War's Reward (Free Fleet Book 6) Read online

  Chapter There are no victors in war

  Chapter Holding Ground

  Chapter Race against time

  Chapter Time to go on the offensive

  Chapter Line in the Sand

  Chapter Endgame

  Chapter A War of Attrition

  Chapter Bad Days

  Chapter Move it

  Chapter Hard Decisions

  Chapter Far from done

  Chapter Help is Coming

  Chapter It comes to this

  Chapter And they held

  Chapter Time to change tactics

  Chapter Slow and Steady

  Chapter Time to End This

  Chapter Redeployment

  Chapter Time to Face the Music

  Chapter Don’t Catch a Tiger by The Tail

  Check out http://michaelchatfield.com for a full map of the Free Fleet universe.

  Chapter There are no victors in war

  Hic Stamus rumbled with fire, it was a constant and tiring noise. We had been in the planet’s atmosphere for a few days, much to the displeasure of the Kalu.

  With every rumble my super-carrier destroyed a new section of Chaleel’s planet. I tried to not think about the cleanup that would happen after the battle across the planet. Chaleel supplied many planets with food from the farms that ran around the entire planet. Fields now filled with Kalu that were trying their damnedest to make it through the Free Fleet ships that floated above them, the Heavily Armored Powered Armor, or HAPA’s that marched beneath us and the Chaleelian tanks that added their own withering fire.

  We weren’t killing the Kalu, we were eradicating them. They were the new crops of Chaleel and harvest had come in the shape of the Free Fleet.

  “Something on your mind?” Rick asked me. The first time I’d met him, he’d patched my shoulder up. I’d been Salchar a world-class gaming celebrity. He had been a recent new addition to the American Air force. Five years later and I was Salchar the Commander of the Free Fleet, he was the Chief of Staff.

  We had fought the Syndicate, Kalu, every kind of race and even our own. We had somehow survived battles that all too many hadn’t, I was twenty-two and damn if I didn’t feel old.

  “Just thinking about the first couple of times that we were here,” I said, my eyes no longer focusing on the screens that processed information from my personal fleet, and the other actions of the Free Fleet at large.

  “Times be changing,” Rick said, I could hear similar emotions in his voice.

  The first time we had come to Chaleel it had been in a baptism of fire. We had just finished training at Hachiro, it hadn’t been named that yet, and we were told to take and hold Chaleel’s power plants.

  We’d taken those positions and terrorized the people of Chaleel under the instructions of the Syndicate. Half of our number had stayed here and the rest had continued on towards Parnmal. We didn’t have a choice in the matter, not doing as we were told meant that we were tortured, or killed.

  My jaw clamped in anger, thinking of those months that had turned us from kids and teenagers into soldiers. It had also led to the creation of the Free Fleet.

  With our return to Chaleel, we rescued our people and took on the Syndicate forces in the system. This also led to us freeing Chaleel. They’d been apprehensive of our actions at the beginning, it took them time to warm up to us. We promised to do our best in looking out for them and set out towards Earth.

  Chaleel was under attack again, and again the Free Fleet was protecting them. They weren’t the only system that the Free Fleet was defending. We were spread across nine systems fighting the Kalu.

  Sol had Orshpa making his entrance into the system.

  Daestramus had started their ground campaign against Orshpa’s prime Falhu which had finally taken out the planet’s cities which had been converted into laser-canoes. Calling them Laser cannons was a weak comparison to the fire that they had hurled into the Kalu forces.

  “How long until Bregend’s Henry-Classed Destroyers in Daestramus reach Earth and Cheerleader?” I asked.

  “A day for Earth, they’re going to do three jumps. Five days for the other half to get to Cheerleader,” Rick said.

  I nodded, they would be joining what looked to be the last two star-battles against the Kalu. Hopefully withering down Orshpa’s fleet down to something that wouldn’t immediately overwhelm the Free Fleet infrastructure and Earth.

  I looked to the swiping information across the deck, while I wouldn’t be in Earth for a few days, Whorst and all of the ships I was capable of releasing from Chaleel were on their way.

  I stood from my seat, striding forth in my powered armor, my feet clanked on the floor as I wrapped my hands over the railing. I watched the main screen that looked at the ground beneath us.

  Machines of war followed in our path, weapons fire lashing out from our turrets. I watched as we burned away Chaleel and the Kalu infection that had touched it.

  We killed thousands of the Kalu in minutes. I had seen the feeds from Jakram, I remember having fought the Kalu on Heija. Some might call this fight a genocide, I wasn’t sure that I’d disagree with them. I was sure that I wasn’t going to give the Kalu an honorable fight.

  I watched and waited, I dared not look away, bartering my soul for the victory that would come. This was an extermination.

  A part of me wished the fights had been this easy on the other planets. Another part of me wished that war was never as easy as this.

  When the dust settles and the people finally look out to see their lands are clear of Kalu, will they look to the sky in fear? That thought pervaded my mind as Hic Stamus and the rest of my fleet continued their unrelenting push forward. Kalu fighters still tried to attack us, wings of our own Multiple Environment Fighters, or MEF’s smashing into them with the assistance of the Personal Defense Systems of our warships.

