Warpath (Rise of the Empire Book 4) Page 20
Nimuse now older, and wiser, knew that things couldn’t keep going like this for long. And when she heard the last idiocy that Tavaar ordered she knew that the time was now. Tavaar had ordered the fleet ships in orbit of Nelus to join with their fleet and Nelat and drive the Empire’s ships out of their system. And with that Nimuse could no longer sit quietly. After the meeting ended, Nimuse used her family’s significant wealth and influence to set things in motion. She might not have the power to end the idiocy of the council on her own, but she had enough to light up the spark that would grow into a roaring flame to consume and burn away the filth that had grown at the heart of her world.
***
Four days after the battle for Nelus
Massar Erani sat on the bridge of his battleship, watching on his screens as the Nelus remaining ships sped from his home world towards the force garrisoned in the orbit of Nelat, the fifth planet in the Nelus system. The area in which the greatest Sowir fleet Erani had ever laid eyes upon was just destroyed by a much smaller number of ships.
Eran, like every other person on Nelus had watched the battle, and had seen their force retreat and leave the Empire ships to be slaughtered by the immense Sowir force. He knew why the commander did that. The council had sent an order and ordered them to pull back, and Eran didn’t oppose that order. Over his entire upbringing and adult life he had always obeyed the council, it didn’t even cross his mind to countermand the council orders even though the fleet would have followed his orders over those of the council.
And now he was ordered to meet up with that force and chase the Empire ships out of the system. How idiotic the council truly is if it believed that his ships were capable of doing that. Eran had seen what the Empire’s ships can do, and even outnumbered as they were his ships wouldn’t stand a chance. Not to mention it being wrong. The Empire had warned them about the Sowir, and then even sent ships to help them. And the council wanted to reward that help with insults and threats.
But Nelus and Eran were ruled by the council, it had always been that way. To disobey was unimaginable. And yet Eran could think of nothing else.
“Massar?” Erani’s communications officer said, breaking him out of his thoughts.
“Yes?”
“You have a priority one message from Nelus.”
Erani checked his screens and saw the forwarded message, he was instructed to listen to the message in private. So he got up from his chair and walked over to his ready room, sat down behind his desk and played the message. He was surprised to see that it was a message from Sestar Nimuse of the council.
“Massar Erani. I have chosen to send you this message in secret, bypassing the council, because I believe that this last insanity is the last drop. Nelus can take no more. After Sesatar Jusan left, I have come to realize just how much damage the council was doing to our people. And I started building influence and power in order to change things. But house Nor Ral is too powerful and alone I could do nothing. But you Massar Erani now have the power to change things. This message is a plea. Take action, the council must be disbanded. Help the people take their world back. Whether you do what I know you feel is right or report this message to the council and remain their minion, I will already have started a revolution on Nelus. The people cannot stay silent anymore.”
Stunned Erani looked at the blank screen for several minutes. And then he rose up, he knew what he had to do.
***
Invictus
Isani sat in the command center of his ship, the remaining Empire ships remained in the system still, except for the Harbinger that had raced back to Sanctuary in order to provide Adrian with the best medical care. He hoped that Adrian would be alright. He knew that using the Watchtower was dangerous, but they had no choice. Without it Isani doubted that they could have defeated the Sowir force. Perhaps they could have, but he was sure that they would have lost more ships.
Isani was in the system because the Empire wanted an explanation for the betrayal of their fleet. The Nelus Council had, like it always does, threatened and started moving the rest of their fleet from Nelus to join the ships that had been fighting the Sowir.
And the Emperor wasn’t amused. Nelus had the advantage in numbers, but their ships were even worse than those of the Sowir, and Isani was fully prepared to pit the remaining third of the Warpath fleet against them. But when the two Nelus forces joined forces they didn’t try to attack the Empire fleet.
Instead the entire fleet turned and headed back to Nelus. The Lighthouse’s sensor drones had intercepted communications between Nelus and the fleet, or rather communication from Nelus to the fleet. The Nelus ships didn’t respond back. To all appearances the Nelus fleet seemed to have gone rogue. One of the drones followed the fleet giving Isani and his ships live feed of what was happening light hours away.
The Nelus fleet reached the effective range of the Nelus defense platforms. One of them even fired on the ships, but the fire ceased within minutes. An enormous amount of chatter was happening between the fleet, the stations, and military installations on the ground. The drone couldn’t get everything but apparently a coup was in progress. The military in concert with the Nelus people rose up against the Council. That was three days ago.
The fighting lasted for two days, but eventually the military and the people overthrew the Council. Another day passed before the people of Nelus sent a message to Isani’s ships. The drone that was close to their fleet and undetectable received the message and passed it on via FTL comms, ahead of the light speed signal that the message was sent in. Isani watched the message, and intrigued by it recorded one of his own. Then he used the drone to send the response back hours before Nelus expected it.
***
A day later Invictus with an escort of six ships met up with the diplomatic ship from Nelus halfway to the planet. He insisted that their team comes on the Invictus, which they surprisingly agreed to. Isani and his second - Sub Commander Liz Turner sat and waited in the meeting room as the security escorted them through the ship to him. A few minutes later the doors opened and three Nel walked in.
