Chapter 9

Chapter Nine

F�"ngfù System
Planet IV �" Nóngtián
Former Wan Ren Territory

Captain Xun Ren could see the satellites appear in the video screens as the battleship he was on came out of warp a mere ten kilometres away.  It was a new tactic his people had been developing.  Warp in directly on top of the targets with your fingers on the trigger. The enemy would have no time to react, no time to escape.  The danger of such a maneuver, and why it had never been performed in large scale fleet combat, came from the massive energy burst created as the negative energy built up by the warp engines was suddenly released as the ships came out of warp.  Come in too close to another ship and both could be ripped apart in the shockwave.  But the reward from a successful hot drop, as they called it, was far greater than the risks. And they had been practicing for this moment for the better part of a decade.

The first part of the attack strategy was simple, cut the head from the beast.  Communications satellites came first.  A volley of torpedoes hurtled towards the orbiting structures.  Next were the station and space elevator. A small squadron of attack cruisers and frigates began flickering in to existence as they came out of warp.  They swarmed the station like a plague of locusts.  Tiny explosions rippled across the structures followed quickly by larger ones until the entire station was consumed in a fireball, quickly extinguished by the vacuum of space.  The space elevator began to fall, it’s massive column whipping down to the planets surface like a vengeful strike from god.   No one could warn anyone, no one could escape.  

A cacophony of voices flooded the command deck as commands, coordinates and trajectories were echoed through communication networks.  Xun began tuning it all out as he focused on the data and images scrolling past his eyes.  The flotilla consisted of three battleships, ten heavy attack cruisers, five support vessels and an array of frigates with various specialties.  Complete overkill, he thought.  He found himself filled with an odd mixture of vengeful satisfaction and disappointing regret.

“Communications down.  Station and Transport down.” A voice noted from somewhere in the room.

“Prepare the ground assault,” another said.

Xun was all too aware of the devastation that was about to unfold planet side.  There were no soldiers here, no standing military.  No, this was a land of famers, workers, families.  Nongtian was a custom made planet, terraformed for the sole purpose of producing food for the Wan Ren territories. This planet, like so many others, had been ripped away from his people nearly two decades ago.  In the void left when his people were forced to flee, Nongtian was occupied by independent colonists.  This would be the seventh system and ninth planet the Wan-Ren had reclaimed.  

He had been just a child when the scourge surfaced, a strange illness that swept across the known galaxy, seeming to infect only the genetically pure Wan Ren.  It had claimed his brother and sisters, his parents.  Before long, war had broken out between the Wan Ren and the Central Systems Alliance, the latest political atrocity to govern his ancestral home.  Between the war and the plague, some eighty percent of his people fell from this existence.  

Xun never fully understood, growing up, why everyone hated everyone else.  It all seemed contrary to the teachings of his parents and the way of the ancestors. Loyalty, compassion, love of your fellow man, these were the tenets that guided his nation from earth so many centuries ago.  But when his parents died and his siblings fell ill he too found a hatred growing inside.  A rage had formed, a fire stoked by the society around him, now scarred by fear and war.  

His uncle was a former soldier turned politician and when Xun’s family died he was taken to live with him.  His uncle believed, like many at the time, that the plague was a deliberate attack designed by the Central Systems to weaken their great nation and take control of their territories.  Xun could hear his uncle’s angry rhetoric echoing in his ears as he watched the swarm of ships wash over the remnants of the planets defences.  The klaxons wailed.  Xun’s eyes began to burn as he realized he hadn’t blinked in some time.  

“Captain?  Will you be joining your squad?” a voice said as though it had been repeating the question.

Xun took his helmet from under his arm and placed it on his head.  The seals hissed as the suit pressurized and locked in to place.  He spun on his heels and nodded to the ships commander as he walked quickly from the room.   

