Chapter 151: (Telkan) (1/2)
Lieutenant General Malcolm would never tell anyone but General Takilikakik frightened him in ways that he had never been frightened before. Malcolm had fought on over a hundred worlds, have faced down strange creatures from beyond space and time, and had been scraped up with a putty knife more than once. He had served in the infantry and the artillery, had charged enemy lines and held the line against a charge.
But he had never served beneath someone like General Takilikakik.
Many combat officers that General Malcolm had met held the portly General in slight contempt. A Terran Marine without a Combat Action Badge, who had apparently never been in combat at all, anywhere, in over a century of service.
But any combat officer who had relied on General Takilikakik during a combat operation would shut any being's mouth who denigrated ”Tik-Tac”, usually with a fist, a bottle, or a nearby chair.
Now General Malcolm knew why.
The last week should have been a disaster. The creation engines and nano-forges should have been dead, overheated and scorched out. The mechanics should have been so exhausted they were making little mistakes. Morale should have been staggering as the line troops started to clash with the logistics troops.
Instead, the log bases and forward operations bases were humming along almost as if it was peacetime. The stocks were all at 80% and every unit had been able to rotate through at least twelve hours of downtime. The guns were reloaded, the walls repaired, and the vehicles were all almost ready to roll back out. The jungle had been pushed back, by fire and flame, from every base to over a mile outside. Spirits were high and Malcolm had actually heard the lower enlisted cracking jokes with one another in the mess hall.
As if less than four days ago there had not been a brutal fight to the death outside ever logbase and FOB in the system as the jungle had made a push to take out the Terran bases.
The Elven Queens were only hours from being deployed. The High Queen and her High Court were already on the Telkan moon, she was already moving from dreaming to wakefulness. The Royal Courts were landed already, nanite breeders were deployed across the world, and even the sea elves had been deployed.
In hours they'd be woken to full awareness. Not Born Whole, which would have been optimal, but Young Queens.
Malcolm was very aware that things could still go wrong and he just had this nagging feeling that kept whispering in the back of his mind to wake up General Takilikakik despite the fact the General had only been asleep for six hours.
”Sir,” one of the intelligence analysts said, coming forward.
”Yes,” Malcolm checked the patches on the analysts uniform. ”Captain Drader?”
”Imperium units are moving out. They took a member of First Telkan with them,” the female officer said. She shifted the view of the holotank to show dropships moving out across the continent.
”Any idea why?” Malcolm asked.
The Captain consulted her datalink then shook her head. ”Apparently they claim that their oracles determined that there will be attacks across multiple shelters and that shelter 371A4 will suffer a malfunction and surface.”
”When did they inform you of this?” Malcolm asked.
”A half hour ago. We're still trying to determine what they mean by seers and oracles,” the Captain said.
Malcolm brought up what he could on Imperium oracles and seers but there wasn't any data on the subject beyond some rather lurid, gory, graphic, and sexualized drawings by artists from around the time of the fall of the Imperium of Rage.
”What's the status of Shelter 371A4?” Malcolm asked.
Captain Drader checked her implant. ”It's green across the board. The aVI reports there's some seismic, but that's consistent with the entire planet right now. I had the aVI run diagnostics but there's nothing wrong.”
”No reason for the Imperium troops to mobilize?” Malcom asked.
Again, Captain Drader shook her head. ”No reason, but they're hard to understand. The language has drifted quite a bit and their dialect's a little difficult to understand.”
Malcolm thought for a long moment and tapped his datalink, bringing up the General's Aide.
”Wake General Takilikakik. Something's happening. The Imperium troops are on the move,” Malcolm said. He stared at the holotank, watching the icons for the Imperium dropships moving quickly.
”Imperium officers, I think they're officers, these old battle-codes are hard to decipher, are requesting artillery and air support to augment their own units,” the Captain said.
General Malcolm nodded. ”Authorize it.”
”There's no basis for what they're asking for. They're asking for heavy artillery and heavy close air support on areas they haven't even reached yet,” the Captain protested.
General Malcolm felt it, right then. That shivering, frozen, crystalline instant. He'd never felt it outside of combat before.
He looked over the status of all the units he had authority and oversight over.
He looked at the Imperium forces.
”Wake the General. Shift all zones up one threat level. Bring all units to active rapid ready,” he said, speaking slowly and carefully.
Something passed behind Captain Drader's eyes.
”You're right. It's too quiet,” the female Captain answered. ”The Imperium troops have been around since the Combine, any of them with poor instincts would be dead a long time ago.”
She turned away from the General, making a tossing motion with one hand. ”Go back over all the data from the last eight days, focus around the shelters, this time don't remove the geological seismic data. Get everyone on it.”
