Legacy of the Guardians
by AJ Marks
Part 26
The Ilderians watched in horror at the descending craft. News reports stated that they were Skartians, invading their planet. Yet mixed in with this was a sketchy report of a human fleet and an Ilderian defense force. No one knew what the truth was, and who the enemy was.
The strange craft landed in a nearby park, and nearby troops anxiously surrounded it, waiting for the invaders to step out. A figure stepped out, quickly surrounded.
Ahmed simply raised his hands seeing the Ilderians. They were not the enemy here. “Do as they say people, the invasion has probably already started.”
He watched the commander of the Ilderian forces look at him, confused. The other people in the escape pod slowly exited in the same fashion.
“We’re human,” Ahmed said to him, hoping that would help. They would have to wait and see what might happen next. He had no problem being a prisoner of the Ilderians now.
“Captain, look,” a man next to him said, pointing up to the sky.
They all looked up seeing a familiar ship heading down to the surface of the planet. A Skartian landing craft, he knew they had weapons in the escape pod, and they could help, but first he had to quickly convince the Ilderian here.
“That’s a Skartian troop transport, and it looks like its going to land not far from here. We can help you,” Ahmed said, as they both looked up at the craft. He watched the Ilderiand for a few seconds as he radioed to headquarters something and got a reply back.
“It appears you humans are here to help, very well, follow me,” he said.
“Private, break out the weapons, form up with the Ilderians, take your orders from them,” Ahmed said, watching the Ilderian appear a bit shocked by his words. They looked back up at the ship as one of the privates came up to him.
“They’ll jump out I a few seconds, I figure the closest will land right over there,” the private said, and Ahmed realized he was a marine, who handed Ahmed an assault rifle.
“Take a position over there,” the Ilderian finally said, pointing over to an area close by where they could take cover.
“Okay, let’s move people, we have inbound,” Ahmed said, another person handing him a communicator. He listened in on the reports, hearing that Fleet R arrived shortly after the destruction of the Moscow. “We need to stall them again, we have reinforcements inbound from Fleet R.”
The group did not have to wait long until the Skartians landed in force. The Ilderians and humans were outnumbered, and as they fired he wondered how long he would have to hold out. Two men had fallen, along with several Ilderians. He finally decided to radio for help.
“This is Captain Ahmed to anyone listening, come in,” he said, wondering if anyone would even reply.
“Captain Ahmed, this is Captain Yattel, what can I do for you?” a voice said back.
“Just great, about to get overrun by Skartians,” Ahmed replied back to him.
“I need your position, we have ground forces about to descend to the planet’s surface,” Yattel said. Ahmed quickly gave the position and was told an ETA of a few minutes. Ahmed quickly informed the rest saying they only had to hold on for a more minutes.
The group seemed to gain some renewed fight with the knowledge that help was on the way. Even the Ilderians fought well holding off the Skartians. Ahmed glanced up seeing an encouraging sight, a descending marine transport.
It landed quickly and the commander of the troops quickly took over, and drove the Skartians back. Once the Skartians were pushed back first aid was given to a few of Ahmed’s people and the Ilderians. The commander came over quickly updating him. They had made it, and that the fight in space was in their favor. Landing crews were send down where ever the Skartians were.
Even as they talked, the Ilderian commander came over with reports that the human marines had turned the tide of battle all over the planet. The Skartians were in full retreat.
*****
Jack paced around the room, as he had ever since he had sent the fleet off. With no word he had no idea what might be happening, and sitting here proved extremely difficult for the admiral.
“Why are you not worried,” Jack asked, looking over at Steve, who sat with a casual attitude despite the situation.
“Because you’re going enough worrying for both of us,” Steve replied back to him, as Jack continued to pace. “Besides, me worrying about it won’t change what’s happened. And one of us needs to be calm. Why are you so worried?”
“There’s too much on my being right this time, if I’m wrong, it would be a disaster. And not knowing if I’m right or wrong is nerve wracking,” Jack replied back to him.
“Commander, incoming message from Fleet R,” the communications officer said, directing any further conversation between them.
“Put it though,” Jack said, watching as the screen showed George’s face. “How are things going?”
“The battle’s over for now, I’d like a couple of refueling tankers and supply ships sent out as soon as possible,” George said.
