Solaris Fall: A Behemoth Ascending Novella Read online

  Everything was lost.

  Tactical Officer Coram was injured, though he could manage to talk. “Admiral,” he said coughing. “Energy screens offline. Weapons systems offline. Heavy damage in engineering and sectors five, seven, ten and fourteen. Sub-light and FTL drives offline. Life support at fifteen percent and rapidly decreasing,” he informed, his coughing getting worse and spiting blood.

  Evea turned her face toward him to see he just died with his eyes riveted on her. It was a grievous situation. All her friends in that ship were dead. The Blaze of Glory would be remembered, if anyone survived this war, as the Embracer of Death.

  Evea needed to do one more thing, send a message to her father, Consul Atlas. She pressed her comm icon in one of the displays that partially worked. “Here Admiral Evea of the Blaze of Glory. Mission failed. The destroyers Courageous, Valorous and Adventurer are destroyed. All our systems have failed. We are powerless in space,” she paused for a moment when tears began once again running down her cheeks. She could see all her memories crossing her mind at a tremendous speed. “Dad, I am sorry. I have failed you and our people. Tell mum I love her so much as I do love you…”

  Suddenly, an energy beam penetrated across the Command Center in a bright white light, moments later, the Blaze of Glory exploded, killing everyone on board.

  ◆◆◆

  “Enemy ships have been destroyed,” Second Commander Marduk informed as the last red threat icon disappeared from his tactical display.

  “Very well, continue our advance to the planet. Launch the fighters and bombers. Order them to destroy the defense satellites and platforms,” High Commander Enki said with a grin in his face.

  He was closer to reconquer the gold planet as he always referred about Terra. This time he would exterminate the Vegans and most of the native population. Only a few ten of thousand would survive the genocide he was about to commit for one reason, to extract as much gold as possible. He would make sure the surviving humans would die working in the mines and those who might survive will be moved into another slave off-world.

  Over one hundred defensive satellites begun firing the Thuban fleet. They were equipped with a dual energy cannon and sixteen defense platforms armed with Goliath cannons were placed in strategic positions around the blue-white globe.

  “Enemy satellites are opening fire,” Sensor Officer Okyd reported as small red icon appeared in the screen. “Fighters are engaging the satellites and bombers are targeting the platforms with tactical nuclear warheads.”

  “Prepare the ground troops shuttles, we are to begin the invasion,” High Commander Enki ordered.

  “As you command,” First Officer Ebagesh said, leaving the Command Center in a fast pace.

  CHAPTER SIX

  Several minutes passed in the situation room at the Atlantean Government Palace situated at the central concentric ring of Atlantis, and the movement inside was very chaotic. In a holographic display in the middle of the situation table station, progress of the current battle between the Atlantean and Thuban fleets was showing a catastrophic outcome; Atlanteans were in the losing end.

  “We lost three destroyers!” Sensor Operator Allumin informed, his gaze turning pale.

  Consul’s Atlas heart suddenly stopped. “What’s the status of the Blaze of Glory?”

  Valentis interrupted as it was better that he said the news. “The Blaze of Glory is powerless drifting in space, Consul,” Valentis suddenly looked at the communications display as he received a message. “Message incoming!”

  “Play it on the view screen,” ordered Atlas, hoping it was his daughter.

  Valentis pressed an icon and the image of the young Admiral appeared. Everyone was still watching the message of Admiral Evea, cover by bruisers and blood when a white light abruptly ended it.

  A sudden silence covered the whole place as the green icon of the Blaze of Glory, the Consul’s daughter ship, disappeared from the holographic viewscreen.

  Consul Atlas remained quiet for several minutes as everyone else. No one dare to say anything as the pain the Consul felt in that moment was the greatest ever imagined for a human being; losing a child. Tears ran wildly in the Consul’s face, then, he crumbled. It was too much at the same time. Losing his only daughter in that cruel manner, thousands fleet personnel dead and once again, at the brink of losing another homeworld.

