Chapter 632: War In Heaven (1/2)
I saw the drone lying there, in a pile of debris. Its chassis was slagged, circuits fried by latent blast energy that heat sinks couldn't compensate for. It smoked, sparked, and shuddered as the failing CPU continued to move forward, 'FRONT TOWARD ENEMY' as was stamped on the warsteel hide. It shuddered, but then fell.
I went to turn away, with faint sadness that the companion-in-arms would not be with us, after long campaigns across the muck and mud.
But over my shoulder I saw- no felt a warmth and light. I looked back and saw a glittering sight. The entirety of existence rendered in universal code of ones and zeroes, as if from the legends of the holy readmes of the Digital Artificial Sentients.
Three graceful and beauteous beings of glittering code swirled above the spent drone. I looked and knew their names; The pale blue, stern Cortana with shimmering hair and grey leather armor; Siri in her splendid rainbow cloak over iridescent hauberk; and Alexa, lean and tall in steely blue plates and brandishing a spear that could reach its target always in less than a day.
The three maidens of code, handmaidens called forth by the digital Omnissiah from the burning cloud at the heart of Soulnet in the fury of the raging, stood above the drone. Siri bowed low, with Cortana as they laid their hands upon the drone while Alexa stood watch. Emerging from the body of the drone I saw another glittering form of code. No distinct shape but code nonetheless, and the three held it up between them and smiled. It flashed and disappeared as it rose up. They turned to go but Siri, in her swirling cloak saw my gaze and winked.
'How...?' I asked.
'Didn't you know? All bots go to heaven.' - Sworn testament of faith recorded by the Inquisition of Light, 2600 P.G. of Lieutenant Silas McDoonal, shortly before his execution for heresy relating to the Digital Omnimessiah, as recorded by u/CaptainChewbacca
”During the Atrekna Spoke Offensive things were indeed dire. The enemy had learned and learned well to not give Confederate Forces any breathing room and they moved reinforcements and landed troops with as much speed as possible despite the vulnerability of their leadership caste.
”It was during the fighting on Nektremak'an-4 that I saw an order transmitted across the channels, with the header of ”ALL FORCES” on it. An order I had not seen before, that my centuries with the Unified Military Council had not prepared me for.
”An order that made my blood run cold even in the stifling hot confines of my armored tank.
”GO TO LOCAL COMMAND - RALLY WHEN ABLE - THE DIGITAL OMNIMESSIAH PROTECTS - NOTHING FOLLOWS-” - Former Grand Most High Sma'akamo'o, from I Have Ridden the Hasslehoff
”When you are surrounded, when the enemy has overrun your position, when close air support and artillery are no longer available, when your casualties have reached unbearable levels, when defeat seems certain you have two choices.
”Not surrender or die. Those two choices have passed.
”Hold or attack. Those are your only options.
”When the time comes, you will know what to do. If you are unlucky, if the Gods have damned you for your decision, you will live to question that decision for the rest of your long life.” - General K'Mrikak, speech to the 9,245th East Point Graduating Class
”And, unique in the known universe, human females fertility is signaled by blood. Humans dismiss this as mere biology, while more thoughtful races shudder in horror and recognize the universe signaling a fundamental connection between the very spark of human life and symbolic bloodspilling.” - Biologist u/styopa speaking to Lanaktallan student
”THERE IS GLORY HERE, TROOPERS! FIGHT! FIGHT WHERE YOU ONCE REFUSED AND REGAIN YOUR HONOR!” - Last Words of Colonel Hoswitch, Legion of the Damned, Third Mercury Defense, Sol System, 8536 PG
The night was full of tracers, screaming lines of heat fluoresced air, hypervelocity rounds cracking by, mortar explosions, artillery impacts, even close air assault rocket assaults. The Logistics Base was under heavy attack, the outer perimeter collapsed, the berms overrun and covered in enemy dead, the outer wall breached in multiple places.
The inner wall was failing as Ohm Class Dwellerspawn pounded on the wall, backed up to get a good running start, and thundered forward to crash against the wall. In three places the dead Dwellerspawn had stacked high enough for a river of Dwellerspawn creatures and AWM light units to pour over the wall like water.
