The Round Table (Space Lore Book 3) (29 page)

Down in one of the tunnels, Morgan was leading a group of soldiers toward Mowbray’s forces while, in another, Hector led another squad in the same direction. In some tunnels, there were only forces from allied armies and not a single CasterLan soldier. Kaiser Doom’s forces advanced through one, as a group of Baron Von Wrth’s elite Venators made its way through another.

Traskk hissed a comment that it was in these tunnels where one of their supposed allies could betray them. They could disappear into the tunnels as if they were going in search of Vonnegan troopers, only to regroup down there and come back out the same opening, firing at Vere and the other CasterLan forces.

She could only smile and take one of his large clawed hands between both of her own. “We have to trust them. I know it didn’t turn out in our favor two years ago, but you can’t stop having faith in others.”

To this, he gave a low growl and went off in search of solid proof that someone must be trying to betray them.

Vere drew her attention to eye level so she could see how the ground forces were arrayed. It was the hologram with the least activity because the forces assembled there knew to stay in their bunkers unless they wanted to be easy targets for the opposing side’s snipers. In zone three, on the far left of the display, a small contingent of her soldiers were positioned alongside all of Gerchin the Suspicious’s forces and a large portion of Kaiser Doom’s ground troops, all of whom were situated in bunkers or at the opening of tunnels. Next to them, half of Baron Von Wrth’s soldiers were stationed with another small contingent of CasterLan troops. In the middle of her line, in zone two, was the main group of CasterLan soldiers, along with platoons from some of the smaller kingdoms that had answered the call of the round table.

A rapid series of beeps began coming across the comm board to her side.

“Urgent communication,” the ensign seated there told her.

But she already knew what the alert was going to say. Looking at the holographic battlefield, it was obvious why the communication was so important. Beside her, Pistol noticed the same thing. Even the android, programmed to show restraint and lack of emotion, let out a hum of concern. As he did, his eyes began to glow, running calculations of some sort.

“Urgent communication,” the ensign said again when Vere didn’t respond.

“I know,” she said.

The alert was from the main command center. The entire right side of the battlefield, all of zone one, the side that the Gur-Khan were supposed to be in charge of, was completely empty. There was no sign at all of the ten warriors in charge of defending that portion of the wall.

The Vonnegan army wouldn’t have to face Kaiser Doom’s ground forces or Baron Von Wrth’s or even her own because they could all stream toward zone one and get to the capital wall without any confrontation at all.

“That’s not good,” she mumbled.

As if on cue, the first rows of Vonnegan ground forces began making their way across the fields, causing emergency notifications of every type to begin sounding in the bunker around her.

76

“Go,” Mowbray said. “Win glory for your family. Win glory for your ruler.”

In front of him, a line of enormous armored hover mechs began moving forward, out of the forest. Every tree in their path snapped in half and crashed to the ground.

It was obvious that Vere’s forces would be working their way toward him via underground tunnels. It didn’t make sense for either army to take the losses that would be incurred by crossing miles of open fields and having hundreds of heavy cannons take open shots at them. His own forces were doing the same thing, working their way toward CamaLon’s main wall by digging tunnels under the fields. As they did, his Athens Destroyers had an array of sensors detecting weak spots in the allied formations and possible access points to breach the capital wall.

Just because the majority of his forces were working underground, however, didn’t mean that the surface was off limits. He rather liked the idea of sending a limited number of ground forces across the fields to keep Vere occupied and to make her generals second-guess their plans. His armored mechs would offer that distraction.

Hover mechs looked as different from one army to the next as the Thunderbolts did from the Llyushin fighters. Some looked like protective shells. Others resembled old-fashioned hover tanks. But they were all designed to do the same thing: move across all types of terrain, including deserts, bodies of water, and even comparatively rough or rocky patches. They did this by hovering above the surface they moved along, similar to the way Hector floated aboard his energy platform. The hover mechs were sometimes used to clear debris and mines. Other times, they were used to transport soldiers. Occasionally, they were armed with ion missiles and became offensive weapons.

All Vere and her friends would know was that dozens of such machines were now making their way toward her. This made Mowbray smile. Vere wouldn’t know if hundreds of Vonnegan troopers were aboard each one or if the machines were designed to get as close as possible to their target before self-destructing. That was the Vonnegan ruler’s point in using them: cause as much panic and chaos as possible.

The oblong cubes, plated with armor and mounted with heavy cannons on either side, cleared the forest edge and began moving across the field. Each one hovered two yards off the ground as it progressed slowly forward.

Hundreds of laser blasts immediately came roaring out across the battlefield. From atop the wall. From hidden bunkers. From everywhere. Almost all of the initial shots bounced off the Vonnegan mechs’ blast-proof plating. Most shots zipped away in random directions, up into space or down into the ground. But a few went flying back toward the very cannons that had fired them, and this made Mowbray chuckle.

The first line of mechs only made it one hundred yards before their armor plating wore away. They made it another hundred yards before the machines were so riddled with blaster holes that they were inoperable. When this happened, the hover platforms shut off and the mechs dropped to the ground, hitting with a thud and kicking dirt into the air. After that, the machines would never move again.

When the initial wave was wiped out, a second wave navigated around the remains of the first set and continued forward. The same thing happened again: thousands of CasterLan and Round Table blasts hit the mechs’ armor. Initially, most bounced off in various directions. A few took out unlucky CasterLan soldiers or cannons stationed atop the CamaLon wall. After advancing a quarter of a mile across the field, these mechs also became useless, and another wave of mechs was launched.

The armored machines, meant for nothing more than a diversion, were actually getting farther than Mowbray had anticipated. And they were attracting even more attention than he would have thought necessary. More than he would have given to such a transparent gambit.

