Battle for the Confederacy Pt.II
Bell, captain of the Beelzebub and chief tactical officer of the Hellworlder fleet stood with her ship’s darkened CIC and studied the holographic display before her. Her husband, Michael, had taken over the minutia of commanding a battle cruiser while she focused all her attention on the chaos before her.
The Hellworlders had a major problem, one that couldn’t be addressed right now but would soon need to be solved. The Hellworlders as an organization had no de facto leader. She served as the chief tactical officer of the fleet and often gave direction in battle, but in terms of leadership the mantel often fell to Lucile. Despite the fact that Lucile often had her own ship to command in battle, and couldn’t divert her attention to things like tactics and strategy. And to make things even more confusing, when it came to matters of policy Astarte’s voice held an almost presidential authority over things. Not to mention many often thought of her as the face of the organization, whether it was the Martian Prime Minister, Domnall, or even Kazlum, they all addressed her as if she were the sole leader of the Hellworlders.
Throw in Bell’s old subordinate Modius, who had substantial ties with the leadership of Torwen, and was unofficially still a member of their military, and you had a hot mess that complicated the chain of command.
They hadn’t needed to officialize the chain of command since all the Hellworlder ships were designed to operate separate from a greater chain of command. But now that they had begun to establish themselves as an organized fleet they would soon need to decide who was in charge. But those were all problems for another day, right now she needed to focus on the assembling enemy fleets.
Kazlum wasn’t the only one to betray the confederacy, it seemed that a number of powerful and minor pirate clans had sided with him and his bid for the throne. They were all pouring out of the station with their weapons charged and ready to destroy whoever opposed them. A majority had formed a shell around the Aunviry fleet that had trapped the Astaroth against the Kruhur fleet marked as K-B. The only thing that kept them from completely overwhelming Karega and the second fleet was their lack of organization and communication. In fact as things stood the more who joined the Aunviry fleet the less effective they became. But that wouldn’t last long, even now they were starting to organize themselves. She had to think of some way to handle that, or else they might lose the whole second fleet.
Their salvation came in the form of an order from the king, any ship who participated in the ongoing battle outside was promised a very large reward. And for every confirmed kill they would earn a reward based on the tonnage of the ship they brought down. With the promise of bountiful riches pirates did what they always did and rushed into the battle with reckless abandon in pursuit of money. Even as she internally scoffed at the greed of pirates as she ordered her computer and sensor techs to begin contacting the ‘friendly’ pirates and begin to weave them into the vast information web they had assembled.
They were hesitant at first until they began to see all the advantages the Hellworlder’s information offered them. Some even allowed Bell to command and direct them in battle. She did her best to arrange the makeshift and patchwork pirate ships into a proper formation that could relieve some of the pressure on the second fleet. Those who were too prideful to listen to her commands were at least smart enough to listen when she told them to stay out of their way.
Once again the field of battle shifted in their favor, and even as one of first fleet’s destroyers went up in flames she began to feel optimistic about the battle ahead of them. Until K-C and K-D broke off their bombardment and began to maneuver over to them.
She sighed as she watched the approaching mass of enemies and set down her teacup to better focus on the mayhem.
~~~*~~~
Well no one had ordered an air strike on them yet, which Alice was thankful for. On the other hand the swarms of armored Egh’ahds pouring out of the Igrathoth were slowly forcing them back. Three men from Loki squad had already experienced suit containment failure and died as their space suit depressurized, with another lost after being blasted off the hull of the Igrathoth and collided with one on the smaller Kruhur ships that were buzzing around.
Their position was being overrun and Alice was tempted to order a full retreat. Unfortunately it was vital that the Igrathoth and its massive gun batteries stay on this side of the capital where its guns couldn’t effectively aim at the Hellworlder fleet.
“Charity, how goes disabling the power!” she shouted into her comm.
“Working on it Ghost. Its going faster than we expected, not as much resistance as predicted” Charity, Brevot, reported.
“Yeah, that’s because they’re all up here. We’re about to be overrun”
“Fuck, we’ll pick up the pace then” Brevot said.
She knew that what he said was a lie, they were already going as fast as they could. He was just trying to reassure her.
~~~*~~~
Metallika took a drag from her cigarette, typically lighting up a smoke during a stealth mission would have been a big no-no. But seeing as the entire Great Hollow market was on fire, and everyone was too busy rioting and looting, Metallika couldn’t find it within herself to give a danm. And neither did Mute. For once she had taken off her scarf and head covering as she smoked her own cigarette next to Metallika.
Did you know this text is from a different site? Read the official version to support the creator.
Metallika leaned back against the nuke and used it as a backrest as she groaned “This is so fuckin boring. Everyone else gets to be involved in epic space battles and are probably killing Aunviry, and we get stuck with nuke duty”
Mute let out an ashy gray breath and looked over at Metallika “Please quit complaining. And be more careful with the nuke” her face said.
“Oh come on, you have to admit this sucks.”
“It does. But its our job. Would you trust Ed with a nuke”
“Fuck no”
“Then don’t complain” she berated silently.
Metallika sighed and was about to lift the cigarette back to her mouth when the distractive pops of Terran made rifles resounded throughout the Great Hollow. She sat up and pulled her binoculars up to her eyes and tossed the cigarette away. She watched as an armored company of Terrans forced their way out of Clancy’s and began to march for the exit doors. “Domnall is on the move” she reported, her earlier flippancy gone and replaced with cold professionalism.
She didn’t take her eyes off the scene of Humans effortlessly shoving aliens out of their way.
“I’ll signal Ed” a soft voice said beside her.