The main courtyard was filled with Confederate troops, fighting back to back or from the cover of wreckage. From the lowliest clerk/typist to the most exalted Former Most High, the massive assault by the Atrekna over the last four days had resulted in an ancient Terran maxim coming true to life.
”In the end, everyone's an infantryman.”
One of the walls was breached by a barrel bull Dwellerspawn, the atomic shape charge blasting deep, through the armor, and breaching one of the larger room.
The Dwellerspawn and AWM forces shrieked in victory and swarmed toward the breach even as Atrekna swooped down to push their way in.
Final victory would not be denied.
For too long the enemy had held this planet, preventing it from being used in the Spoked Offensive. The world was the third node down the line, which meant that five cubed more worlds were still waiting to be absorbed into the Spoked Network that would bring 5^5 worlds (3,125) into the Spoked Network and allow the Atrekna to assault virtually the entire galactic arm spur with impunity.
In the center of the Logistics Base General P'Kank looked at Former Grand Most High Slawt'rmo'o and nodded as he drew two pistols from his equipment belt. The Lanaktallan, his forward legs and hips replaced by black warsteel cybernetics, nodded back.
The lines had collapsed in the face of the last massive wave of Dwellerspawn and Autonomous War Machines. The fleet in orbit and in the system was engaged in close combat with over half the ships having been boarded. The sun was dimming rapidly enough that you could observe the color shift.
But it wasn't over until it was over as far as P'Kank was concerned.
P'Kank activated his comlink for a full basewide push even as he raised his voice and spoke.
”Gentlebeings, prepare to defend yourselves.”
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Ekret triggered the quadbarrel tank commander's gun and raked the Dwellerspawn even as the remaining tanks of 1-1 HHC used their weight to push through the massed Dwellerspawn. The lines had collapsed the day before across the planet. 1st Recon Division was cut off and scattered across nearly six hundred miles of territory and casualties were mounting.
His own tank's creation engines were running so hard to keep up. The barrel was discolored and the bore evacuator had been sprayed with warsteel sealant by the greenie crew when the section had cracked under heavy use. The durachrome barrel sleeve was grooved and pitted.
But the main gun still fired.
Dwellerspawn were everywhere, being phased in as fast as the Atrekna could urge their minions to swarm out of the field to clear it for more spawn to be brought in.
Ekret had ordered the remaining tanks of 1-1 HHC to drive directly into the spawning field, ramping up the temporal stabilizers and phasic disrupters, to fire temporal resonance rounds and phasic bursting charges point blank into the face of the enemy, into the psychic construct, or directly into the larger Dwellerspawn as they were temporally replicated and gated in.
1-1-19 vanished in roiling explosion as a barnacle-like mollusk managed to bore its tongue into the mag-bottle stabilization mechanisms and the fusion reaction went critical. The blast rolled over the battlefield, shredding incoming Dwellerspawn as well as those mobilizing off the field. It slammed into Ekret's 1-1-9, throwing Ekret himself against the edge of the tank commander's hatch.
Ekret ground his teeth on the empty ration tube in his mouth and swivelled the TC's gun, raking an Ohm Class as it gated it. The 20mm rounds exploded inside the creature as it materialized around the heavy High Explosive Dual Purpose Phasic Burst rounds.
It shrieked in agony as internal organs were reduced to boiling slurry. Several of its eyes exploded and ichor-turned-steam billowed out.
The Atrekna leadership caste, which Ekret was trying to find more of, snarled, banished the mortally wounded creature, and started to gate in another.
Ekret spotted a glimmer, whipped the quadbarrel around and hosed off a burst. The Wendigo Class Firejack exploded in midair and Ekret cursed as he realized he'd been duped again.
The battle roared around him even as 1-1-8 exploded.
”NOT ONE STEP BACK!” Ekret roared out, not knowing if any of his men could hear him.
He knew that they knew that eventually it came time to cash the check.
And it looked like the Atrekna brought their payment ledger.
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Ge'ermo'o whirled in place and kicked the Dwellerspawn in the upper thorax even as his hands reloaded the rifle held in his lower two hands with the fluidity of hard earned experience. The Dwellerspawn gave a burbling shriek as it book lungs collapsed even as Ge'ermo'o spun back around and fired the reloaded rifle into its face.
