Birthright: Battle for the Confederation- Pursuit (3 page)

BOOK: Birthright: Battle for the Confederation- Pursuit
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"Where did you get a code key to
release those?" asked Captain Orjon of Mithus.

"Don't need one," the SAR
operative replied.  "I just thought it would be courteous to leave them on
until we were all good with each other."

Orjon hopped down off his tank deck and
walked up to Mithus, eyeing him up carefully.  "It appears we have a lot to
talk about."

"And not much time to do it
in."

 

 

Representative Ravine watched with
satisfaction as the last of the Confederation ships disappeared.  The
battleship Renown had barreled into the ground a continent away from the mining
town that was contested, creating a crater miles across and throwing up a
debris cloud that would obscure the sun there for weeks.

"And now we begin the second phase
of the operation," she said confidently to Captain Vol, who turned and
nodded to his ops officer.  The Priman female in turn started entering commands
into her console which ordered dozens of dropships to churn forth from the
hangars of his three escort carriers.  He hated that his people had needed to
adapt to a Confed tactic, but he also had to admit that the cruiser-turned-light-carrier
design was a very important niche vessel to have.  They had brought the
thousands of troops that were now in their dropships headed to the moon's
surface.

"Those mineral resources will be
ours within the hour," Captain Vol said confidently.

Ravine just nodded, for though she knew
he was being optimistic, she didn't think it was worth admonishing him over if
it meant putting a damper on the crew's spirits.  They were showing a swagger
that had been lacking lately, and she fully approved.

Only Ravine also knew that the second
phase was really only a part of the operational plan.  Of course they were in
orbit to appropriate the valuable resources that the Galactic Ore Corporation
had been kind enough to leave stockpiled here.  Those elements would be turned
into fuel cells, blaster packs and various types of explosives and catalysts. 
But the operation in general had been conceived as a way to eliminate more
Confederation forces.  They'd been lured to this moon to die, and she intended to
follow through.

 

 

Mithus was thinking fast, trying to
decide how much to tell Captain Orjon.  He'd been ordered to the installation
to take inventory of the ore the mining company had supposedly left behind.  On
orders from the Governing Committee, the moon was on a list of approved
targets, and once he'd verified the ore he'd called it in and was told to wait
until the friendly forces had recovered the ore and left before he would depart
as well.  Those plans were obviously long since obsolete.

He and the captain were walking the
perimeter of the city while inspecting the fortifications.  Overall, it was a
fairly defensible position.  A large open plain to the east of the city was the
best place to land.  The mountains to the west and north, with their mines
underneath, rose far up into the skies and created a natural barrier to easy
movement.  Dense forest to the south wound back behind the mountains, forcing
any attacking ground force to approach from the east, just like Captain Orjon's
Marines had. 

He also knew about the EMP weapon.  The
SAR operatives had received a briefing cobbled together from many sources whose
reports were more redacted information than text, and the end conclusion was
that the Priman EMP weaponry was a game-changer.  There was no available
counter other than the possibility that some equipment wouldn't be affected if
powered down.  They weren't even sure if the weapons needed some sort of
physical contact or if a proximity burst was all that was needed.  However,
this evidence was not properly validated, and so was considered unreliable.  He
could only guess as to why the nanites that inhabited his bloodstream were
still functional.  Maybe it was because they were designed to repair themselves
as well as him.   Maybe it was because they were more biological than
artificial, or there weren't enough circuits to corrupt anyway.  In any case,
it didn't help him all that much now.

"I saw the fleet's
transmissions," Mithus began.  "And they're right; we can fight, or
flee.  But the Primans are going to come down here and get what they want from
this place.  There's just no way we can stop them without top cover.  Do you
have any orders that cover this?"

"You mean in case all our warships
were destroyed and we were left down on the surface in a shooting
gallery?" began Orjon in an exasperated tone.  "No, I don't think
they wargamed that scenario out."  They walked on in silence for a handful
of steps.  "Alright," the captain continued, "sorry about that." 
He took a deep breath and continued.  "I assume they want something from
this mine, probably the same raw materials we were going to collect.  If not,
they would probably have just bombarded the surface until they'd created a nice
glass-bottomed parking lot.  You agree?"

