Chapter 425 (2/2)
”Geez, what a mess,” was the common analysis.
”Think they're here yet?” Commander Levi Klikakiti asked, nervously lighting another cigarette.
”Without a doubt. They're hiding. Run a scan high enough to blister paint, concentrate on those gas giants and the asteroid belts,” Admiral Smith ordered.
”Scans show enough drive trails that you could probably see them with the unaided eye,” a scan-tech noted.
”How recent?” Admiral Smith asked.
”Days, at the most,” the scan-tech said.
”Alert all Task Force elements. We're jumping to the preset rally points. Everyone stays cleared for action, shields up, weapons hot,” Admiral Smith ordered. ”Jump when ready.”
She listened as each task force made their jumps further in system.
She felt the odd thrum in her bone marrow of the FTL engines prepping a short hyperjump when the scanning tech turned around.
”WEAPONS FIRE!” they called out.
Admiral Smith opened her mouth to cancel the jump when everything stretched out into an eternal split second.
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Cu'udchu'ar stood on the deck of his command center, deep within the armored core of the great dreadnaught, watching the holotanks as his ship began to sink deeper into the gas giant. He, like most of the Great Herd Armada ships, had only been in the upper atmosphere.
The roar of HEAVY METAL IS HERE had warned his fleet, and now he was sinking down to where the gas would be too thick to allow the Terran scanners to discover his massive fleet waiting.
The pressure increased and part of him, the alien part of him that had been pressed into his brain by the helmet, began being alarmed by what he was seeing for the atmosphere.
Something about the hydrocarbon levels.
Phosphorous.
Carbon dioxide.
Hydrogen dioxide.
Dihydrogen oxide
Dihydrogen dioxide
Carbon monoxide
Sulphuric dioxide
One of the ships deeper in the gas giant's atmosphere suddenly quit broadcasting. For a second it had squealed a datastream full of massive damage, as if the armored hull had suddenly succumbed to the pressures of the gas giant.
Battlesteel hulls were rated for enough pressure that the ship should have been able to reach the edge of the gas-liquid boundary. The ship had been no deeper than halfway there when it suddenly stopped transmitting.
Another ship stopped. And another.
”MOST HIGH!” one of the commo technicians called out, pulling Cu'udchu'ar's attention to the holotank they were in front of.
It was showing the external camera feeds from one of the smaller vessels.
Out of the gas uncoiled a dozen thick long tentacles. Ribbed flesh, heavy suckers, thick barbs of chitin extending out of the middle of the suckers. The tentacles reached out, obviously grabbing the ships.
The tentacles flexed and the feed cut out.
”ALL SHIPS! GET OUT OF THE ATMOSPHERE!” Cu'udchu'ar yelled out. ”Activate point defense, battlescreens to full!”
The implanted part of him recognized those tentacles, recognized what was happened.
”ATREKNA AMBUSH!” he bellowed out.
The ships of the Great Herd Armada reversed course, heading for space, battlescreens coming up and point defense systems going to rapid fire.
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The ships of 29th Task Force streaked back into existence with the bellow of ”HEAVY METAL IS HERE” to bleed off some of the hyperspace energies.
”Talk to me!” Admiral Smith yelled at the scan-tech.
”Multiple Lanaktallan vessels are leaving the gas giants. We've got weapons fire in the asteroid belt and inside the gas giants,” he called out. ”Unsure of what they are engaging.”
”Signal from CSFNV Henry Green,” a commo tech called out.
”Put them through,” Admiral Smith said, turning to one of her datascreens in time to see the commander of the combat force appear on her screen.
”We've got dwellerspawn everywhere. Coming out of every gas giant, all through the asteroid belt,” he said. ”Big ones. The really big ones,” he said. The lights behind him were dim and red and the video had the crystal clear quality of a bridge under vacuum. ”They've been growing here for eons.”
Smith nodded. ”Scrap the plans, protect your ships. I'm working on it right now,” she said. She cut the signal, turning to the commo tech. ”All ships, go to divisional command. Get me the rest of my tactical section together.”
