Star Force: Newbslayer (SF64) (11 page)

“Does using those make you tired?”

“Extremely. We’ll be here for the next hour,” she
said, sending him another beacon marker. “Bring our weapons and any additional
intel
or problems to our attention, then we’ll be back in
orbit for a while. I trust you can maintain the city without us?”

“So long as they don’t send a second attack force,
yes.”

“I meant with the locals.”

“There’s a lot of good will out there right now for
us. Enough that we’re already getting support from some of the citizenry. I
think we can handle things, even if the bureaucrats feel like trying to throw
some weight around.”

“See that you do,” Jenna said before turning around
and slowly walking off with Levi. They made their way about half a kilometer
off to a courtyard large enough to accommodate a dropship that they called down
with supplies. When it landed they camped out in the rear compartment, getting
ambrosia and some foodstuffs while still staying in their armor. A Knight came
down with it and stood guard outside while they hung around the open ramp, just
sitting and staring off in a fatigue-induced haze until the
mercs
caught up with them again.

They brought their empty rifles and pistols back, then
Brayden gave them a situation update from his search teams. They were finding
pockets of citizens that had taken to hiding, and in some cases sealing
themselves into whatever hideaways they thought could preserve them. It was
going to take some time to rescue them from their own imprisonment, but the
Marauders insisted that they could handle that, and with no more Varshoo troops
showing up in the search the Archons finally called it a day after the last of
the prisoners were recovered, both from the Defense Force and the city streets,
and loaded up into Marauder transports.

Those were taken to a landing zone outside the city
where other dropships were coming down to pick them up. Jenna trusted them
enough to finish the handover without her babysitting them, so she took Levi
and herself back up to the
Jor
-El
with both
heading straight for their quarters, already having got some food and ambrosia in
the dropship.

Jenna didn’t even bother to shower, simply pulling her
sweaty self out of her armor and flopping down on her bed, resisting the urge
to fall asleep as she activated her Sesspik. The healing trance took a moment
to begin, but when it did the ache in her head diminished by half instantly,
with the remainder slowly
eeking
away as she sped her
recovery as quickly as possible, knowing that unless their luck was very, very
good there was going to be more fighting in the other cities, and that they
couldn’t delay retaking them very long.

As it turned out, she and Levi would have to fight
three more battles against the largest sections of the Varshoo army before the
rest of their units finally accepted her offer of retreat. A lot of the
Tieor
government didn’t care for that option, wanting the
invaders captured or killed, but with the Marauders backing up the two
supersoldiers
they were able to provide enough intimidation
cover to allow the Varshoo to evacuate the cities they still possessed and
return to their troop transports.

Those were allowed to fly up to orbit and dock with
the cargo ships that were still in the system. Given that some had fled with
their jumpship, it was a tight fit squeezing them all in on their own vessels,
but there they would stay until jumpships were sent to pick them up, with a
Varshoo courier vessel being sent out immediately to relay the request and
inform the others as to what had happened here.

The Varshoo warships, on the other hand, were not
returning with them. Star Force took possession of those and subsequently
turned them over to the Marauders, along with the task that Brayden had been
initially reluctant to accept…that being the permanent defense of
Tieor
. The mercenary preferred to pick and choose where he
fought, but he was also ambitious, which was part of the reason he had left
Star Force to begin with, and Jenna had just given him an entire planet of his
own.

It took several weeks of wrangling and threats, but
eventually what was left of the
Tieor
government and
Defense Force agreed to her terms. The Marauders would take over full
responsibility for the defense of the planet, in whatever manner they chose,
supplanting the inadequate local defenders. With their own more advanced
technology, the captured Varshoo warfleet, and the battle records of what had
taken place across the planet, the local
Tieor
population was firmly behind the change, feeling that they were extremely
fortunate not to be living in occupied territory right now, and with that
support the local government couldn’t do anything to remove the new rulers of
the planet.

But rulers in a caretaker sense. Jenna had instructed
them to defend and pacify the planet, ensuring that no bad behavior was going
on with the government and interfering when necessary, but otherwise letting
the locals manage themselves. That would keep the Marauders independent, but
still involved enough to bring a bit of civilization to
Tieor
,
though obviously not up to Star Force standards.

As for the
Jor
-El
, it would
be leaving as soon as the Varshoo jumpships came to pick up their army, after
which time the Marauders would be on their own, both in terms of military
support and oversight. Jenna made it clear to Brayden that he was completely on
his own, and whether this turned out to be a beneficial turn of events or just
a delay in the Varshoo taking over she wouldn’t know, for Star Force wasn’t
going to maintain any ties, even surveillance. The
mercs
were on their own, for better or worse.

Accepting the dangerous challenge for what it was
Brayden, thanked the Archons for their decision to return and the new future
for his mercenary unit…whose reputation had just skyrocketed, not to mention
their war assets, though many of the ships would have to be refitted, possibly
back in the ADZ at a later time. Never the less, they had suddenly become a
naval-equipped organization with a planet full of resources and personnel to
draw off of.

Brayden still intended to keep the Marauders as 100%
ex-Star Force personnel, but recognized that he’d need to set up some support
units with locals. He had a lot of work ahead of him, very lucrative work
considering the fee
Tieor
would be annually paying
them, both in currency and raw materials, plus real-estate to set up proper
bases.

Jenna left him and his men to their own volition, not
sure how
Tieor
would play out but washing her hands
of it. She’d done an awful lot to help out, and done so in a typically Star
Force way, but their fate was now their own. A day after the Varshoo jumpships
departed with their troops the Ma’kri left as well, heading to the nearest
clandestine Star Force base for resupply, then it would be off again on another
mission of Jenna’s choosing.

Where that would lead her and her apprentice she
didn’t know, but there was always need for them somewhere on the border and she
liked being a roamer far better than being tied to a semi-permanent assignment
for a decade or more.

As they traveled back from
Tieor
she wrote up a report that would post to the message boards as soon as they got
back on the grid. She sent a special flag with it, for the attention of the
trailblazers, in which she detailed how useful the master/apprentice system
was, for to her knowledge such a pairing had never been pushed to that limit.
Jenna added the subsequent problems with the psionic
overusage
,
including the battlemeld abilities, noting that some additional high endurance
training should be devised to counter the problem.

And throwing a training issue out to the trailblazers
was the equivalent of feeding them candy. Either they or Wilson would come up
with a counter program in short order, but for Jenna she wasn’t going to worry
about it. Her focus was on getting into the action and making a difference on
the front lines, whether lizard huge or border world small. She’d use whatever
training they devised, but she wasn’t going to waste her time experimenting and
designing it.

That was for others. She and Levi both were cut out
for action, and one way or another they always found their way to a mission
that required it. The lizards might be the greatest threat Star Force currently
faced, but that didn’t mean all the little ones didn’t matter, and as both she
and her current and futures apprentices grew in strength, the bigger the
difference they could make in these small conflicts where sending in a Star
Force army wasn’t an option.

Jenna hadn’t originally intended to take on that role,
but accepted it for what it became as well as the nickname some of the others
on the major front lines gave her.

Newbslayer.

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