  Hic Stamus rolled, we’d taken a number of hits on our presented side. Bots moved across the side not shown to the Kalu fighters and started their repairs.

  “Not long until the Kalu fighters start running out of fuel,” Rick observed.

  “Couldn’t come fast enough,” I replied, standing away from the railing while rolling the shoulders of my powered armor.

  I walked back to my chair, pulling up information on Commander Whorst and Foshunti’s fleet.

  ***

  “Let’s be about it,” Commander Whorst said, looking to his command center. Calling it a bridge would be pushing it. He was the Commander of War-station the biggest mobile platform in known existence.

  Five decks made up the command center to relay all of the information of the station and the fleet.

  A hologram appeared of a creature wearing a dark cloak with Dovarkian numbers in grey running over it.

  “Devastahli, good of you to join us,” Commander Whorst said, the apparition looking to him with glowing red eyes. Commander Whorst had never seen the form underneath the cloak, but the way it lay across Devastahli’s body spoke to the holographically animated muscles that bunched with every movement.

  “Seeing as you are the one’s piloting my habitat I have little ability to be anywhere else,” he said. His voice was harsh and deep.

  Whereas Devastahli was large with a deep voice, Whorst was average height with dirty blonde hair and a muscular build. No one in the Free Fleet got through training without muscle.

  “Such is the way of the Free Fleet, we go where we’re told,” Whorst said, his eyes on the holographic sphere around him. It took the collective information from those around him and allowed him to manipulate it with ease.

  Right now he was looking at a representation of Sol, Orshpa and his forces had entered the system along a p
ath that took them towards Mars. While it was a good path to mars, it wasn’t a good path to Earth. Earth was about Twenty degrees off of Mars and a hell of a lot farther.

  “Wormhole generators are good to go, shifting power to the projectors,” Peck said from his position at Helm.

  What looked to be a spinning sphere appeared before War-station and the rest of the Fleet. Their Wormhole to Sol.

  “Let’s get a move on then,” Whorst said, the station’s engines increased power, passing through the wormhole’s event horizon, other ships also opening and passing through their wormholes.

  The Screens changed for a few moments and then flashed to life with the Faster-Than-Light relays recognizing them and shunting all of the sensor data of the system into their systems.

  “We are clear of hostiles,” Zal said, studying sensors.

  “Clearing wormhole and setting course for Mars,” Peck said.

  “Richter, take us off of alert.” Whorst looked to the blonde haired, blue eyed poster boy that was his second-in-command.

  “Sir,” Richter acknowledged, his eyes on his screens as lights changed colors and people took their powered armor’s helmets off.

  “Arfo, get me a channel to Commander Foshunti,” Whorst said as this was going on.

  “One moment,” Arfo said.

  A ping on Whorst’s holographic sphere told him that Foshunti was available.

  “Letting us go Commander?” Foshunti asked. Whorst could hear the hunger in Foshunti’s voice, undoubtedly being stuck to go the pace of War-station had played on the other commander’s nerves.

  You’d be lying if you said it didn’t play on yours too, Whorst thought to himself.

  “Yes, you and your squadron are free to go, good hunting commander,” Whorst said.

  “And you too Commander,” Foshunti cut off the channel.

  “Commander Foshunti’s squadron is moving away,” Zal said a few moments later.

  Twenty-seven ships moved to intercept the Kalu heading towards Earth.

  Whorst and nineteen other ships were powering on towards Mars. According to the laws of physics and Peck’s calculations, the Free Fleet would be there in a day with eight hours to spare before the Kalu arrived.

  Whorst changed his view of the system, looking to the fleet that was approaching Earth, since it was going along a path with less planets and gravitational objects on it, the Henry-Classed Destroyers, or HCD’s were jumping around the fleet, hitting them with their laser cannons.

  Whorst had watched their attacks while the Kalu crossed the systems between Chaleel and Sol, now they were on their final leg. Kalu fighters raced around the Kalu fleet and tried to bring the HCD formations under fire, but they were too far away and their lasers too weak to do too much damage. They had got lucky and the HCD’s had grouped together more tightly and spread away from the Kalu formation.

  The hope was that the Kalu fighters would burn a hell of a lot of fuel, plus with their lack of bombs to accelerate themselves like the rest of the Kalu fleet, the Kalu fleet had to travel at slower speeds.

  It wouldn't be long until they got too far in-system for them to keep jumping ahead of the Kalu without severe risks of the wormhole malfunctioning and opening in the wrong place or the wormhole’s being unstable and destroying any ships that traveled them.

  Not long ago Whorst had been the system commander of Earth. In the short time that he had been away from his post it had changed. Mars was creating its own cities, Hachiro was now twice the size and there were three other asteroids that had been moved into orbit to become stations. Nancy was nearly as big as she had been before she donated Nelly and Nate to Chaleel and AIH.

