B00BKLL1XI EBOK (44 page)

A gravity wave hit the Nation’s ships, distorting their appearance for just a moment. The Dark Gods just decelerated and caused a sudden disturbance in the fabric of space with the immense armada’s collective mass and energy. Moments later, close range probes saw the battle cruisers, gunships and fighters rushing towards Abydos at breakneck speed, followed by their asteroid bound temples.

“They’re here!” announced Sergio. “Let’s do this people, let’s do this! Ace, we go on your command.”

“Stand by for my mark,” confirmed Ace.

He cleared his screen of all individual video modules and affixed his eyes to the crosshairs which indicated that the Dark Gods were in IGF and planet killer range. They crept ever closer to that faint, red curve on the bridge’s screen. His claws started to dig into the hand of his seat as the targeting mechanism began to beep, about to lock on to enemy craft.

The targeting system switched to a steady drone.

“And so begins the end,” smirked Ace, flashing one of his fangs.

[ chapter _ 042 ]

Milliseconds after the Dark Gods entered the Nation’s range, a surge of IGFs exploded towards them. Ready for the cyborgs’ typical trick, the Dark Gods fired an impressive volley of countermeasures; bombs able to neutralize the IGFs’ blast waves. But to their surprise, none of the Nation’s bombs exploded as they reached the forward units of the alien armada. Instead, they scattered throughout the enemy fleet and allowed the Dark Gods’ missiles to pass through and accelerate towards the Nation’s ships.

Scattering between the confused alien craft, the IFGs detonated in unison, immediately striking at the core of the invaders’ forces. As the blinding light from the explosions faded, the Dark Gods saw the missiles they fired to counteract the IGFs slam into the front lines of the Nation’s defenses.

Gathering into clusters, the destroyers, fighters and planet killers effectively combined their formidable shields for just enough time to absorb the impact of the terrifying fusion bombs. The moment each squadron was out of danger, it rushed towards the Dark Gods’ fleet with guns blazing. Attacking with up to twenty squadrons at a time, the cyborgs smashed into the alien armada in powerful waves which cut wide swaths through the swarms of battle cruisers and gunships, then dissipated and cycled back to the main formation as another wave hit with the same ferocity. Fierce death beams from the booms of planet killers punched through concentrated pockets of gunships and fighters to assure that each wave of destroyers and supporting fighters and bombers did maximum damage. The liquid craft which assisted the main fleet performed their signature zigzag through the alien swarm, helping the destroyers make their lethal sweep.

In response, the Dark Gods concentrated the bulk of their ships around the floating temples and built elaborate, maze like matrices of expendable warships, countering the battering action of the bombers and destroyers venturing deep into their formations. Even as every wave of the Nation’s ships turned thousands of enemies into shrapnel or crippled heaps of scrap careening every which way, the matrices hid disparate clusters of bombers and destroyers from each other in their midst and tore them to shreds with a rain of laser fire and hail of high powered fusion missiles.

For their part, the destroyers and bombers replied with a vicious volley of missiles, particle fire and an occasional IGF or dark matter bomb. From time to time, from deep within the Dark Gods’ fleet, the blinding light of an IGF or the sudden cloud of torn gunships and battle cruisers made an appearance. As always, mortally wounded destroyers powered by AI chips careened into nearby enemy ships to detonate with the force of an IGF when their reactors reached critical mass. The shape shifting craft of the previous Sentries acted the same way; the crippled ships detonating their power cores as they morphed into shards and drove themselves deep into enemy ships.

While the Nation routinely lost robotic destroyers in battle, very willingly sacrificing them if they saw any advantage in doing so, this battle soon began to claim lives. Commanders trapped in matrices or hit by a stray round went down with their destroyers, only occasionally able to eject and transfer their bridge pods to a robotic destroyer or to escape back to the Nation’s main fleet. Names of the dead flashed on holographic displays which appeared to high ranking officers. Brief messages with the name of the deceased, their division and squadron flashed above the hand rest controls of their chairs with an alarm. In about three seconds, the notifications wound fade until the next time a life was lost.