Metallika didn’t remark on the fact that Mute had spoken. Mute wasn’t actually incapable of speech; she just generally preferred silence. It had taken Metallika a while to learn to read her slight expressions which had eventually earned her a few terse words out of the silent girl. And just like Metallika, she dropped any personality quirks she had when the situation called for it.
“Ed, a rifle company is coming your way, tail them. We’ll prime the bomb, and warn the others” she said softly into the radio.
Static crackled on the other end “Roger”
Metallika listened halfheartedly as a hatch on the top of Clancy’s opened up and Domnall himself walked onto the roof. Metallika frowned “Prime the bomb, but be aware that Domnall is still in range of the detonation.”
“Why?”
“Fuck if I know, but let’s assume he hasn’t yet betrayed us and has something else planned.”
“Tricky bastard” Mute cursed.
Metallika grunted.
~~~*~~~
“Terrans are insane” Alwen thought as the Captain and Gato cleaned the red Aunviry blood off their blades.
Those two had the audacity to clean themselves off in the middle of a fire fight after taking down two 8-meter-tall monsters by jumping high into the sky and piercing their brains. Meanwhile Alwen was trying not to be in the way of the marines as they made mincemeat of the Egh’ahds. She had twice tried to line her sights on the golden crowned figure of Ah’ared, but each time a different Egh’ahd got in the way of her shot.
The Hellworlder marines were steadily advancing forward, and panic was beginning to set into the Egh’ahds. But their success might not last long as sparks were coming from the giant titanium doors as plasma cutters on the other side slowly cut their way through.
“Oi!” a voice shouted next to her.
Alwen turned to see Limey tossing here a grenade, she barely caught it with her gun in hand.
“Pull the pin, wait two Mississippi’s, and toss the pineapple!” he said jovially.
A marine next to Limey who was also carrying a grenade glared at him “That’s the American word for it ya danm limey” he growled.
“Naw, totally British. We used to toss pineapples whenever a trireme ran out of grape shot.” He retorted as he pulled the pin and tossed the grenade.
Alwen listened to the Terrans bicker around her as they debated whether grape shot was made with actual grapes, and whether or not triremes even carried grape shot and mentally reaffirmed her earlier thought that Terrans were fucking insane! “But here I am with them, I guess that makes me fucking insane as well” she thought as she pulled the pin and tossed the ‘pineapple’, and completely over shot because of the lower gravity.
“Give me another!” she roared to Limey as her grenade burst just behind the Egh’ahds.
Limey passed her another grenade as the plasma cutters finished cutting through the doors and a new horde of Egh’ahds swarmed in. She saw the golden crowned head of Ah’ared push through the oncoming horde trying to get out of the fire fight. She gritted her teeth, thought of Wraith and Sean, and tossed the grenade as hard as she could to reach all the way to Ah’ared. She watched the grenade as it flew across, and she felt her heart drop as it fell short of Ah’ared and into the densely packed Egh’ahds.
It burst and filled the air with sickly green blood and body parts, but failed to get the fleeing leader of the Egh’ahds. She growled and was about to rush forward when a hand clapped on her shoulder stopping her. Alwen turned and saw Astarte and Gato had climbed up and were now assembling a team to chase after Kazlum.
“Leave Ah’ared be” the captain said. “We’re going after the big boss. I have another team on the other side to deal with that slimy worm.”
Alwen straightened and nodded.
The captain grinned and turned to the other marines. “Wrath, Greed, and Freya on me, we’re killing Kazlum next” she ordered as she began to lead the charge.
Alwen dropped the empty clip from her pistol and drew a new clip out as she rushed next to Gato. Their team ran around the length of the bloody courtroom and began to scale the raised balconies until they had reached the massive doors that had been torn off their hinges. They rushed through the long hall, whose fine decorations had been smashed under massive feet. The whole way Alwen heard the sound of three titanic monsters roaring in glee as they tore through the defenders.
~~~*~~~
Aster felt her heart begin to pound and the blood rush into her ears as they rushed through the long hallway leading to King X’thar’s private palace buried deep within the station. They rushed up the grand entrance into the King’s palace and took point on either side. Aster peered around the corner to get a better view, Kazlum and his lackies had made short work of the couple hundred guards who had set up an ambush. Only a few upraised gun nests remained, but not for long.
“Wrath and Greed you each take one of the smaller ones, Freya you’re with me, we’re going to take on Kazlum. There’s plenty of cover in there, pick your positions well and kite them as best as you can. Watch for their feet, but most importantly watch for those tentacles, they can extend to three times their current length.”
She saw nods of assent from all squad leaders. She held up her fingers and counted down from three. When she reached zero they all burst into the room and divided into three groups, one for each monster.
Aster and Freya team barely had enough time to duck as a massive plasma cannon was torn out of its emplacement and was tossed at the door. None of them were hit by the improvised projectile, but it smashed into the door and promptly burst into flames. Blocking their way.
“So you have come to face me yourself Astarte, how foolish of you. If you had only agreed; you could have stood at my side while I built my empire. But now you have killed my other two sons, and must die for that insult” Kazlum said imperiously, actually doing the whole arrogant villain monologue.
“Should have figured those ugly fuckers were you’re crotch spawn, blegh, just the idea of you ugly monsters reproducing disgusts me”
Kazlum and what must have been his other two sons were staring only at Astarte, so she decided to banter with them to give her men the time they needed to get into position.
“You would dare call us monsters, compared to you we are gods. What are you to challenge a God”
Aster smiled wickedly “What’s a God when compared to a Devil from a Hellworld”
Kazlum roared and charged at her. Seeing as her gun had been useless before, she instead drew Tenken to bring down some divine punishment on the monstrous god.