  Markers of haulers, freighters and shuttles moved between all of the different structures. Earth by contrast had only a few ships moving around the entire planet. After they had tried to take over the Free Fleet they had been ostracized by the space-going community at large. Most of the ships that were moving around were either private company owned, or built by the governments of Earth. Each of them represented a good chunk of Earth’s resources and credits.

  The Kalu ships, even with all that the HCD’s had done outnumbered all of the ships in-system by a hefty margin. That wasn’t even including their fighters.

  “Let’s have a look at those weapon emplacements around Mars again,” Whorst said. He had one task, keep Mars safe. It was Foshunti’s job to look after Earth.

  Gun emplacements appeared on the map in front of him, detailing what their range and cones of fire were.

  He had a battle to plan for and if there was a saint Murphy, and he knew there was there would be last minute alterations and decisions that he would have to make.

  ***

  Commander Wesom looked over what had been the purple’s, yellows and blues of Jakram. Now there were just scars, fires and the bodies of Free Fleet and Kalu alike.

  Five hundred thousand Commandos had been waiting on the planet when the battle had started, four hundred thousand more of the population had volunteered for combat, two hundred and thirteen thousand were left of either force, but the civilians were safe.

  Wesom wanted to fall in the dirt and cry, he had lost so many friends, so many people had died and yet he had survived to see this terrible sight.

  There was a booming noise from above, the first Free Fleet ships were finally descending towards the planet. Following them were the Free Merchant ships that would drop off what aid they could and gather up Wesom and his forces. They were needed on Ershue, Jakram might be safe, but the Free Fleet and the Kalu were far from finished in their war.

  “Check all of our people, make sure they are ready to go,” Wesom said, he turned towards the space port. The view didn’t change much, signs of death and loss were everywhere. He stood in what had been the capital of Jakram. Now it was falling buildings, burnt parks and bodies. Kalu lay across defenses, civilians that hadn’t run lay in the street. Wesom had opened his mask when he exited the bunkers and promptly evacuated the purple soup the Free Fleet lived on.

  The planet smelt like death a few months old in a humid atmosphere.

  Civilians walked through the cities, looking in wonder and shock. Volunteers walked around, making sure there were no surprises. Some had found a comfortable place to sit and were crying, sleeping, or looking at what had become of their planet.

  Wesom moved through defensive positions that he had manned just months or weeks ago, they felt like years.

  He trudged through the mess, his second, Jar sent him an alert. The first Commandos were boarding their shuttles and other craft.

  He picked up his pace, memories flicked through his mind as he focused on his path through the destroyed city.

  It didn’t take him long to get to the space port.

  Commandos, HAPA’s and personnel moved in order to the massive Free Fleet warships and Merchant freighters. He cast a look over the city that was perched on the edge of a cliff. The sun was near afternoon, but the red dust from bombarding the planet so many times with the Free Fleet’s shipboard guns made it look pink. Some said that it would remain for generations.

  A month of fighting and we changed an entire planet for generations. He shook his head, not knowing if he felt, disgust, guilt, anger or just frustration.

  He opened up his HUD, information filling his field of view, a line showed him the way to his ship. He joined the moving mass of a hundred a seventy-three thousand Commandos.

  It was quiet other than the thumping of armor on the space port’s reinforced pad. They all knew where they were going and they all knew some of them weren’t coming back.

  They were veterans, one and all, gone were the illusions of heroism or the belief that they couldn’t be killed.

  I just hope I kill more of the bastards before they take me out, Wesom summarized their feelings as he thumped aboard a shuttle. The doors sealed and the shuttle took off, he fell into a seat, a harness clamping over him.

  The rough jostling was nothing like the poun
ding of the Free Fleet’s cannons, he quickly fell asleep, he’d need all the rest he could get before Ershue.

  ***

  Fal looked at the main screen that displayed what had come to be referred to as ‘The Mound’ on Ershue.

  The landscape had changed in ways he had never thought possible since the Kalu landed. Swathes of sacred forest had been ripped apart by both the mound's artillery and the Kalu's lasers.

  The mounds flat top had been dug into with massive trenches and the three-kilometer-wide and three story tall base that he stood in the center of.

  Smoke rose from the forest. Trees for kilometers around the mound had been turned into wreckage. The vibrant colors of the forest colored with destruction.

  It hurt him inside to see the new scars that his planet now bore.

  "We will rebuild Fal," Kurft said, reading his thoughts as he too looked at the main screen.

  "I know," Fal answered, their eyes meeting briefly before they looked towards the screen again.

  "We have word coming in from the guerilla forces," Poj said, referring to the platoon sized Ershue units that had been deployed around the planet to make the Kalu's lives a living hell. They'd done well in their duties, poisoning food and water so Kalu were barely able to fight, booby trapping their lines of approach and designating camps for bombing targets.

  It hadn't been without risks. Hundreds had died in order to carry out their duty.

  "On screen," Kurft said. The guerilla forces always got priority.

  It was an artillery designation, the reason that they were asking for confirmation was because it was on a fuelling facility.

  The Kalu weren't as dumb as they looked, they had brought machinery and supplies with them in order to keep themselves and their weapons going. Including Helium processors that could turn water into fusion fuel.