As he moved quickly down the corridors, his fast walk became a run.  The corridors were eerily empty, everyone already at their combat stations.  His suit clanked and echoed through the empty halls as he made his way to the drop room.  As the final door slid open he was greeted by row after row of soldiers locked in to harnesses.  One hundred armoured faced snapped his direction and shouted in salute.  He took a moment to survey his troops.  He knew very few would die today and it gave him a small amount of comfort, but not enough to overcome his previous state of mind.

Xun stepped to his harness and placed a hand on the shoulder of his second in command.

“Hiro.”  He said as he settled himself in and locked the harness.

“For our people,” Hiro said.

“For our Ancestors,” Xun replied.

Xun could hear the sounds of the battleship launching the pre assault weapons, a series of bombs designed to shock and incapacitate any resistance.  They weren’t explosive per say, but rather would land and release a thick poisonous fog and a network of proximity mines though out a central radius.  Anyone attempting to navigate through the haze would either choke to death or eventually run in to one of the mines releasing its payload.  

Shortly after the bombardment stopped a new set of klaxons rang and his drop pod jolted.  The lights switched from red to green and the atmospheric shields slammed shut around him as the drop pod began hurling through the launch tubes.  After thirty seconds of intense jostling Xun felt gravity taking control of the pod as it exited the ship.  Outside he knew the air was rushing past him, gravity doing its best to tear him apart before reaching the ground.  Inside, all he could hear were the subtle chirps of his suits computer relaying information through his visors heads up display.  A small ticker flashed in the bottom counting down the time until landing.  He knew that if he were on the ground looking up right now, it would seem as though the sky were raining fire as a terrifying fog began creeping across the fields before him leaving death in its wake.  

Xun knew the fog alone would do enough damage to the small farming communities that the entire assault would cause barely a drop of sweat to shed from his soldiers.  One by one the drop pods thrusters began to fire slowing down the pods and guiding them to their landing zone.  They fell with absolute precision and as the doors slid open the soldiers in side rushed to form their squads.  Across the planet twenty squads were executing the same maneuvers.  His own pod landed with a violent jolt.  The doors slid open and his harness released.  He raised his rifle and moved with purpose towards the front of his squad’s formation.  

It was early morning in Nóngtián’s district eight where Xun’s squad had dropped.  Other squads would be attacking in the middle of the night, but at the rising sun began to peak out above the distant mountains separating the field districts, beams of light danced through the fog creating an almost ethereal beauty.  Most of the people in the near by city would be still asleep, or just waking up and getting to their daily routines.  He felt a pity for them.

Xun sent three of the five squads under his command to do an advance sweep while the remaining two would flank the perimeter of the city to prevent anyone from escaping.  With in moments the low rumble of the gauss rifles and ion pistols charging and releasing rounds echoed through the air. The report was broken by the occasional hushed explosions of the proximity mines followed by the wet pops of bodies being ripped apart by the shockwaves.  And then there were the screams.  Xun cringed as they pierced the air.  

Their mission was simple.  Remove the inhabitants and cause as little damage to the surface as possible.   Once reclaimed, farming operations would need to resume as quickly as possible to ensure enough supply to the growing assault forces.  Xun had never been to Nóngtián before now, but he could imagine what it must have been like before all of this, before the plague.  Before he was forced to come here and cleanse the world for his people.

He tried to keep his focus as the first sign of runners came staggering through the fog.  Xun raised his weapon and took aim.  In an instant his gauss riffle whined with its charge and released three rounds of ionized tungsten bullets.  They ripped through the target leaving clouds of red hanging in the air as the blood droplets clung to the deadly mist.  The person fell, and as another figure emerged nearby, Xun heard his squad open fire and like the first unfortunate soul, the other denizens burst into clouds of red.

As the squad moved deeper in to the fog, the city slowly came into shape.  Another stranger stumbled his way towards them, gasping for air, but before Xun could fire, a flash went off as an invisible shockwave vaporized the top half of the inhabitant’s body leaving behind only a twitching pair of legs on the ground where he was alive just moments ago.  By the time his squad had circled the perimeter and met the rest of the platoon in the town square the violence had all but ended.  Xun called in for the water ships to come supress the fog.