  Tears stopped, and the Consul stood again with a serious gaze. “Make them pay,” said with revenge in his eyes.

  “They are here!” Sensor operator Allumin screamed. “They are engaged with our orbital defenses.”

  “Damn it,” said Commodore Valentis. “Send all fighters and bombers to the outer atmosphere and shoot the Goliath Cannons!”

  The Goliath Cannons was the ultimate defense weapon the Atlanteans had. They were an eighty meters high double energy cannon that shoot an energy beam capable of reach outer space to a maximum altitude of forty-thousand kilometers. They had twenty of them across the planet.

  “Air force in combat, cannons are shooting, Commodore,” said Allumin with a visible tension in his body. The first of the cannons shot the double white energy beam and in just a couple of seconds impacted in one enemy battleships at twenty-eight thousand kilometers, but it didn’t have the effect that was expected. “Cannons ineffective, sir.”

  Four hundred years ago when the battle for Terra occurred, the Draconian Thubans, or Anunnaki, didn’t possess any kind of energy screen, but Vegans did have one, giving them the ultimate strategic advantage in the battle. It was a decisive factor in the Vegan victory as they destroyed Thuban ships with impunity.

  “Impossible!” Consul Atlas shouted furiously, dissipating all hope for a victory.

  “They must have developed a powerful Draconian energy shield in all this time, just why they did not come back,” added Valentis with desperation. “The cannons are designed to destroy missiles inbound the surface of ships with shields weaker than ours. Again, a proof of your incompetence. Your greed with lead us to defeat!” he recriminated the greedy and fool Consul. Atlanteans became greedy over the time as people lost their vitality and dreams.

  “We are then doomed,” Atlas declared, bending his head in surrender. “Evacuate everyone. All military personnel, government and civilians to the shuttles,” he ordered.

  “But sir, there aren’t enough shuttles for everyone,” Valentis revealed, his face showing a growing concern.

  “I know, evacuate as many people as possible and leave. Now!” the Consul shouted in anger. “Deploy combat robots, let’s make them pay with blood!”

  ◆◆◆

  Captain Taloo was ascending with a squadron of fifteen fighters armed with energy cannons and two ten kiloton warheads to use in an extreme situation. These vessels weren’t the modern Wasp fighters that were deployed at Mars, as the production of them was just started a year back.

  The squadron was over twenty thousand kilometers high when they located the enemy ships, just lightly over eight thousand kilometers away.

  “We got visual contact with the enemy,” Taloo informed through his comm channel. “Five minutes for combat range. Squadron in combat formation.”

  No one replied from the Command and Control Center. Taloo was growing in concern. He resent the message, but nothing was coming back. It was like they just left the place. A third attempt to establish communication with Command and Control Center was done, with identical results.

  “What’s going on, Captain? Why no one answers down there?” Lieutenant Durro said. The Lieutenant was over five hundred meters away of Taloo’s fighter.

  “I don’t know, Lieutenant. Perhaps it’s a security measure, you know, black out all communications in attempt to avoid a nuke,” Taloo replied, not convinced of what he just said. He needed to remain calm, his squadron survival depended on that. “Let’s get those sons of a bitch.”

  “Yeah, let’s get those goddamn salamanders,” other pilots said animatedly through communications.

  �
��◆◆

  Minutes passed rapidly, and the fifteen fighters squadron entered in combat range.

  In space, thirty nuclear warheads, in the ten-kiloton range, fired against the Thuban battleships and battlecruisers. Two missiles each enemy vessel. Taloo’s squadron spared the escort cruisers for now, attempting to destroy the bigger vessels and perhaps the Goliath cannons could finish the work with the smaller ones.

  Railguns fired from the Thuban ships, intercepting almost every missile inbound. Only two missiles impacted in the enemy battleship, Dog of War. Brilliant flashes of nuclear fire erupted, making the battleship’s energy screen to glow and then, once the energy dissipated, the vessel was still unharmed.