She paused a second.
”Wake up 108th MI.”
She glanced at the icon for the lead dropship, wondering what was going on.
The flight was a short one, landing only a few miles from where the shelter that Vuxten's wife had been in was located. The ship hovered off the ground, scorching the plant life away with the thrusters until nothing but ash and dirt remained. There was a tone, a steady beeping that was growing faster. A red light started blinking as the vegetation burned away. It turned yellow and flashed faster as the thrusters started burning into the ground. It went fast enough to go solid right before the beeping went to a steady tone.
Vuxten and the largest one stepped out at the same time.
Standard landing pose: knee into the dirt, fist into the dirt to flare off the kinetic energy, give the battlecomp a second as you come up, deploying the shoulder weapons, 471 linked in deploying his own weaponry. Step forward, straighten up, deploy the rifle (or the heavy autocannon he was now carrying), check your HUD.
The lessons had been ground into Vuxten till they were were just as natural as breathing.
The others thudded the ground, most of them just landing solid and walking forward, steady almost mechanical steps. Vuxten realized the on he had ridden on wasn't the only dropship as more and more of the heavily armored humans slammed to the ground.
A geological tremor shivered the clearing.
--unlocked-- 471 told him.
”They will arise here, Brother Vuxten, my seers and oracles have foreseen it,” the largest figure said.
”Does command know?” Vuxten asked, unsure of what to call the figure. All of the big humans only read as ”ERROR” on his datalink but he'd gotten used to that over the last two weeks.
”I informed them that I required your presence,” the large figure said. ”They acquiesced to my demand.”
”What do I call you?” Vuxten asked.
”He is Daxin the Unfeeling, Osiris of the Black Warsteel Flame, The Undying One, the Last of the Immortals,” the woman said, the torches over each shoulder bursting into flame. Black sooty smoke oozed from the barrel of her plasma ejector gun.
”Brother will do,” Daxin rumbled. ”You have faced the Dwellerspawn since they arrived. Driving them back with fire and steel. I know not why the half-dead oracles and the riven souled seers saw you here, standing with us as a brother, but here you shall be just as they forsaw your flight from the citadel walls during our arrival.”
”My broodcarriers and podlings are here. I will be nowhere else, brother,” Vuxten said. The formal, rigid method of speaking was catching and he didn't even realize he was doing it.
The big one just nodded, staring at the jungle around where the dropships had burned away the vegetation.
Another grinding sound that shook the ground, causing dust to raise up from the thruster-scorched ground.
--skyeye gap 2 min last 41 min-- 471 warned Vuxten.
”We've got a gap in the satellite coverage coming up,” Vuxten said. ”Two minutes from now, it'll last for 41 minutes.”
”GET READY, BROTHERS!” the large one roared out. The massive four legged black warsteel cyborg deployed guns from the back. Vuxten checked his 20mm magac cannon, making sure the ammunition hopper's creation engine was warming up.
Warbois moved into position in between others as the armored Terrans checked their weapons and got ready. To Vuxten it felt almost as if the jungle was waiting, as if it was gathering itself, clenching like a fist.
”You feel it, don't you, brother?” the female Terran with the slit throat burbled, turning to look at Vuxten.
”Yes, sister,” Vuxten said.
--sixty seconds-- 471 warned.
”Sixty seconds, brothers,” Vuxten called out.
”Incoming artillery in ninety seconds,” One of the heavy armored humans called out.
”Close air support on station,” another roared. There was a faint tremor again.
One of the huge robotic looking ones raised its arms to the sky and screamed in rage.
--thirty seconds--
”Thirty seconds!” Vuxten warned.
”Sixty seconds till artillery impace,” another called out.
Vuxten's armor notified him of incoming artillery, high parabolic arcs fired by 223 Field Artillery Regiment. Fuel air explosives coming in aimed around the grouped up troops.
”FIFTEEN SECONDS!” Vuxten yelled. Another mild quake shuddered across the clearing.
The large robotic looking ones readied their weapons.
Vuxten could feel the hatred of the jungle, feel it tensing and getting ready. It was almost pounding at him, waves of hatred that were getting stronger and stronger. Not like the dismissive empty disdain of the Overseers, not like the negligent anger of the Precursor machines, unlike the clean burning wrath and hate of the Imperium troops. The hatred he could feel from the jungle was greasy, cloying, almost gleeful in its hatred of him. Like it wanted to not only kill him but completely obliterate him.
That feeling was one of the reasons he hated the jungle and its creatures.
The countdown ended and a hush fell over the large clearing, even the hissing of the armor and power chassis becoming muted, the idling chainswords seeming to recede, the burning hiss of the flamers quieting.