In this melee, the Nation lost more soldiers in ten minutes than it did in the entire war. Notifications of death appeared with horrifying regularity above Ace’s, Nelson’s Sergio’s and Dot’s controls. They did their best to suppress their rising anxiety and sense of dread. On a battlefield, facing off with an enemy with enough power to hold its own against their most devastating attacks, there was no time to have an existential breakdown. The cyborgs pressed on, finally managing to split the invaders apart into relatively manageable groups, gently nudging them closer and closer to the dust cloud around Abydos.

At first, this was exactly where the Dark Gods wanted to go, but realizing that the Nation was actually pushing them towards the cloud, they knew something was very wrong. Chaotically, they tried to regroup, join the heavily defended core of the fleet and surge downwards as fast as possible. Fortunately for the cyborgs, they didn’t have enough time. As the combatants swept through the topmost layers of the dust cloud, the hidden IGFs surged towards the Dark Gods’ craft. Taken by surprise and with almost no time to react, the aliens took the brunt of the devastating volley at point blank range.

Vast pillars of dust were blasted out of the way by shockwaves, countless alien craft were vaporized and the Nation was finally able to carry out its familiar and brutally effective strategy of thinning out superior enemy forces with their weapons of mass destruction. Now, the space cities hiding beneath the dust joined the fray, blasting out a shower of missiles, terrifying energy pulses and high energy lasers. From missiles silos carved into the rock that made their platforms, a volley of interstellar IGF missiles shot forth, thinning out the Dark Gods’ fleet even further.

Finally, the defenders and the attackers were equal in number. It began to show as the aliens’ kill rate plunged and their craft began to desperately flock to their temples, now past the dust clouds and well on their way towards the planet’s surface. Detecting the Dark Gods, the circling clouds of dark matter bombs shot their hyper-dense bits of exotic particles which turned ship after ship inside out. Friendly destroyers and fighters not quick enough to get out of the way were torn to shreds by the high gravity of the dark matter or imploded as their black hole reactors were disturbed by the chaotic gravity waves, twisting and bending the craft until the nanobots in the hull could no longer keep their formation. A number of the shape shifting warships were pulled apart or distorted so much so, their propulsion shut off, leaving them to drift in the crossfire of the battlefield.

On the surface of Abydos, entire armies of rovers, OctoBots, Guardians and Siege Machines were amassing, waiting for the Dark Gods to dispatch their ground troops as they came closer and closer to the planet. In the skies above the Nation’s capital, streaks of light, frequently punctuated by bursts and flashes of explosions traveled at a breakneck pace, showing the full violence of the battle happening only several hundred miles above.

As the Dark Gods’ fleet began to dwindle and only the temples and their throngs of armed escorts remained, thousands of pods with ground troops shot towards the planet below to clear room for their masters’ anticipated landing. The destroyers and space cities reacted, shooting down countless pods and using planet killers to plow their way through the defenders of the alien temples.

Slowly but surely, the Nation cleared the way to attack the grand temples of the Dark Gods, the shape shifting craft holding any aliens rushing to their defense at bay. Combined bolts from planet killers, joined by the destroyers’ main cannons obliterated five of them in no time at all. Additional volleys from space cities and missile silos on the outskirts of the Nation’s capital mopped up as many escorts of the destroyed temples as possible, keeping them from strengthening the perimeters around the remaining structures.

Several squadrons darted between spires, evaluating each for its defenses, strategic importance and number of armed escorts. Among these ships was Ace’s destroyer, closely followed by Sergio’s. They were looking for a very particular target. They thought they saw it in the images taken by the spy probe and now, when they finally started to get the upper hand in the battle, it was of the outmost importance that they found it and brought it down.

Ace examined each of the temples as their veils of battle cruisers and gunships were lifted. Out of the dozen remaining spires, he saw what he was hoping he’d see. It was an imposing tower, reminiscent of a cancer cell, attached to its rocky platform by tendrils like the carcinoma it so resembled attached to surrounding tissues. Firing off powerful cannons to back up its horde of defenders, it was a menacing and imposing structure. With excitement, he notified the fleet.