Mithus nodded.

"So, I figure it's only right if we
not let them have those materials.  We could drop them back into the mine, blow
the entrance, is what I was thinking.  I wouldn't mind finding a way to not die
in the process, either, but first thing's first: we need to hump their
day."

"That, we can do."

 

 

The Priman ground commander, Azul, was
done organizing his troops.  His people hadn't fought any ground battles in the
last few centuries, but had simply adopted Confederation and Talaran doctrine
and copied their vehicles.  In reality, this operation was an aberration;
Primans fought in space, controlled the orbits above planets.  They didn't have
enough manpower to fully occupy and pacify every planet they'd taken, and had
found it just as effective to leave capital ships in orbit that would
obliterate anything on the surface that offended them.  Having to land his own
ground forces in order to capture these admittedly desirable raw materials was
not his first choice of fights.  Better to demand the Confeds on the surface do
it for him or risk destruction.  A civilian population would comply, but he'd
learned from hard experience that the men and women of the Confederation
military took a perverse joy in being difficult.

"Move up all elements," he said
into his comm unit.  Three swarms of Priman troops and vehicles surged away
from their transports and lumbered towards the mining town.

CHAPTER
TWO

 

 

 

 

"You're sure it will work?"
asked Orjon of Mithus with a skeptical glance.

"Sure.  Probably," Mithus
conceded.  "Look, we get enough debris in the air; even Priman sensors
will take a beating.  Your troops all have adaptive camouflage cloaks that will
help as well.  We occupy random buildings so they can't gauge our numbers,
falling more people back every time we give ground.  Then we take care of the
mines and head all the way back through the forest to the southwest and back
behind the mountain.  Yes, they have the advantage and sooner or later they'll
find us, but this gives us a chance.  At the very least it'll buy us enough
time to get those minerals destroyed."

Orjon had to admit it was the best of the
unpleasant options open to him.  Mithus wanted to conduct a running retreat
through the city, making the Primans fight their way through while the Confeds
used guerrilla tactics to slow them down.  Oh, and he also wanted to set the
city on fire.  He said that if they could generate a big enough firestorm and
smoke/ash cloud, it would drastically hamper the Primans' ability to track
them, which would give them time to accomplish their work at the mine and give
them a chance to sneak out of town.  It was a decent sized city; if the whole
thing went up, it would make a hell of a mess.

Orjon had trained in urban tactics as
well and together they'd laid out a plan.  Only about one of every ten of his
soldiers had a functioning weapon, though they'd managed to scrape together and
cobble up an impressive array of explosives.

They stood now a block in from the
eastern edge of town, watching as the Priman invaders approached.  All of the
Confed troops were using their adaptive camouflage cloaks to hinder the
Primans' ability to detect them.  They'd considered the city secure and stored
the camo cloaks by the time the EMP torpedoes had gone off, and as a result
they had powered right up.  The cloaks attached to the shoulders of their web
gear and received power from their body armor.  Their function was to mirror
their surroundings, helping them blend in instantly wherever they were.  In
addition, they masked IR and messed with silhouette detection gear.  Couple
that with their positions hidden in the buildings edging the town and the
Primans were at a loss as to where their enemies were.  It wasn't as good as
the Confeds having their powered armor back, but it was better than nothing.

           

 

Azul scanned the buildings with his long
range scanners and gave a frustrated sigh.  His gear could detect some of the
signatures that must be the Confed soldiers, but there were obviously a lot
more in that city than he could see.  Since their Assault Ship had been
destroyed, he couldn't conduct a head count.  He knew the ships could carry
around 5000 troops, but he had no idea how many were on the surface.  At least
they didn't have a lot of technology to draw on.

"Send in the scouts," he said to
the officer next to him.  Maybe the Confeds would just let him have the
minerals in the hopes that he'd leave them alone afterwards.  False hope, yes,
but it would make his life so much easier if they were wishful thinkers.

A pair of scout fighters rose from the
grassy plain behind him.  They were atmospheric craft, streamlined and swoopy,
with powerful lift thrusters so they could hover in place or land vertically. 
They flashed overhead, racing to the mine entrance and the storage buildings
close by.