Once the ships had brought the rain, the fog faded away leaving behind a muddy blood stained ground littered with bodies, some whole, some in pieces.   The pain in his chest from before the assault had returned.

He removed his helmet, the air now safe to breath, and surveyed the area with fresh eyes.  Near the edge of the square was a row of captives was being formed by a few soldiers.  The sergeant giving orders pulled out his side arm and began walking behind the captives, one by one, pulling the trigger. Xun turned away.

Out of the corner of his eye he saw movement.  Instinctively he spun and raised his rifle, silently cursing himself for drawing attention. But it didn’t matter; the executioner saw it, two people running from behind a building.  What looked like a young boy and girl, perhaps no older than Xun himself, were desperately fleeing the square.  The sergeant shouted a command and two privates raised their weapons and began waking calmly towards them as they ran.  Xun had his sight on the couple but couldn’t manage to pull the trigger.  His finger trembled as the muscles tightened and he held his breathe asa whining boom echoed from behind him and a puff of red bloomed from the boy’s chest.  His body dropped and slid across the dirt.  The girl spun, dropping to her knees, screaming as she pulled at the boy’s lifeless body.  He fired. The girls head snapped back and she collapsed on top of the boy.  Xun lowered his weapon and looked over his shoulder at the soldier who took the first shot.  Together they continued to approach the couple.  

They were indeed young.  Too young, Xun thought, to have died in such a way.  The boy’s fist was clenched tight, holding something.  The private stepped on his wrist forcing it to release and a small diamond ring rolled out.  Xun’s gut twisted in agony.

“Sir?  Are you alright?” the private asked.   He sounded as though he were a thousand kilometres away.  Xun ignored him and called out of the network,

“Sergeant, cease fire.”

The sergeant performing the executions stopped his killing.

“Sir?”

“We’re done here.  Put them on a shuttle with clearance codes for the blockade and send them away.”

“He could see his squad was confused but they obeyed his commands.  He bent down and picked up the ring that had been in the boys hand and placed it in his side satchel.  Then placed his helmet back on and began walking towards the extraction point.

The flight back to the battle ship was rough and filled with unexpected thoughts.  Xun found himself deeply troubled by the deaths of the young couple at the city.  He had been brought up in a traditional Wan Ren fashion, family meditations, weekly ceremonies and nightly offerings to speak with those no longer with him.  His father had taught him the importance and value of the martial arts, and how to make it a part of his daily meditations.  Xun’s mother, thoughts of her hurt the most, taught him of compassion and love for the Universe and all things in it.  She taught him of the Universes greater purpose.

When they were killed by the plague he was still a child.  His uncles family had taken him in, they were of a more modern mentality with strong political and nationalist ties.  The talk at dinners would typically include conspiracy theories, demagoguery and anti-Earth rhetoric, and occasionally, an apology to Xun for the loss of his of family.  His uncles words began to play back in his mind again as the drop ship breached the planets orbit.

In all fairness, he was angry too.  His family was gone and he didn’t really know why.  No one did.  The origins of the plague to this very day remained a mystery.  But that did not stop his government from seeking vengeance on those they felt responsible for the thing that very nearly erased his nation from existence.  After all, what else could they do?  The plague killed more than two thirds of his entire civilization.  At first only a few rogue ‘resistance’ groups began attacking the so called relief efforts the CSA had sent.  Eventually, though, that dragged the rest of his people in to all-out war.  But between the plague and an all-out assault by CSA forces, the Wan Ren were forced to retreat as their numbers fell rapidly.

Xun felt a surge of rage overpower his guilt, but the rage was quickly replaced with shame as he again thought of his mother.  What would she think of his life now?  Resorting to petty vengeance on a people who may very well have had nothing at all to do with the struggles of his people?  The drop ship rocked and slammed against something as it began its docking procedure and he suddenly found himself back in his harness.  He examined the cabin, looking over his troops as they chatted among themselves with an almost joyous tone.  After all, it had been a decisive victory.  All he had to do now was face his superiors.