“Anyone who can get close to that building, fire at its engines,” he commanded. “That’s the Tower of the Dark Ones. We have to get it down to the planet’s surface. Remember, do not shoot to kill. Do not shoot to kill. Disable and crash.”

Following his call, tens of thousands of the Nation’s warships screamed towards the twisted spire. Sensing imminent danger, the Dark Gods left their other temples to the mercy of the space cities and the remaining destroyers and planet killers to defend their leaders. Ace’s destroyer joined the front lines of the attack, deftly navigating his way through the incoming tsunami of enemy fire as the cyborgs and the aliens smashed into each other’s squadrons head on. On his screens, he saw that Sergio and Nelson joined him in making a path towards the Tower.

“Nelson, you’re jumping in too?” asked Ace, bringing up a video module with Nelson above his armrest controls.

“Hey, all the cool kids are doing it,” laughed Nelson.

“Be careful dammit. This is the Dark Ones’ ship. The defenses around this thing are going to be the strongest battle cruisers they have in their fleet.”

“Roger that,” nodded Nelson and his video module faded out of sight as his destroyer approached the churning ball of ships around the Tower.

With enough firepower and momentum on their side, Sergio and Nelson pierced the thick layer of battle cruisers. Ace followed with a much larger force in tow, providing cover fire for his friends. Three vortices of alien warships shot towards the Nation’s squadrons with their guns at full power, ripping through hundreds of destroyers, shape shifter craft and supporting fighters. Two planet killers accompanying the destroyers shattered under the onslaught. One more was sliced apart by the beam from the Tower.

“Oh God, they are absolutely pissed,” Ace thought aloud as his screen filled with laser and particle fire from incoming enemy ships.

An alarm rang out. He tapped a control on his armrest to open a video module with Nelson. In the outer edges of the frame, he could see the flashes of exploding destroyers and fighters, bolts from shape shifting craft and squads of gunships in Nelson’s panoramic screen. Looking out of his bridge, he could see that his friend’s squadron hit a dense pocket of enemy gunships.

“Ace, I hate to do this,” said Nelson as his destroyer rocked from a direct hit, “but could you give me a hand here?”

“Hold on,” acknowledged Ace, turning his squadron to get between Nelson and the Dark Gods.

Tearing his way through the tendrils of gunships, battle cruisers and alien fighters, Ace’s squadron jumped into the maelstrom which swirled around Nelson’s ship. But it seemed that he’d come too late. What was once a squadron thousands of destroyers strong was down to just under a hundred. As Ace’s destroyers intervened, gunships at the verge of tasting cyborg blood scattered.

Nelson’s destroyer was suddenly in the direct path of a cannon somewhere in the Tower of the Dark Ones. The space faring temple shot a devastating pulse directly at the cyborg’s command ship. Ace, seeing the pulse or raw energy instantly sent his destroyer between the Tower and Nelson. Screaming towards the incoming burst, the destroyer was just a second shy of intercepting it.

The volley brushed against Ace’s shields and tore right through Nelson’s hull. Ace turned to the video module above his armrest. It was blank as the pulse interrupted communication arrays. He turned back to his panoramic screen to see Nelson’s destroyer break up as if in slow motion, snapping in half and splintering across its hull while a brilliant light engulfed it whole.

A buzz indicating a casualty sounded and a notification of a dead commander appeared. It read: “Thomas Nelson, Sixth Expeditionary Fleet, Omega Squadron.” And just like that, a being who lived longer than most human empires existed was gone.

When the message flashed on Dot’s bridge, her squadron was in an intense fight to prevent pods with ground troops slamming into the Nation’s capital, picking off their defenders and launching bomb after bomb into the pod formations. She froze in mid command and recalled the notification after it faded to make sure she really saw it. Ordering her squadron to keep fighting, she climbed into a higher orbit towards the Tower and its defenders, hacking her way through with shape shifting craft surrounding her for protection. Tracking Ace’s destroyer, she called him via a video module.

Ace sat on the edge of his chair, looking at the scrap that only a minute ago was his closest friend’s ship. Frozen in shock and anger, his destroyer simply sat there, protected by what was left of his robot squadron. When Dot’s screen appeared, he didn’t react.