The pair circled the mine opposite each
other, getting lower and lower each time they completed a circuit.  Finally,
they both settled into a hover just above the tops of the warehouses as they
scanned for their quarry.  They were sitting ducks to the hidden soldiers who
popped out of windows and vehicles and opened fire with the majority of the
functioning weapons that were on hand.  One of Orjon's people had even found a
surface-to-air missile among the working weaponry and let it fly from the tube
on his shoulder. 

The missile struck one of the scouts and
it exploded right there, raining parts and flaming debris down in the parking
lot.  The other one peeled off as ribbons of holes were stitched in the sides
by armor piercing rounds from a mass of HMR-12 assault rifles.  It disappeared
over the edge of town, trailing smoke and flames.

"Excellent work," Mithus said
to Orjon as the wounded Priman ship flew overhead.

"They are really not going to like
that," was all Orjon could say softly.       

 

 

Azul was irate.  These Confederation
types were supposed to be such fierce warriors, and they were hiding in the
city striking at his people from the shadows?  It was time to end their
pathetic little game.

"Southern Force, Northern Force,
attack," he barked into his comm unit.  Though not technically southern or
northern since their direction of attack was from the east, one unit was
attacking from the southeast and the other from the northeast.  Both would
advance until contact was achieved.  Wherever the Confeds offered battle first,
that unit would dig in and try to fix the Confeds in position with heavy fire. 
Meanwhile, the other unit would pivot and move through the city, attempting to
approach the enemy's flank.  Either way, the defenders would have to deal with
Azul's forces attacking through two different axes through the city.  Wherever
one unit bogged down, the other unit would try to advance, and eventually the
Confeds would have to choose one spot to defend.  Then they'd either have to
withdraw or get caught in a pincer; the mineral ore would be his and the enemy
would be eliminated.

 

 

"Well," started Mithus
neutrally, "they seem to have the basics of urban assault.  Now we'll see
if they're familiar with the finer points."

Captain Orjon smiled as he nodded at a soldier
next to him.   She dashed from the building to the strongpoints, alerting them
to proceed according to the plan.  "I just heard from the mine
detachment.  They need another fifteen minutes to dump the ore down the tunnels
and rig the charges."     

"Remember: lots of booby
traps," Mithus reminded Orjon.

"Oh yes; they're having a lot of fun
with those.  And they're going old school.  No electronic sensors, pressure
pads, that sort of thing.  If the Primans can disable electronics and detect
damn near anything, we need to use simple things that a scan won't see.  My
people are rigging tripwires, mines, all kinds of great things."

 

 

The Primans advanced slowly to the edge
of the city and both elements reached the first major streets at the same
time.  Their hovertanks were smaller than Confed's, which made them more agile
but also less armored.  Dismounted infantry accompanied them, marching along
and scanning the buildings, ready to react.

Suddenly, the side of a building
detonated, the explosion ripping into the enemy vehicles and troops.  The
Primans dispersed and started firing into the building that had exploded as
well as the one on each side.  The tank traversed its turret and started firing
heavy blasts through the torn up wall as well. 

 

 

"First unit has made contact;
they're already on the way out," Orjon replied.

Mithus nodded his approval.  He hated
having to fight this way, darting in the shadows, but if the Primans had to
slow down and clear the blocks the old fashioned way, it would take hours to
get through town.  And the Confed forces didn't need to occupy every building;
just enough to keep the Primans from putting together a pattern and adapting to
the tactic.

As if in response, Mithus and Orjon both
heard a noise above at the same time.  It was another round of sonic booms, and
they both looked down at their weapons in time to see their displays flicker
and die out.  

"Well damn," Orjon said in
disgust.  "Now what?"

Mithus dropped the useless Hammer rifle
and pulled a knife with a blade as long as his forearm from a sheath on his
back.  "We do this the old fashioned way.  I'll take a squad and start
hitting their flanks.  You get started with your end run to the southwest and
head behind the mountains.  I'll catch up."