When the first wave of Llyushin fighters came in and began firing at the armored mechs, Mowbray shrugged.

“Send out the Thunderbolts,” he said.

Behind him, a general in gray armor sent out the order. Moments later, dozens of Thunderbolts began to engage the CasterLan fighters, giving the mechs even more opportunity to make their way across the field. The Vonnegan ships served a second purpose as well. Any time a Thunderbolt pilot had the opportunity, he targeted the Crown and sent a few laser blasts toward it. Eventually, the Crown’s shields would be damaged and when that happened, the Athens Destroyers would have a much better chance if they had to engage the Round Table forces.

Mowbray couldn’t help but notice that one entire side of the opposing battlefield was empty of allied soldiers. His generals had immediately brought this to his attention, of course.

“It’s a trap,” he had told them.

But the more he watched, the more he realized that his mechs could cause even more damage and havoc if they angled their route toward the open zone of the CamaLon wall.

“Make it happen,” he said.

And as he watched, the mechs began to change direction slightly. No longer were they heading straight for the perimeter wall. Instead, they were heading toward the empty portion of battlefield, where not a single cannon was set up to stop them.

77

Morgan looked down once more at the display on her wrist. The miniature screen could only show a comparatively crude version of the three-dimensional holograms Vere and Mowbray were viewing from opposite sides of the battlefield. Instead of four levels of three-dimensional terrain, she only saw the tunnel she was in and the ones that could be detected within a mile of her. Instead of moving images of troops and machines, her display only had different colored flashing dots. Red for the enemy. White, yellow, and green to note different kinds of allies. The intensity of each color revealed its proximity to her.

Judging from the device and how long she had been following the trench machine in front of her, she guessed they only had a few minutes remaining before they got to Mowbray’s location.

A red blinking dot got closer and closer to her location, until her destination was almost directly above her.

She brought her fist over her head and waved it back and forth. The soldier behind her stopped and waited for the next command.

“Shut off the trench machine,” she yelled.

The soldier only shrugged.

With exaggerated movements of her mouth, she yelled, “Turn off the trench machine.”

This time, either because he could read her lips through the transparent portion of her breathing mask, or because he remembered to turn on the audio feed to his earpiece, he nodded.

She was about to say something else, something less supportive and much more threatening, when the trench machine’s loud motors began to wind down. It seemed to take forever, but eventually the thrumming of the machine got softer, its drills and compression cylinders slowing, then stopping completely.

Once it was off, she removed her ear protectors. None of them could remove their respiratory masks until they got out of the tunnels because of all the floating dust, but removing the ear protectors allowed her to get a sense of how close the enemy might be. Even with the motors off, it took a few moments for the ringing in her ears to subside.

“Hear something?” the soldier next to her asked.

She waved her palm in his direction, signaling him to be silent. There she stood, for what felt like an hour, listening. She thought something was there and her wrist display confirmed it, but she couldn’t see or hear it. It was big, and it meant to destroy her and her friends, but all she knew for certain was that there was a red blinking dot on her wrist.

Then she heard it. Or rather, felt it. A small, almost imperceptible rumbling. Her feet were numb from walking behind a machine that tore apart and compacted the ground in front of it. Just by standing there, she never would have been able to feel the tremors. It was only when she walked to the side of the underground tunnel and put her fingertips to the walls that she knew for sure.

A Vonnegan trench machine was almost on top of them.

But there was something else. The machines that carved tunnels through the ground offered a steady rumble and whir. They remained at roughly the same speed and generated the same force no matter where they went. In that regard, they were predictable. What she was feeling, though, only sporadically, were tremors in the ground like small earthquakes.

“Bombs?” the officer next to her asked, feeling the same thing.

“Explosions of some sort. And a lot of them.”

For her, it was the final indication that the battle had begun in earnest. Technically, it had started with the first sniper blast sailing miles across the field toward the other army, although some might say it hadn’t begun until the first starship fired its cannons. But this, for her at least, was the real start. Somewhere above ground, both sides were unleashing their full arsenal of ion cannons at anything they could find to target.

Even a significant distance underground, she could feel the tunnel shake because of all the violence above her. It might be that one or both sides had sent their armored transports across the battlefield. Or maybe the Llyushin fighters and Thunderbolt or both were bombing anything that moved. She could have radioed back to the command center to find out what was going on up there, but it didn’t matter. None of it concerned her because none of it related to her mission.

Looking back down at her wrist, the red dot was still there, but it had moved past their position, slightly closer to the capital wall. A Vonnegan trench machine had been there, it just hadn’t been the thing causing the ground to shake.

Pointing to the trench machine in front of her, she said, “Power it back up.” Then, after putting her earpieces back in, added, “Let’s go.”

Not even the idea of the Vonnegan trench machine being within dozens of yards from her position concerned her. She was well aware that the Vonnegan troops making their way underground behind that machine could change levels and break through into Morgan’s tunnel. If they did, they could double back and attack her and her soldiers from behind. Not even that possibility troubled her enough to stop moving forward.

The only thing that did concern her was getting to Mowbray and killing him.

78

What Morgan didn’t know was that the exact tactic she guessed the Vonnegan troops might try—changing levels and doubling back—was being carried out in a different portion of the battlefield. But not by the Vonnegans.

“You know what to do,” Hector told his soldiers. “You’ve trained for this. You’ve prepared for this.” He patted each of them on the shoulder. “Know that I will do whatever it takes to return all of you to your families when this is over.”

The soldiers nodded and gently tapped their trigger fingers against their staff blasters, knowing that Hector meant what he said. Without having to say anything else, all of Hector’s soldiers knew he would die to save any one of them. He would always put himself at the front of the line.