“All right, any reason why?” Jack asked.
“I have a feeling that we’ll need to help the others as well. The Skartians came close to destroying the Ilderian homeworld. It was close,” George said before continuing. “I pushed the ships beyond the safety limits and almost arrived too late to help.”
“How close?” Steve asked, interrupting the conversation.
“Too close, another five minutes and they’d have destroyed every major city on the planet, as I was, the losses are quite high,” George told them. It made Jack uneasy that the Skartians would kill so many civilians so easily. What was there motivation?
“Have you talked to the Ilderian government about staying?” Steve asked, bringing the conversation back on track. It was a logical question considering the fact George seemed to want to stay.
“Yes, they have no problems, and they want to talk about combining forces against the Skartians,” George said. “They are going to present Randall with an alliance proposal for defense and trade, and allies in this current war.”
“Unexpected news, but welcomed,” Steve said, as jack thought about that for a few seconds. His superiors would defiantly like that news.
“This could come in handy, especially when explaining the events in the Middle East and the situation to the current world. They are still in disbelief over what happened. I don’t think we can pass off that the missiles were self-detonated, because not every missile did that,” Jack said, thinking out loud to himself. “Tell the Ilderians I look forward to working with them. What are our loses?”
“Lost a cruiser and destroyer on the way, FTL drives exploded. The carrier Shokaku and battlecruiser Hannover along with three destroyers have engine damage. During the battle we lost the carrier Courageous, and the battlecruisers Moscow, Urel and etrai along with three cruisers and five destroyers, most were part of the first patrol squadron, baseically wiped out but their actions probably saved a lot of lives,” George said. “Loss of life was lither because most got to the escape pods and made to the planet. Ground forces lost about a hundred and fifty men, and from the ship about a thousand. The ilderians give an estimate of some fifty million killed.”
“And the fleet?” Jack asked,
“About eighty percent of our normal strength, the Shokaku and Hannover should be joining the fleet shortly. The captains dropped out of FTL to cool down their engines before they exploded and any real damage occurred,” George told them.
“Okay, we’ll get the supply ships out to you at once, good job admiral,” Jack said, as George ended the conversation.
Jack ordered a fleet of tankers and supply ships to head out at once before looking once more at the border situation. Everything still appeared calm.
“Looks like you were right,” Steve said. “Seems quiet, wonder if that will stay that way?”
“Don’t know, but I want the remaining ships to continue to protect Earth, this station is expendable,” Jack said to him. They had told Petrov to ignore any attack against the station, his only concern was Earth until further orders came in.
“Been an interesting day,” Steve finally said, as they went about gathering the latest information from the battle that Dinen sent.
*****
Randall walked back into the room after lunch and felt as if he walked into a war. The Heckian and Ukpter ambassadors were screaming about the Skartians. The Dedian ambassador stood firm against any idea of total war against any race. The fact that so many still were on the Dedian’s made everything very vocal.
I think you’ve suffered an illusion by the humans, after all, haven’t they destroyed most of the Skartian military?” the Dedian ambassador said to everyone. “They probably orchestrated the entire thing, after all you can’t trust a human.”
“Do you have anything to say in your defense ambassador?” the President asked, as everyone looked over at Randall.
“First of I’d like to know what is going on?” Randall said. He had a feeling he knew, but wanted to make sure before saying anything. He felt concerned, especially considering he still felt strange in the room.
“There are reports of Skartians attacking several other races, including the Ilderians, Ukpters, Heckians and the Yettipians,’ the President replied, and Randall fet a bit of shock a the last race. He had not been informed of them.
“The Yettipians?” Randall asked quickly, looking over for conformation from their ambassador, who merely nodded in sullen silence. “I’m afraid that one is news to me, we were not aware of such an attack on them.”
Randall’s answer did not appease the Dedian ambassador one bit. Instead he continued to attack the human race. Randall found himself defending his race the entire meeting. He could see that the entire debate had split the council more than anything else ever had. The four of them, the humans, Heckians, Ukpter and Yettipian ambassadors against everyone else.
Randall would have liked to have Kinser there as well, but his friend was busy with what happened back on his homeworld.
Once the meeting was over, he invited the other to a conference. It did not take long before they were all in the room, minus Kinser, who was talking to his government.