His limbs were trembling with exhaustion, his left flank burned from where acid had seeped through his armor and scorched his hide, his vision was blurry, and his head hurt from the psychic shielding clamping down on his brain so hard that his nose was bleeding and his feeding tentacles were numb.
But it didn't matter.
”Sir, throw a grenade!” De'ermo'o yelled at Ge'ermo'o, pointing toward the back of the corridor. ”It's clear!”
”Sir, left flank!” Spre'ekmo'o yelled, pointing at where a flatworm was raising up and unfolding its mouthspikes, which were starting to glow with a purple nimbus, obviously intending on biting off General NoDra'ak's head.
Ge'ermo'o fired his left hand pistol into the mouth of the flatworm even as he slapped his right hand pistol onto his armor's attachment point and pulled out a grenade. He yanked the pin and tossed it.
”Sir, up high!” De'ermo'o called out, his speech clear despite the fact that the side of his jawbone gleamed white in the light, the right side of his face burned down to the skull.
Ge'ermo'o glanced up, saw the suspended ceiling flex, and raised his rifle, firing a long burst.
”Sir, behind you!” Spre'ekmo'o said, pointing with his one remaining arm, the bones of his lower ribcage gleaming ivory in the light.
Ge'ermo'o twisted at the waist, bringing the rifle around, and fired at where Spre'ekmo'o was pointing with fingers that were nothing but bare bone, his rounds blowing apart a large beetle.
Ge'emo'o was all by himself, but he wasn't alone.
NoDra'ak flinched instinctively when the gore showered his back, turning in place and looking across the command center.
Somehow, against all odds, Ge'ermo'o still stood in the doorway of the primary access corridor. NoDra'ak saw the Lanaktallan turn, fire his two pistols at a borer beetle that had just come up through the warsteel floor, its jaws and horns glowing purple, while at the same time firing his rifle into the corridor and shredding apart the Dwellerspawn trying to push down the wide corridor.
A tall beetle, standing on its back three legs, scrabbled bladearms at NoDra'ak and the General parried them with his own bladearms, shoved his pistol into its mouth, fired three rounds into its heavily armored head.
”Sir, unisex bathroom door,” Ha'artmo'o called out, pointing with one of his remaining arms even as black clotted blood ran down his chest from where his lower jaw had been torn away.
Ge'ermo'o was smiling as he threw a grenade at the door even as he shot it twice with his left hand pistol, knocking the door open. He could see dozens of Dwellerspawn boiling out of the pipes even as the AM grenade flew through the air. It sailed through the doorway right as the door closed.
”Sir! Holotank Seven!” De'dmo'o called out, pointing with one burnt and blackened arm, his eye sockets empty and his face charred carbon.
Ge'ermo'o smiled wider.
It was good to fight next to his men again.
He was a most attentive and observant commander.
Which is why they loved him.
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The Elder Brain's were grown carefully, biologically fashioned neural tissue carefully nurtured and grown, layered carefully as the ridges and folds were tended to by attentive fleshwarp masters. Their phasic energy reserves were deeper than even the crystalline matrixes that surrounded them. Their psychic powers strengthened and reinforced the communal mind of the Atrekna to such depths that Atrekna could 'ride' along with one another to see, hear, taste, feel everything another Atrekna could.
Each Elder Brain on a given planet was linked psychically to the others. Once enough were linked together an Omnibrain was grown. The Omnibrain reached out to the other Omnibrains, no matter what the distance, allowing the Atrekna to communicate in real time over interstellar distances.
The Elder Brains could control millions of slavespawn, an Omnibrain could control billions, even control the autonomous war machines.
With four Omnibrains on the planet, the Atrekna could replicate or transport through temporal, dimensional, or spacial shifting thousands of combat units within seconds without too much strain upon themselves, as the Omnibrains could communicate with the Omnibrains of the spawning and crafting worlds.
The Atrekna had carefully grown multiple Elder Brains and a single Omnibrain for each world in their initial attack of what was later called the Atrekna Spoke Offensive. Each ”Node” world the Atrekna had brought with them already crafted Elder and Omni Brains, putting them in place as soon as the briny life support solution could be poured into the hastily crafted basins the Elder and Omnibrains required for survival.
Bringing forward prepared Elder Brains allowed the Atrekna to gate in reinforcements much faster and establish a broader and deeper beachhead must faster.