Ah-ha! Groovy! I'll play with that when I have more time. Tis 12:14 and I've just written another chapter in two hours... I don't write as much these days, but when I do, damn. Hopefully this won't seem...off...
Now, on to the details...
I really wanted more detail discription inside the deflector station (you'll see what I mean), but every time I tried such, I felt it dragged down the tempo of the scene itself. So most of it got scragged in editting. Maybe it isn't noticable.
To Jaeih: There's a grizzly scene in this chapter you may want to skip. It emphasises on a particular acpect of Ron'jar that you, and all Rihansu lovers, may not like to read. If you do read, do so at your own risk! Just kidding, It ain't that bad...but then...maybe... Can't really tell how people react somethimes...
Any who:
Chapter Eleven
Trade Square, Jessa’man’a City,
Goesa’vaina
February 21, 2274
“You are certain, Lieutenant?” The surprise laden within the Goesan queen’s voice bordered on grief. Jackson could sympathize. So far, all their efforts had been bent on preventing the Klingons from getting into the city. Now he had brought them all news that their enemy was likely already within the shield.
“Those shuttles were manned with only a pilot each. Just enough to fight them and put up a good show,” Alfred began to lay down the facts as he’d been mulling them over in his mind for the past two hours. “We’ve searched three of the downed craft to make sure the first wasn’t some kind of fluke. There were no transports detected from the surface to any ship or location on the planet. No one near by saw any one leave those craft. And there has been no follow up bombardment of the shield, even though that fleet up there could punch through in a few minutes.”
“So you believe the Klingons are already here…in force…” Elani could barely manage her voice above a whisper. This monarch had her inspired moments, but she was very young. Jackson would not have been surprised if she retired suddenly from the field.
“We can assume nothing else, my lady.” Prime Coarus told her, his own voice a stoic measure of certainty in comparison. His long fingered, callused hand grasped her shoulder. The young ruler seemed to take strength from contact with the older man. “They will go for the shield generators.”
Other people would have wasted valuable time concentrating on how the enemy had gotten in, Jackson thought to himself. These people saw more import in just stopping what the enemy was doing. Others could figure out how to keep them from getting through the shield again. The human security officer already had a good idea of how they’d managed that feat. He’d seen the two-meter or better tall sewage drain which had emptied into the flats the farmers used to process fertilizer. The shield would have been weakest in that area…
“We have to stop them if we’re going to keep the Klingons out of here till the fleet arrives.” Jackson added emphasis. His hand rested on the solid form of his slung phaser rifle.
“Then you shall go.” Elani’tess said. Her eye turned to Coarus. “Send two units to each of the generator stations. Three shall go to the power station and secure it there. You shall take charge Coarus.”
“As you will, my lady.”
Near Deflector Generator
Station One,
Jessa’man’a City.
Ron’jar paused as again he drew out his now-silenced tricorder and passed it about the immediate area. He glowered in silence over the readings, but shared none of them. They were far too close to the generating station to allow any stray noise to give them away. Their emergence from the under-city had been quick and undetected, and the only soldiers within sight had been eliminated in moments with equal silence. Now their objective lay but forty meters from them. The streets were empty and quiet.
The commander remained in the shadows of the narrow alley his team hunkered within. The columned buildings at every street face provided ample cover for his men to skulk behind. They also allowed great advantaged in cover to defender and invader alike. The cobbled street eased up the city’s gentle slope as straight as a line, hooking to several smaller walk paths left and right. The city street lamps shone out garishly upon everything, accentuated at intervals by lower hued torches.
Ron’jar surveyed the way in silence. Something was not correct here, he realized. When he’d come here years ago, foot traffic in this quadrant of the inner city had been dense at all times of day and night. Surely most within the city would be frightened of the coming battle and fearing raining death from the heavens, but where were the idle gossips, the men and women not content to sit by and let the government handle everything for them whilst they remained in the dark? There were always those who did not preserve their personal safety and went looking for those who knew more. There were always those who sought to protect their streets in their own manner, particularly among these strong people.
Why were the streets here empty, when others, even now, were not.
Commander Ron’jar signaled his party to be alert with a shaking, closed fist signal. All behind him hefted rifles to their shoulders and began to more thoroughly scan their threat vectors. The commander himself knelt and affixed both the rifle stock and optical scope to his weapon. Lifting the optical sight to his eye, he scoured the generator building with the sensor he trusted more than any tricorder.
“The roof guards are behind cover,” he murmured lowly to his men. Beside him, S’tall fidgeted nervously. Some of his own men did as well, but not with their weapons.
“No other soldiers in sight.” He lowered his scope to the doorways leading into the station. No guards were visible, adding to the suspicion he felt over the whole situation. He twisted the selector on his sight till it switched to thermographic imaging. There he saw the low-resolution forms of two armed sentries, hiding on either side of the entrance, which itself was covered by the shimmering splatter of an active deflector shield.
With a series of fast hand signals, Ron’jar conveyed the intel to his team and then began to issue deployment commands. With lethal silence, the men and women of his team filed deftly out of the alley and took suppression positions behind the evenly spaced columns before the building right of their commander. S’tall, for her part, remained with Ron’jar, weapon up and aimed to cover the rear.