Isani recognized two of them. The one who appeared to be in the lead was Retsar Erani, or at least he was at the time Isani knew him, now his dress told him that he was promoted to Massar – the supreme commander of Nel fleets. The second person he recognized, was Sestar Nimuse of the House Jar Tel, who was now an old woman. The third was a younger man, who Isani didn’t recognize.
Restar – or rather Massar Erani spoke first.
“I didn’t know that Retsar Isani had a son.” He commented.
Isani smiled. “I didn’t.” He said. That confused the two who knew him previously and both of them studied him closely.
The first to respond was Nimuse. “Retsar Isani was in his fifties when Sowir attacked Nuva, he would be my age now. You are obviously in your thirties.”
“It’s just Isani, or Commander Isani now. And yes, you are correct I am eighty seven years old.” Isani said.
“That is impossible.” Erani said.
“The Empire possesses many advances not known to Nelus or the Sowir.” Isani said simply.
“So you have some kind of rejuvenation technology?” Nimuse asked yearningly.
Isani at her feeble form and decided to answer with the truth. “The Empire does have rejuvenation tech, which I have used, but we also possess the means to stop the aging process altogether. I will never lose my young appearance, nor will I physically age.”
“That is absurd! Immortality is a myth!” The third Nel said.
Isani turned to look at him and smiled. He knew that such open usage facial expressions was something that Nel that were not part of the Empire rarely saw outside of family units.
Ereni made a Nel gesture that indicated calmness and restraint to the young Nel. “We are not here to discuss technologies, and what is or is not possible Hishok Tansi.” Ereni said.
Upon hearing the young man’s tittle Isani was surprised. Hishok roughly tr
anslated to citizen in standard, and it referred to ordinary people who were not a part of an organized group.
Ereni turned back to Isani and made a gesture signaling apology, surprising Isani yet again. Nel, and especially Nel from Nelus were not known for being humble. Isani answered with the gesture meaning acceptance, and then gestured for them to continue.
Eren visibly relaxed and started speaking. “We would like to open diplomatic talks with the Empire, we are here now hoping to talk with the leader of this fleet.”
Isani frowned. “You’ve been talking to him.” He said.
The three suddenly looked flabbergasted. Isani looked at them as they exchanged looks and glanced at Liz at Isani’s side, who had kept silent. Then Isani realized what surprised them.
“You thought that the leader of this fleet needed to be human.” He stated. Seeing their chagrin, Isani pressed on. “Well, you are right. The commander of this fleet is a human, but he was injured during the fighting and I as his second have assumed command. But the Nel and humans are all members of the Empire and as such have equal rights.”
“We didn’t mean to imply anything, it is just that the last time that we had contact with you we dealt with a human.” Nimuse said.
“As I said, we are all equal in the Empire. Your request for diplomatic talk is accepted. I invite you to stay aboard the Invictus until I inform the Emperor. I am sure that he would want to send an expert negotiation team to speak with you. But I warn you that he is not happy, the actions of your fleet had lost us many lives.” Isani said.
“We understand. It is because of the insane orders of the Council that the people and the fleet finally found the will to break away from their rule.” Hishok Tansi said.
“You finally taking control over your own lives is good, but there is a lot of mistrust between my people and yours. In time we might be able to repair it, for now you are welcome aboard my ship.” With that Isani left the room leaving telling Liz to take care of their guests over his implant. He headed toward his quarters to talk to the Emperor.
***
Sanctuary
“So Nelus wants to talk?” Sumia asked. On the Emperor’s request she had been staying at her house on Sanctuary, in case that he needed to speak with her in person on matters concerning Nelus or the Sowir.
“It looks like it. As they say they had rebelled against the Council’s rule, and wish to open talks with us.” Tomas said.
“I can’t believe that they rebelled… The ruling Houses always had such an iron grip on Nelus.” Sumia commented.
“It has been a long time, and their society had stood still. No advances, no expansion, they were stagnating. Seeing our smaller fleet defeat such overwhelming Sowir fleet must have been the last drop.” Tomas said.
“Well, at least they had finally come to their senses. So what do I have to do with this?” Sumia asked.
Tomas smiled at her perceptiveness. “I want you to head the talks with them.”
“I knew that it was going to be something like that…” She said resigned.
“So you’ll do it?”
“Yes, I’ll go talk with them. But I will need a list of things that we want from the talk.” Sumia said.
“Already prepared.” Tomas said and handed her a small data chip.
Sumia shook her head. “Of course it is.”
***
Hishok Tansi sat in a spacious room provided to him aboard the Emprie ship with Sestar Nimuse and Massar Erani. It had been a few days since their arrival, and they had been on informed that an envoy from the Empire was on her way to Nelus in order to speak with them. But in the meantime the three had been allowed to look through some of the Empire’s databases, mainly their history as well as entertainment channels. But they were also allowed to view a small portion of their tech databases.