  Taloo was in shock as he didn’t know the enemy possessed energy screens. He was always told in the flight academy when they studied the first battle against the Thubans, where Commodore Toldax participated in command of the Atlantean battleship Atlantis Pioneer, that Thubans were so inferior in technology that they didn’t develop energy screens. That wasn’t true. Thubans were scavengers always preying in lesser civilizations, most of them in an agricultural status without chance of resisting them, therefore, the need of energy screen was secondary. Draconians did have energy screens, in fact, their shields were among the most powerful ones in the galaxy, but only major clans used them as they were always at war against other humanoids and totally alien civilizations.

  After the nuclear attack, numerous semicircular vessels left the enemy battlecarrier and promptly, the firework show begun. Energy beams and lasers could be seen everywhere. The semicircular Thuban fighters did not possess an energy screen which it was an advantage for the Atlantean fighters that did have one, though, they were badly outnumbered by twenty to one.

  Taloo saw a red light blinking in his console that was indicating a locked target. He felt a chilled sensation crossing all his body as he saw in his viewscreen how many enemy fighters were leaving the battlecarrier. Without hesitation, he pressed the firing bottom and the flashing target locked in his holographic cockpit panel disappeared as two energy beams were shot from his wing’s cannons doing a short work of the enemy vessel that instantly became a fire ball.

  “Enemy vessel down!” Taloo said through his comm channel. “Next target locked,” he fired again the energy beam cannons and another vessel was down. “One more!” said excitedly.

  In a moment, everything changed. Battlecruisers opened fire their railguns and laser turrets and one by one, over half of the Atlantean fighters were shot down. Without the support of the destroyers, the Atlanteans had no real chance of victory. There was no hope, but it was the right thing to do, fighting for your people and your home, and Taloo would die as a hero.

  Taloo was doing evasive manoeuvres to skip the heavy attack from some enemy vessels and from one battlecruiser when Lieutenant Durro spoke. “I am surrounded by enemy fighters; my energy screen is down to thirty percent. I won’t stand another hit!”

  Taloo tried to respond when Lieutenant Durro’s green icon vanished from the viewscreen.

  Still concentrated in evading the enemy fire, he realized he was the only pilot left in combat. A sudden feeling of defeat crossed his heart. Taloo changed course in a daring manoeuvre accelerating his fighter and left for a moment the battle. Then, he sought for the nearest enemy vessel. He calculated fast the power of those energy shields. He made the capital decision, to ram a battlecruiser. Atlanteans old fighters couldn’t manoeuvre as the Wasp ones but they were very fast. If he could accelerate up to twenty-percent the speed of light, sixty-thousand meters a second, he could cut through the enemy screen. The fighter had the anti-inertia drive; hence, he would be alive at the moment of the impact. He thought one more time about his wife and son, he wished to see them again, then, he accelerated his fighter, diverting all energy to the drive. “Honor and Glory,” Taloo said out loud the motto of his squadron. Those were his last words.

  ◆◆◆

  Taloo’s fighter became almost a beam of light when, suddenly, it cut through the energy screen of the Draconian battlecruiser Scorpion, ramming the ships sub-light and FTL drives. A massive explosion shook the rear side of the Thuban formation. A huge nova-like explosion destroyed the battlecruiser, sending debris in all directions. Once the energy cleared, all what it was left was a glowing ball of gas and wreckage.

  ◆◆◆

  On board of the Thuban Executor, High Commander Enki watched in disbelief as the battlecruiser Scorpion vanished from the viewscreen. Suddenly, the ship shook violently as pieces of wreckage from the twelve-hundred meters long ship impacted the shields.

  “What was that!” Enki demanded from the metal ground of the Command Center. He was thrown to the floor, hitting his head in the violent and unexpected event.

  “An enemy fighter accelerated to twenty per cent the speed of light and rammed the Scorpion’s drives. Our energy shields are not designed to stop something at that speed!” Second Commander Marduk explained as he spat a few of his sharp and reptile fangs covered by dark purple blood.