Taking a solid kneeling stance on the uneven cobblestones of the alley, the Klingon commander set his weapon to full power and took careful aim for his target. The flat thumb-trigger clicked and his weapon bucked in his hands. A blinding burst of emerald spot across the street and blasted a rough-hewn hole through the reinforced duracrete wall of the installation. For all their patience and cunning, the Goesan’s had never constructed a truly blast-proof wall. A force field covering a door was good enough to keep out most cat burglars, but it took more thought to keep out a Klingon warrior.
Standing as his men opened fire on the guard positions above, Ron’jar drew his communicator. “Attack.” His voice muttered as he picked up his Romulan compatriot and shoved her out into the street.
Inside Deflector Generator
Station One
The Dashak Prime turned from behind his position of cover and motioned the alarm to his men. “The outer wall has been breached. Prepare to repel intruders!” His men raised their rifles and submachine guns. This was going to be a close quarters, bloody battle. Coarus mentally steeled himself for the coming moments. His phaser rifle was set to setting five. Enough to kill without doing serious harm to the surrounding machinery. Across the narrow confines of the service corridor, Lieutenant Jackson’s rifle was set likewise. The Dashak Commander momentarily questioned his wisdom in trusting such a technologically different weapon for this fight. He as yet held no faith in these weapons…
There was no time for such self-doubt, however. From the sounds of disruptor fire battering the roof and walls of the structure, the Klingons were nearly to the breach. Coarus could not see the hole in the outer wall from this area, but Jackson’s tricorder device had shown it to be just down the hall. He hefted the lightweight weapon and prepared himself.
Already, flashing pulses of amber light were reaching his awaiting team as the enemy battled his defending comrades. Spatters of jolting gunfire echoed within the confines of the complex, bouncing from wall to wall. The occasional scream or barked order reached the Prime’s ear. The command ‘fall-back’ echoed by more than once…
Coarus gave the silent order for his men to advance. He wasn’t going to wait for the enemy to be firmly entrenched within the station before attacking them. His men needed back up. After the first two men of his team passed his position, I’rell rose to a crouched stance and advanced with them. Out of his peripheral vision, he noted the human security soldier do the same. The Terran’s training was quite good and Coarus felt quite secure with the alien at his back.
The two point men halted at the corner leading to the pitched battle. The first, his identity obscured by the ancient lar’fa kerchief tied about his face, readied his weapon and glanced about the right-hand turn. Returning then to the safe position, the soldier looked back to his commander and began to rote off a series of hand signals detailing what he’d seen. ‘Three hostiles-heavy fire-four casualties-hostiles behind cover.’
Coarus mentally pictured the cover available down this particular corridor. There was a security station meant for screening visitors, the security booth, pipes and electrical switching boxes. Any of these would provide excellent cover. Frowning, Coarus signaled his men ahead.
The first two swung around the turn in the corridor, SMG’s up and raking the way ahead with short and controlled bursts. Coarus followed them up, kneeling at the same corner and pivoting around it to add to their fire.
All of I’rell’s original men which he’d placed here were down by the time the Prime caught view of the battle. The aperture created by the enemy was now very wide, having been battered apart by shots coming and going. Fire had claimed much of the nonmetallic machinery to be had and much of the so-called cover had been shot through by high power hits. The Klingons had already made it inside, and knelt behind whatever was to be had, and some were simply charging up the walkway. One of his two point men took a hit from the Klingon closest his group and clattered to the expanded-metal deck. The second man put a quick burst into the alien, three shots slamming into the silver armor it wore.
The Klingon didn’t fall. It didn’t even stagger. It just raised its pistol and shot Coarus’s man in the face. The alien warrior slowed to a walk as dark red blood flowed down the contours of its armor. It leered at the Dashak Prime. The aim of its disruptor turned his way.
Coarus didn’t hesitate. His phaser rifle came up and planted a glowing crimson beam right in the center of its chest. The beam slapped the alien back several paces as its armored chest came aglow with phased energy. The warrior staggered, looking down at the huge, smoking burn that cratered its chest. But the alien still stood. It glowered back at Coarus and again raised its pistol.
A second, longer phaser blast halted further action in the Klingon. The beam burned a path clean through the warrior and dropped it to the deck atop the first point man. Coarus continued to act, firing back down the corridor at the still advancing forms of enemy soldiers, but was completely stunned by the Klingon’s resistance to injury. Goesan submachine guns fired a twelve-millimeter round at over one hundred fifty meters per second. Three successive hits from said weapon was enough to drop a Goesan male even from a full-tilt charge. The Klingon, from the number of holes in it, had sustained no less than nine such hits, all in the chest. Coarus had heard of their organ redundancy, but the true scope of it leveled him. How many round could they take? There weren’t enough phasers to arm all the military…
More of Coarus’s team took support positions near to him, standing over him and lining the opposite equipment wall. Their ballistic projectile fire deafened him at such proximity. He was used to it. The enemy did bloody jiggles as they continued to advance and take cover before the defenders. A couple of the Klingons fell, only to get right back up again. It was a scene right out of some macabre play. More of Coarus’s own men fell. The man standing above him staggered forward from a hit to the belly, and instantly lost his head to a blast directed at the Prime himself. Half congealed hunks of red gore glopped down of the soldier as he continued to return withering, nearly continuous fire on the aliens.