“We want to know what you have to say to us that you couldn’t say in the council, you were too quiet for a human,” the Heckian ambassador said, sitting down across from Randall.
“Okay, I don’t trust anyone in the council. Someone there is trying to manipulate everyone,” Randall said. “I’ve been getting weird feelings in there, and whenever I sense that, there is an increase in hostility against me. It doesn’t make any sense to me.”
“How do we know you’re not doing it?” the Ukpter asked.
“Think back on the last couple of meetings and the hostility towards me and humanity. It hasn’t always been there, usually you’re all more uncaring, not hostile,” Randall said to them, watching them think about that.
“Now that you mention it, I do recall thinking last meeting that humans were evil the beginning of the last meeting, before I heard about my homeworld, and the warning you gave me,” the Heckian said. The other two sat thinking about that as well.
“I seemed to want to think that as well all meeting long, it confused me, but now, it seems so clear what happened,” the Yettipian said.
“That’s the exact reason why I did not attend,” Kinser said, walking into the room and sat down.
“Kinser, how are you?” Randall asked his friend.
“Well, as good as expected, better thanks to your races quick intervention,” Kinser said, as the others looked confused. “The humans sent one of their fleets to help us against the Skartians, and yes, they were Skartians, we have prisoners.”
“Why did not send help to us?” the Ukpter asked.
“Two reasons, we were not positive about the attacks, and we didn’t have the ships. The Ilderians homeworld was closest,” Randall replied, knowing that this question would come up. “And we still were not sure it wasn’t a trick to divert our ships away from our homeworld. After all, we are the ones who were at war with the Skartians, not you.”
“Can you help us now?” the Ukpter ambassador asked. “Our military is about destroyed.”
“We will only go where we are welcome,” Randall said.
“My government gave me acting ability to do whatever I thought could help under the emergency powers,” the Yettipian ambassador said. “All you need is my word.”
Randall thought about that before realizing the Yettipian was a monarchy, and the ambassador was part of the Royal family. If they were all wiped out he would be the emperor.”
“”I’ll see what I can do,” Randall said.
“My government is proposing a new alliance between the Humans and the Ilderians, we can include you as well,” Kinser said.
The other three thought about it. The Yettipian agreed rather quickly, the other two did not have the power, and would have to talk to their governments, fi they could reach them. Randall made a note to talk to Steve about sending help to the other races as soon as possible as they worked out the details of the agreement.
*****
Jack got back to his desk early the next morning, and saw a message from Randall. It seemed that an agreement between the Ilderians, Ukpterians, Heckians and Yettipians had been reached. The last one he rasied an eyebrow at wondering why they would be part of the alliance. He read through the report, seeing that they had also been attack by the Skartians, and requested help. The more disturbing note mentioned the council might be under someone else’s control.
Jack drummed his fingers on the desk at that news. The council had been a tremendous ally for them over the years, and now to learn most no longer trusted humans was a deep blow. He was glad about the alliance, and could inform Dinen to proceed without any problems. He also noted that the alliance called for type ten warfare, which meant anything was allowed. He also noticed it was the other races calling for that, Randall asked for type eight.
He looked up watching Steve enter the room. Without a word Jack handed him the message, watching as he read it.
“The Yettipians? This is news, didn’t know they were going to be attacked,” Steve finally said after a few seconds. “At least they’re not blaming us for it. The question is now why?”
“Been asking that question myself, but this this is more than the Skartians are, someone is controlling them, and that bothers me,” Jack said, also knowing they had other problems.
“What about India and Pakistan, and the other nations, they won’t believe that surface to air missiles knocked down those nukes, nor will they believe a ‘Star Wars’ type program either, because no nation has one in space yet,” Steve said to him.
“I know, but I have an idea, and for that we’ll need an Ilderian warship here,” Jack said. “We can have them take credit for the destruction of the missiles, we only have to think of a reason why.”
“Might work, send it to intelligence, they might think of something,” Steve said.
“Good idea, go with it,” Jack said, watching as Steve turned to another officer and spoke with him. He turned back to the star charts looking over the area of space that had been invaded by the Skartians. He wished he could figure out who was helping them, and why. The other problem they had, how would they help these other races the fastest?
End part 26
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