A few thousand managed to jump away from the three fleets but in the original fleet that attacked, every ship was destroyed. There were no survivors.”

The Senior knew the information but was still shocked by what happened. The subsequent attacks on the remaining four families were devastating. A half a billion ships had been destroyed and every surviving family suffered high losses. He looked around the large table at the empty seats and decided to let the survivors lead the direction they were to take. He just had to make sure they decided to attack that galaxy. “What do you think we should do now?”

The sole opposition Grandfather said, “We should have listened and avoided any further conflict with that galaxy.”

The Senior nodded and after a moment said, “And what do the rest of you think?”

His main supporter had been primed before the meeting and he said, “We still outnumber them.”

The Senior responded as planned, “But if we organize to attack, they’ll detonate one of those weapons again.”

His second supporter stood, “We just have to organize without giving our intentions away.”

The Opposition Grandfather sneered, “And just how do we make that happen?”

The Senior Military Father said, “We don’t leave the galaxies we’re in; we issue the targets to our ships and have them all jump there at the same moment.”

“Why would we do this?”

The Senior looked at the Opposition Grandfather and said, “I tend to agree with you; going after them again would be crazy.” The entire council was stunned by the statement. Then the Senior said something that changed their minds. “If you were in the enemy’s place and we scattered and ran from this sector, what would you do?”

His first supporter said, “I would take all my ships and go after each family one by one until every ship was destroyed.”

The Senior looked at the Grandfathers, “Do you really think they would do that?” Then he leaned back in his chair and waited. He knew what they would have to do given those circumstances. It took several hours but the four surviving leaders of the Families finally agreed that they had to remove the threat. The Senior Grandfather looked at the Senior Father, “Do you have the locations of the civilizations in that galaxy?”

“I do.”

“How long will it take for you to assign our remaining ships to those targets?”

“They will have to be categorized and broken down into individual coordinates for each ship. I estimate it will take about four months for that to be done.”

“I want it done in three. Get the targets out and keep your ships scattered until it is time to attack. If any of the enemy ships appear, jump away and avoid conflict. We will not offer them a big enough target to harm us until we arrive in their galaxy.” He looked around and after a moment said, “Are there any questions?”

“Do we continue to gather planets?”

“What do you think will happen if you gather ships at a planet to invade?”

The Grandfathers looked at each other and knew their stores would have to last until the large galaxy was invaded. The three Grandfathers from the other families stood and went to their Family’s flagships. They would not meet again until after the galaxy was conquered. The Senior Grandfather’s oldest son looked at him after they left, “May I assume our Family will not be sent to the most difficult targets?”

The Senior changed color, showing his humor, “You may.” The Senior looked at the Senior Father assigned to the council and he nodded. He had been promised a seat on the Council once the attack was completed.

***

Moe watched the feeds coming in from the probes in the four galaxies the Invaders currently occupied and saw their ships scattering. He watched them for an hour and said, “Hub, do you see what’s happening in the Invader galaxies?”

“I do.”