Jackson’s own red beam slashed out at the enemy. The lieutenant picked out one target after another, felling three. Heartened by the reduction in enemy troops, Coarus called for a slow advance. The Klingons had to be pushed out from here…
Outside the Deflector Station
Ron’jar pressed against the thick, fractured wall of the deflector station and gasped from the burning, wet pain from inside his chest. The rifle bullet from those short Goesan repeaters stung like a fire wasp. He glanced down at the small, finger width hole punched through the reinforced leather of his armor and the dark trail of blood emitting from within. The wound did not feel very threatening. He figured the projectile had lost velocity passing through his armor, glanced off a now broken exterior rib and was likely sitting in the middle of his left anterior lung. He took a deep breath, forcing steaming hot air into the injured organ. Yes, his lung was indeed injured. He’d have to watch his stamina in the hours to come.
Ron’jar was in no real danger. His assault party was. Of the eight who had begun the assault, he was reduced to three, himself and the Rihansu included. The rest were either dead or incapacitated. This was not the perfect attack he had envisioned. But then, they seldom were.
The Commander snatched out his communicator.
“Boren, Group One has failed to reach objective. Begin your insertion. I’ll keep the enemy busy.”
“Understood, my lord!” Was the marine commander’s short reply. Ron’jar could hear the pride resonating within the man’s baritone voice. Boren seemed a stout sort of warrior. He would do well to keep that man near him. He glanced aside to the opposite side of the breach in the outer wall. There, S’tall and Bek Orn were still leaning in at intervals to loose harassment fire into the building. Return fire was fierce, and there was also danger from ricochet. S’tall caught his gaze first, then touched the large, tall form of Orn to gather his attention. “Grenades!” He ordered them. Both soldiers began to withdraw numerous packages from their equipment harnesses as the commander kept up their covering fire. He gave his people six seconds to ready, then withdrew from the crevasse.
Orn and S’tall stepped into the danger zone and hurled their weapons. They made five throws before return fire gathered enough strength again to pose a true danger. Jerking a thumb behind him, up the north face of the street, Ron’jar gave them the order to pull back.
At the thundering sounds of grenade detonations, Both Orn and the Romulan sub-lieutenant bolted across the exposed breach and joined the commander in running along the length of the deflector station. Cracks of gunfire called for their attention from the roof guard positions as they negotiated their path. No columns lined the exterior of this building, forcing the defending invaders to press themselves against the face of the retaining wall and return fire almost straight up.
A muffled ‘wump’ bounced down the boulevard. At its sound, Ron’jar felt almost like smiling. Boren had made his entrance on the far side of the station. Perhaps he would be able to take down the shield without mauling the entire city in the process.
“We are inserted.” Came the Lieutenant’s confirmation via their coms.
Ron’jar’s time to exult came abruptly to an end as Bek Orn took a shot to the back from the open crevasse behind them. Soldiers had emerged from within the station and were intent on eradicating the remnant of his team, oblivious to the new threat to the building. Orn dropped, blood coursing from his lips as he mouthed incomprehensible words. Another chattering burst of auto fire caught S’tall in the shoulder with two rounds. Green blood splayed upon the white face of the deflector station as she slumped into the commander’s waiting arms. A grin of cruel satisfaction spread upon his bearded maw as he deftly turned the Rihansu about to face those who’d shot her and held her dead-weight form between himself and danger. Another duo of weapon blasts from both avenging Goesans raked the limp Romulan, drawing the breath from her in a ragged gasp. Two rounds hurtled clean through her and injured the Klingon as well, but it was not enough to bring him down. Behind his non-human shield, he returned fire on his aggressors, putting them down with blinding red shots of disrupted energy.
Ron’jar held the gurgling S’tall aloft for a time longer, making sure no other Goesans abounded to make life difficult for him. When he ascertained that the remainder in the area were battling his harassers and those within the station were slugging it out with Boren’s group, he allowed the Romulan woman to sag to the dusty walk.
Ron’jar looked down at her for a moment, his brief glint of satisfaction over having used her thusly faded. S’tall struggled to drag life-continuing breath into her ravaged lungs, all the while staring in shock back up at him. Her back muscles twitched spasmodically, giving her the dead feline look as she lay there spilling dark green fluid onto the packed cobblestones. With a grin of admiration, he saw that the Rihansu was willing to die as a warrior. Her gun hand tried valiantly to raise her disruptor to bear on him. With a nod, Ron’jar ended her struggles with a single blast to the forehead and stepped over her inert form.
From far above, streams of brilliant emerald fire rained from the heavens. The shield had been brought down. The siege of Jessa’man’a had begun.
****************************************************************************
Hope that was bearable, y'all. Please post all coments and continued objections to my comments below.
Topic: Goesa'vaina (Read 25094 times)