If I jump out, I lose the chance to cripple the Lanaktallan space force. If I don't, I risk going at it with Dwellerspawn, the big ones, she thought, staring at the tactical screen. We've got light minutes in between the fleet elements, it'll take me time to get the scans and recon probe data back, and in that time everything can go even further tits up.
”STATUS CHANGE!” another tactical officer called out. ”FIVE! TEN! FIFTY! MANY MANY MANY HELLJUMP PORTALS!”
”STATUS CHANGE!” a second called out. ”UNKNOWN SHIPS APPEARING ON SCANS! TWO HUNDRED AND COUNTING!”
Smith pushed back the urge to panic and brought up the data on her screens.
The ones helljumping in were PAWM. Big ones too. They were already shedding ancillary craft.
THERE IS ONLY ENOUGH FOR ONE! roared out as she gave them a once over. A mixture of Type I, Type II, and Type III.
The second set that was just appearing by the hundreds were the ones that Space Force had fought in the Hesstla System, the Type-IV PAWM. Additionally there were dozens of craft that looked more grown than built.
YOU BELONG TO US!
The back of her teeth suddenly tingled and burned with the taste of tinfoil. Her vision tunneled down for a second and a pain lanced through her head just behind her eyes.
”Temporal stabilizer emergency system just activated, Ma'am,” someone called out as Smith blinked rapidly, wishing she could rub her eyes.
”Order the fleet to go to max power on the temporal stabilizers,” she ordered.
”Temporal resonance stabilization field signatures from the PAWM fleet!” someone else called out.
”Ignore the Lankys unless they fire on us! Target the PAWM and the Dwellerspawn!” Admiral Smith ordered. ”Brigade Fire Plans or better! LET 'EM HAVE IT!”
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Cu'udchu'ar stared in shock as the Terran fleet went from locking up his ships with targeting systems to switching to the Atrekna and the PAWM.
The thousands of Helljumps had taken him by surprise, and before he could even come to grips with that, with thousands of Precursor capital and resource stripping vessels, more ships began to appear.
The ships looked as if they had been grown on a sea floor, created to imitate aquatic creature. Curled shells, long gauzy solar sails that looked like wings, all of them ejecting swarms of smaller craft. Mixed in were massive creatures, all of which were vomiting up smaller creatures.
The creatures inside the gas giants were starting to emerge, chasing the Lanaktallan fleets. Two of the smaller gas giant moons looked as if they had sprouted tens of thousands of tentacles as miles long graspers reached out toward the fleeing vessels.
”Shift targeting from the Terrans to the Precursors and the Atrekna!” Cu'udchu'ar ordered. ”Ignore the lemurs unless they attack us! Lesser Herds, run your warplans, get them updated!”
His head was starting to pound.
”Crank up the psychic shielding till we get bloody noses!” he roared out.
YOU BELONG TO US! roared out in his mind.
THERE IS ONLY ENOUGH FOR ONE! came the opposing scream.
ALL OF YOU EAT A DICK! Cu'udchu'ar heard the mad lemurs of Terra scream back.
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The system was a mess. Twisting and winding gravitational bands. No solid planetary bodies.
But the gas giants were important.
They contained the necessary chemicals and elements for life.
And for a hundred million years they had nurtured the life seeded in them.
Awoken by the arrival of the Lanaktallan Great Herd Armada entering the gas giants, the feral Dwellerspawn eagerly pursued what they viewed as a meal out of the gas giants. They felt the attempt by the Atrekna to seize control of their thought processes and, assisted by a hundred million years of evolution, rejected it.
The feral dwellerspawn looked at the Atrekna and the dwellerspawn accompanying them and licked their chops. The psychic energy glowed like a flare on a dark night to the feral dwellerspawn's senses.
The broke off chasing the cold metal ships of the Lanaktallan and charged toward their makers.
The universe, cold and malevolent, howled with laughter.