Rise of the Resistance (War for Orion Trilogy Book Two) (6 page)

“Why would we want to fight them?” One of
the races asked. “We all want the same thing: to kill.”

“That's what I'm afraid of,” Donnchadh
looked around. “That won’t include the crodillians, you don't have
to like them or even be friends with them, but you will respect
them. They did spare you lives after all.” Donnchadh turned around
and headed in the direction of one of the crodillian ships. “If you
don't want to be on the same ship as them, I suggest that you all
board this one.”

Donnchadh boarded the ship and heard the
entire group of convicts following close behind him. It didn't
surprise him they were all boarding the same ship as he was, the
fact that they were comforted him. He didn't like them, but they
were much better than the crodillians. Once he reached the cockpit,
he sat in the pilot seat and looked to the hangar. Three groups of
crodillians split off to the three other ships and Kellagh was
heading to his ship with none by his side. He switched to the
co-pilot seat and waited for Kellagh to board the ship. Donnchadh
had a feeling Kellagh was piloting this ship for a very specific
reason, and that meant his guard would have to stay up at all
times.

Kellagh sat down next to him and strapped
in. “So, we're going to Erebos?”

“Yes,” Donnchadh nodded. “The Deimos
Brotherhood has a huge hidden base there. It’s where Kirill and
most of the assassins will be hidden, unless he’s sent them to
other outposts.”

“And Merikh wouldn't be happy if we used any
type of force on them?”

“That's correct. He wants no casualties.
Your leader wants to speak to Kirill himself.”

“That's no fun,” Kellagh started to lift the
ship and exit the hangar. “How does he expect us to get them to
come peacefully if they're as dangerous as you claim them to
be?”

“Let me worry about that part.”

Kellagh got on the comline. “Set your
destination to Erebos. Follow my lead. Don't do anything without my
specific orders,” Kellagh told the pilots of the other ships. “This
is going to be a very different mission than we're used to, but
Merikh ordered complete peace, if any of you break that order, I’ll
kill you myself.”

Kellagh initiated sonodrive and Donnchadh
got up from the co-pilot seat. He needed to figure out exactly how
he was going to get Kirill to cooperate peacefully. It wouldn't be
easy, and that's one of the reasons he hadn't thought about it yet.
His main focus was delaying the death of the Queen for as long as
possible, so it really didn't matter to him how long it took Kirill
to cooperate. In fact, the longer it took, the better.

Pyrrhus piloted his small evac pod through
Ares' atmosphere and chose to land at Lacedaemon. It was where most
of the leaders would have gathered if they left their home planets
upon the crodillian invasion. Lacedaemon was well equipped for any
type of invasion, or war if it came to that. The quierleons didn't
just train for war, they prepared for it on their home planet
daily. Though most of Orion saw it as pointless, it was part of the
quierleon culture, dating back centuries. They were known to have
been superior warriors in the past, and now they’d have the chance
to prove their superiority against the crodillians.

He’d never gotten to see first-hand what the
quierleons were capable of, but he’d heard they were silent, quick,
and deadly. They used a combination of advanced weapons, hand to
hand combat, and blending in with their surroundings, making them
the best warriors in the galaxy’s history. Pyrrhus knew all of
their skill would be needed if they were to defeat the
crodillians.

As soon as he saw Lacedaemon appear through
the thick sea of forest, he called the dock on his comline. He
didn't want to take the chance of surprising them and getting shot
down accidently. The go ahead was given to him like he expected and
he squeezed his evac pod between two ships.

The dock, and the city of Lacedaemon, was
swarming with more races than he’d ever seen in the city at one
time. He’d expected it to be a little busy after the defeat at
Hera, but nothing like this. Ares was getting ready for a full
scale war against the crodillians.

Pyrrhus climbed out of the pod and was
immediately approached by a dock worker. “What’s your business
here? Are you taking refuge, or are you taking up arms?” The worker
looked down at her pad, waiting for an answer to put in.

“I'm here to lead the fight against the
crodillians.”

The worker looked up routinely. “You can go
to the recruitment office, which will be that way,” she pointed.
“They're taking anyone that they can get right now.”

“I need to know where the planetary leaders
and military officers are, not the recruitment office.”

“I'm not sure I can reveal information like
that to you.”

“I'm General Pyrrhus,” he looked down at the
girl. “I led the fleet that was defeated at Hera. I’ve come to
offer my help, or whatever I can to ensure defeat doesn’t befall
this planet.”

The bay worker looked at him surprised. “One
moment General, I didn't recognize you.”

The girl pulled out a comlink and told the
person on the other end what she had just been told. Pyrrhus could
tell that whoever was on the other end didn't believe her because
she had to repeat herself several times. He grabbed the comlink
from her and spoke into it.

“Where are the leaders and officers?”
Pyrrhus demanded. “I don't have time to play games, let them decide
if I'm who I say I am.”

“We'll send a cruiser for you right away,
sir.” the voice stuttered.

Pyrrhus handed the comlink back to the girl.
“It's not every day you see a man who's supposed to be dead.”

He turned around and walked over to a bus
station, where he was sure he’d be picked up. He sat down an
observed Lacedaemon. It made him happy the quierleons didn't mess
around when they said they trained for war. Now that he was able to
observe the city, he could see defense raised at every corner, and
many building were being fortified. Along with the dense forest
surrounding the city, this would be a hard place to overtake. The
quierleons stood a good chance if they were invaded.