 

 

Azul fumed.  His offensive had bogged
down.  The Confeds were obviously not strong in number, since their ambushes
were scattered randomly and infrequently.  Still, it was slow going.  Unwilling
to commit all of his thousands of troops until he knew more about what to expect,
he'd been forced to wait and see what the Confeds had in mind as far as their
tactics went.  Both of his forces were working their way through the city now,
though most of his tanks were disabled, smoking wrecks left abandoned in the
streets, and his reserves were on the edge of town just waiting to be committed
to whichever force gained momentum.  But his enemy had accomplished their
goal.  He'd heard a massive, muffled series of explosions; felt them through
the deck plates of his command tank at the edge of the city.  Then he saw the
dust cloud rising over the mine and knew what this had all been about.  The
Confederation troops weren't trying to fight him to the death, just stall long
enough to try and destroy the ore he'd come for.

In addition, they'd apparently decided to
set the entire city on fire.  He assumed it was to cover their withdrawal to
the mines as well, since he hadn't heard any reports of fighting since the
explosions.  Still, the choking smoke completely obscured his view past the
center of town, and the combination of smoke, flames and charred cinders were
fouling even his advanced sensors.  He knew they'd been moving to the mines,
but as of now everything on the west side of the city was one large, distorted
sensor blob.

He'd considered just ordering a charge to
the mines, because even if they'd destroyed the entrance, given enough time his
people would clear the tunnels and resume production.  Then they'd have the
reward of hunting down the Confed troops inside the dark caves they'd apparently
chosen as their tombs.  The problem was that he'd lost an entire squad to what
appeared to be a single man.  A survivor, uniform in tatters and smeared with
blood, stumbled back to Azul's position with reports of a Confed leader with a
gigantic knife hacking his way through Priman troops.

So Azul had regrouped and gone back to
the doctrine: building by building, street by street.  Approach, fire, grenade,
clear, move on.  It would take the rest of the day to make their way to the
mines at this rate, but in the end he admitted that since the damage to the
mines was already done, he didn't need to lose any more soldiers because he was
rushing.  Besides, once this chaos all died down, the ships in orbit would
start the search, and then these enemy soldiers would be his.

 

 

            "They are fierce
fighters," Captain Vol allowed as he and Representative Ravine stood in
his cabin while they prepared to send off a briefing to the Council and the
Commander.  They'd obviously fallen short of their immediate goal of total
destruction of the Confed force and retrieval of the ore, but in time they'd
dig the ore out and flush the Confeds from wherever they were hiding.

"If only they weren't such an unruly
lot," commented Ravine, "they might be worthy of being called our children. 
They inherited our fighting spirit, at the very least."

"Yes, apparently so much so that
they've even declared war on each other," replied Vol with a grim smirk. 
"Why they'd let themselves fracture apart and attempt to wage a civil war
on each other is beyond reason."

"It's working wonderfully for us
though, wouldn't you say?"

 

 

Senator Zek Dennix, head of the Governing
Committee and for all intents and purposes in control of the Confederation of
Systems, didn't hear a word his aide was saying.  They were sitting in the
Senator's spacious office alone, all of their staff having been sent home for
the night.

His chief aide, Enric Shae, was
recounting something or other that had gone according to plan.  Or maybe not
according to plan; Dennix just didn't care at that moment.  The last month had
been a disaster.  He'd never expected so many planets to secede from the
Confederation, especially considering all the threats he'd made about what
would happen to them. 

The split had been fairly uniform; the
core of the Confederation had stayed loyal to Dennix and his government, while
the systems further out- closer to the galactic core, contested
Talaran/Priman/Enkarran space, the border areas where the fighting was
heaviest- had banded together in a new alliance.  And the worst part was that a
quarter of his military units had defected with them.  It had been a fairly
uncontentious event; senior officers had turned over command and left ships
filled with loyalists, captains had given crew safe passage off vessels where
the loyalties were the other way around.  Sure, there had been a few
skirmishes, soldiers arrested, but he didn't know if the civility was good or
bad for his cause. 

At the direction (more like
demand
) of the Primans, as relayed through Enric Shae, he'd even
ordered actions designed to initiate hostilities.  He'd sent a task force to
retake a planet that had revolted, and that force had been met with an even
larger force of defected Confederation ships.  There had been a standoff, and,
against standing orders, his loyalist forces had withdrawn, citing overwhelming
enemy presence.

BOOK: Birthright: Battle for the Confederation- Pursuit
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