“How could we have allowed Tavaar and the rest of the council to blind us so much. To let us convince that the humans were so primitive when they first contacted us?” Hishok Tansi asked.
“Tavaar is a great speaker and manipulator, he can spin anything in his favor. And we trusted him blindly because we were afraid. Fear can make people do insane things. I too was content to keep my head down and accumulate wealth and power, it took me a long time to realize how wrong I was.” Nimuse said.
“I can understand how the council fooled the people, it is they who controlled the media and information. But the fleet was different. Our ships were close enough to take readings of the human ships when they first arrived, and we watched their records of battle for Nuva. And yet once Tavaar’s experts came out with their story we took it as truth, believing in it even though we should have known better.” Massar Erani added.
“Have you had the chance to look at their technology?” Hishok Tansi asked.
“Yes. If even half of it is true, they are leagues ahead of us now.” Erani answered.
“And their history… Their home world is destroyed, and thirty years ago they were just one colony! Now they have spread so much and so fast… It is mind boggling.” Tansi said.
“Did you come across the information on the connection between us and humans?” Nimuse asked, her face twitching for a moment.
“No, there is so much to read I didn’t have the chance…” Tansi said.
“You should look it up, apparently there is much more to Jusan’s defection to the Empire than it was apparent to us.” Nimuse said.
“I’ll look it up as soon as I get the chance.” He promised, then hesitated before continuing to speak. “But, do we even know what we want from these talks?”
“Establishing good and neighborly relations are our priority.” Eran said, “It will take time for us to repair the damage done by the council. We can worry later about what we want from the relationship.”
Tansi and Nimuse both agreed. The three of them spent the next hour fleshing out the details of what their approach would be, and then retired to their respective rooms to rest. All of them knew that the negotiations would be long and difficult.
Chapter Twenty Five
Ten days after the battle for Nelus – Sowir inner system Laraska
Fleet Commander Bethany Jones-Wright sat on the command center of her flagship leading the Second Fleet as they were taking control of the Laraska system. They had been fighting in the system for three days now. She got the report from the battle at Nelus, and she knew that Adrian managed to defeat a Sowir force almost six times larger than his own. But that he also suffered a lot of losses, she didn’t read too much of the report, focusing instead on her own battle.
She had already received word from the Third Fleet about their action in the Rasaka system. The information on the true Sowir and their apparent mind abilities was very interesting, but not really important to her efforts to take this system. Her army regiments were informed of it, and as she understood it, while the ability was amazing and they didn’t understand anything about it yet, it could be countered easily simply by one being forewarned. But it was the army that would deal with that when they start taking the shipyards and stations in the system, she needed to deal with the Sowir in space.
And while the system didn’t have many ships defending it, it was one of their major industrial systems. They had significant fixed defenses. She had managed to goad and then destroy sixty of one hundred and forty enemy ships in the system on the first day of fighting, then she focused on destroying their defense platforms from far out of their effective range by using her ships kinetic weapons.
That was one big advantage of mass movers, their range didn’t really have a limit. They would speed through space until they impact something. Which was great at destroying target that didn’t move, or at least moved on predictable fixed courses. By the end of the second day she had destroyed the last of the platforms, and now the rest of the Sowir ships were moving to engage hers in a pointless attack. She moved her one hundred Kraken class ships to intercept the remaining eighty Sowir ships.
***
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br /> Eighty Sowir ships moved in a tight concave lens formation, speeding towards the Empire dreadnoughts firing their missiles and lasers. The Empire’s ships moved slowly towards the Sowir and the incoming wave of missiles and laser fire. The Kraken class field defense was weaker than that of the Vanguard ships, but even so the Sowir laser fire was being dissipated completely before it could have a chance of touching the hull. As the missiles entered the range of the dreadnoughts point defenses they started to die. Within a minute all of the Sowir missiles were gone and the Empire ships changed to offense. They opened fire with their particle weapons blowing the smaller Sowir ships to bits.
Soon the last of the Sowir ships exploded, and were just minutes before stood eighty ships now only a slowly expanding field of debris was.
***
With the destruction of the last threat to her ships in the system, Bethany gave the go ahead to the army to begin the operations of taking control of the Sowir shipyards and stations. The ground would be more difficult, but after they take control of the space installations they will turn to it. For now she stood away from the planet, they didn’t know what numbers the Sowir – true Sowir had on the grounds, but they did have a significant number of their agents. The plan was to try and get the Sowir to surrender, but the offer wouldn’t be coming until the prisoners from the border system are transferred back to Sanctuary and interrogated. In the meantime Beth would have her hands full with securing the system.
***
Four days later – Sowir shipyard
Platoon Leader Sahib Adin cursed himself for the hundredth time as he charged an enemy with his mono-blade. He stabbed the seven limbed alien through the top of its body hoping to impale its secondary brain and kill it instantly. They had found out early on that if the secondary brain still functioned the agents would keep fighting. As he pulled his blade back and threw the alien of himself he again cursed his luck. As soon as the Exploration Fleet finished with the Furvor his platoon was recalled and sent to the Second Fleet as the most experienced unit that the Empire had.