Looking to his left, there were two tall
buildings with large gun turrets erected on top that were able to
take out cruisers with one good strike, and with a perfect hit, an
enemy ship. Other buildings had similar turrets and armored
cruisers were skimming through the crowded sky. The most unique
thing that he saw though was the city force field. It wasn't
activated yet, but he had seen the strange bulging balls from the
ground as he landed, and now that he had time to actually focus on
them, he knew exactly what they were. He had only heard of force
fields and seen blueprints of prototypes, but he'd never been
informed of their actual existence. From what he
had
been
told about them, this city would be well defended from any aerial
attacks.

A cruiser pulled up in front of him and a
young man got out to open the passenger door. Pyrrhus stood and got
into the cruiser without a word. The young man closed the door and
got back in the other side to fly the cruiser. The driver was
silent, and Pyrrhus thought it better not to start a conversation
with the young man. He looked out of the window as the cruiser rose
in the sky and observed other parts of the city still being
fortified. If he was going to help defeat the crodillians he needed
to know what he had at hand, and right now, it seemed he’d have
more than enough to hold back the enemy.

Pyrrhus felt the cruiser start to descend as
they reached a grey stone building in the center of the city. It
rose above all the others and seemed very calm compared to the rest
of the bustling city. The entire front of the building was held up
by a large kneeling quierleons made of marble. Every time he saw
it, it impressed him. The amount of time that went into creating
this building was astounding. The cruiser landed on the lawn and
Pyrrhus got out of the cruiser and climbed the hand-chiseled stairs
to the stone doors that read:
Only the worthy shall enter
,
in ancient quierleon above the frame. They slowly swung open and a
dark skinned man stepped out.

“Didn't expect to see you again, Pyrrhus,”
the Prime Minister of Ares said. “Anyway, welcome to Ares. We have
many impending matters to discuss and I’m sure you’re input would
help us a lot.”

Pyrrhus nodded. “You have no idea how
helpful my knowledge will be.”

“I have a pretty good feeling,” the Prime
Minister turned around. “If you follow me, I'll show you where the
rest of the leaders and officers are being held.”

Pyrrhus followed the Prime Minister down the
tall and wide stone hallways and through several rooms that had
been changed into bunkers. It may not have looked chaotic on the
outside, but he knew that it wouldn’t be that way where they were
heading. There had to be hundreds of leaders and officers housed
here, and not all of them would agree on every decision, which
meant only one thing: chaos.

The Prime Minister opened a door and
motioned for Pyrrhus to go in first. He immediately saw this room
was different than the others he had been in. It was much larger
than any of the others, and was overcrowded with hundreds races of
all ranks. There were maps, video feeds of planets, and many other
things scattered in different areas throughout the room. From first
glance it looked like a mess, but Pyrrhus could tell there were
sections for everything and that everyone was working in their area
of specialty, giving whatever advice they thought would be
helpful.

The Prime Minister nudged him. “You can go
up there.”

Pyrrhus looked to where he was pointing and
saw a stage with a podium. “You want me to speak to all of these
races?”

“Well, yes,” the Prime Minister nodded.
“They need to hear from someone that has seen the crodillians
first-hand. Right now, things are looking pretty bleak and most of
them have given up hope. They need you to give them a little boost.
Something to change the attitude in here a little bit.”

“I honestly don't think there is too much
hope right now, Gidon. With the way the crodillians do what they
want with ease, things are looking pretty bleak.”

“Well, just go up there and tell them what
you've seen!” He urged. “They need to hear something. I mean, you
survived! That should be all the hope they need.”

Pyrrhus walked up to the stage and looked
around the room. He could hear the voices slowly fading as races
saw who was standing before them. They all whispered to each other
and pointed for others to look until all eyes were on him.

“Most of you know who I am,” he started.
“I'm General Pyrrhus and I led the fleets that were supposed to
protect Hera and the galaxy. We failed. Miserably at that. We
weren't prepared for this enemy and we made the mistake of putting
almost all of our ships in one place,” he looked around the room to
see that he had the attention of every race. “I urged the Queen to
allow a small portion of every fleet to come here just in case of
failure. That decision has left us with around three hundred ships,
plus whatever extra there are on Ares and whoever else wants to
join the fight with their own ships.”

“Then we need to attack now!” Someone from
the crowd shouted, starting a rumbling of agreeing whispers. “If we
have ships, we need to try and stop them!”

“No,” Pyrrhus boomed. “We will
not
attack now. The crodillians are more powerful and intelligent than
anyone initially thought. That’s why I abandoned the fight at Hera,
I had to make sure that every survivor knew just how powerful they
really are. There are too many leaders who think we can just go
fight the crodillians like another normal enemy we’ve read about.
We can't. Our only option right now is to lay low and keep a close
eye on the enemy.”

“Coward!” Another shout erupted from the
room. “You left your men to die and want the same of all of our
families! They’re counting on us to save them. We won’t sit around
and wait for the crodillians to take another planet.”

“I left them to die in order to make sure
that Orion survived! We haven't been defeated yet, though the
crodillians may think so,” his voiced boomed off the stone walls.
“If I would've stayed with my ship, I would've died and none of you
would know what to expect from them! You would've foolishly sent
our last line of defense to face sure death, and with that, the
death of your families you want to protect. The war is not over
yet, so stop acting like we've been defeated. I have
knowledge
that can help us defeat the crodillians! I’ve seen
how they fight and I know how they'll fight us when we go to finish
them off!” He looked around. “Some of you want to attack now, is
that right?”

Pyrrhus looked around to see nods from some
of the races and looks of fear on the faces of others. These were
leaders, but none of them knew what to do, they’d never faced
adversity like this. None of them had ever thought anything like
this could even happen on Orion. Adira stressed peace so much, and
had been so good at keeping it, all had forgotten about the evil
lurking in the shadows, waiting for the right moment to lash
out.