  “Damn!” Enki shouted, frowning in wrath.

  If only a few more human pilots thought about ramming in that way, most of his fleet would be destroyed.

  “All enemy fighters are down, defense satellites are being eliminated by bombers during the battle and the ground-based cannons are being nuked in this moment, High Commander,” reported Marduk, still spiting blood.

  “Begin the invasion. We need to steal their technology, after that nuke all native settlements,” ordered High Commander Enki in anger.

  “We will become very powerful, one of the most powerful in the galaxy if we acquire some of their technology,” Marduk added, cheering up the High Commander.

  “Ground troops shuttles are on their way,” Second Officer Ynnie reported. “Twenty minutes for landing.”

  CHAPTER SEVEN

  Captain Masan was in his fighter, the Lady Killer, in the outer Martian atmosphere. He was the second in charge of the attack against the five Thuban warships, just behind Commodore Toldax. If was a surprise that the Commodore took a fighter and joined the fight against the lizards.

  They just received the bad news about Terra and the small fleet defending the planet. Now was clear they were the last Atlantean bastion to stop this cruel invasion. Over hundred old fighters were already engaging with the enemy fleet, causing heavy damaged to the enemy’s fighters and bombers and the light escort cruisers were suffering trying to track and shoot them down, though, a few well-placed nukes did impact the surface of the planet. It was the main mission of the fighters to intercept the inbound missiles targeting the planet. That wasn’t the case as someone had made a huge mistake. The Goliath cannons were unable to shoot all missiles down and the railgun batteries were unfinished, therefore, useless in this battle.

  The dome city of Agartha, capital city of Mars, was destroyed. Just the pyramid complex and the human face survived as they were made of huge stone blocks of over hundred tons each. Other small cities as Triton and Cepheus in the equatorial and south regions of the planet were also annihilated. Luckily, they didn’t target the Titan Project as it was deep beneath the surface. It could result catastrophic if the enemy knew about that place, luckily, no sign of that knowledge was shown. Some city survivors travelled in a deep underground transport system of maglevs. Over ten thousand survivors were now safe in the Titan Complex, over two thousand meters beneath the surface at Mariner Valley. It was chosen that area for the project as it was found the crust of the planet was thinner there than in other locations, making it perfect for the colossal megastructure to be built.

  Some civilian shuttles left the planet as it had happened at Terra, although, their destination was unknown. Perhaps few thousand would settle somewhere else. The most logical destination was Sirius A as the other ten warships of the Atlantean fleet were there. There was hope, but in Solaris System there was only death and misery.

  “Two minutes for combat range. All squadrons to target enem
y fighters and bombers, after that, everyone to target the battlecruiser drives in a synchronized attack. All nukes to target within the millisecond. That might work,” Commodore Toldax said through his comm.

  “Roger that, Wasp two,” Captain Masan replied.

  Act immediately, two hundred Wasp fighters replied at unison.

  “Good luck and good hunting,” Toldax added with a secure voice.

  He started accelerating as he was free of the Martian atmosphere. The battle between the old Dragon fighters and the Draconian Thubans was almost over and more news from Terra just came in; the planet fell silent, indicating it has fallen against enemy forces. Only the four-thousand meters spaceyard was standing in the Martian orbit. The enemy didn’t show interest in destroying the station yet, perhaps they had plans for it in the future. The station had an energy screen, but it was unarmed. That was a terrible mistake. That station could have the fire power of ten Atlantean battleships as the antimatter reactors used to power it were more than capable of supporting a lot of weapons systems. Yet again, Atlanteans weren’t a violent race and they became too complacent. That was something it had to change in the future if the Atlantean race was destined to survive.

  Two minutes passed, and the two-hundred Wasp fighters began their fire attack. Energy burst illuminated the space. It was a ferocious and intense battle. Enemy fighters were outnumbered as they never expected a second battalion of fighters, this time better equipped and advanced, had shown up and now they were shooting them down.