Behold: Humanity!: Screams of the Past, page 1
Behold: Humanity!
Screams of the Past
Ralts Bloodthorne
Peeper Corner Publishing
Copyright © 2022 Ralts Bloodthorne
All rights reserved
The characters and events portrayed in this book are fictitious. Any similarity to real persons, living or dead, is coincidental and not intended by the author.
No part of this book may be reproduced, or stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without express written permission of the publisher.
ISBN-13: 9781234567890
ISBN-10: 1477123456
Cover design by:Rick Roner
Editing by: Elaine Daniels
Library of Congress Control Number: 2018675309
Printed in the United States of America
As always, to my wife and beautiful daughters.
To my friends: Ishi & Kat
And special thanks to the First Contact Gestalt and the people of /HFY subreddt!
Contents
Title Page
Copyright
Dedication
What Has Come to Pass
ASSAULT
Meet General Winter
Standard Hazards
NorAm
The Friends
Graveyard
Of Immortals
GLORY
I Just Want Left Alone
‘Net Ops
Little Girls
Screaming Silence
Because You Need This
Infinity
Infinite Infinity
The Man Comes Around
I Know…
Bitter Drinks
Hard Facts
Holding the Line
Blinky
The Historian
Research and Discovery
Desirous Data
Damaged Infinity & Dogs
Reunited
Evil Never Dies
The Red Lines
Rising Tempers
MOUT Blues
The Lady Comes Around
Game Library
Side Player Life
Slow Healing
But… why?
Math’s Bitter Fruit
On the Sidelines
Quebec Tango 3.145
Hard Decisions
Chapter 322
Command & Memes
Secure Archive
Eternity & Evil
System Online
Herod & The Blue Fairy
Are you a Virgin, Speedy?
SNEAK PEEK!
About The Author
What Has Come to Pass
The Terran Confederacy and the Unified Civilized Council have gone to war. The Lanaktallan have suffered nothing but defeat at the hands of the Mad Lemurs of Terra, losing planet after planet to the lemur’s martial might as well as their terrible weaponry.
However, a year before a plan had been approved by the Unified Council and launched in secrecy. The most massive military movement that the Unified Council had approved of in over fifty million years.
The invasion of Terra-Sol.
However, the Terrans were not the unprepared opponent the Lanaktallan and the Unified Council had expected. Terra-Sol is known as “Fortress Sol” even by the Terran’s allies, the most heavily defended stellar system and world in the known universe.
Guarded by the universe’s premier omnivore intelligent predatory lemur.
The Lanaktallan arrived in the Sol System to find that the rumors, if anything, understated just how well defended the Sol System was. Their fleet has been riven and destroyed, the landing troops annihilated, their planet cracking systems useless.
Not just TerraSol is under attack.
Rigel, home of the Rigellian Saurian Women and their precious ducks. Smokey Cone, home of the crafty and cunning Treana’ad. Mantid Prime. Every home system of every nation of the Confederacy is under attack by the largest fleets the Unified Council have ever launched.
However, the Lanaktallan have never come up against anything like the Terran Confederacy of Aligned Systems and the Mad Lemurs of Terra.
ASSAULT
Most of the dropships and virtually all of the aerospace assets were ripped out of the sky by highly accurate surface to air emplacements, the guns putting out a virtual hail of magnetically accelerated shards of metal. The missiles were just as bad, some of them exploding literally meters away and slamming an explosively forged penetrator through the aircraft, others detonating to spear the craft with javelins of metal that were aerodynamically designed to vibrate and shudder, tearing the craft apart that way. Still, others just slammed a high kiloton non-atomic blast in front of the craft so the craft hit a solid wall of atmosphere or ripped at the craft with shrapnel.
The Lanaktallan were used to air defense systems using lasers, not projectiles, which were wasteful and cost prohibitive.
But the humans didn't seem to care.
eVI and DS attacked the craft, just bricking the flight systems and jumping to the next ship. With so many ships were in the sky, all of them with 'thin' computer systems, the DS and advanced warfare eVI couldn't actually jump from ship to ship. They were forced to hit a ship, withdraw to their own systems, hit the next, and withdraw, over and over.
In orbit there was a ring being formed by the debris.
In the atmosphere it was a hell-scape of missiles, autofire projectiles, chaff, microprism, and fire. Atomic weapons were detonating in the upper atmosphere, destroying ships and the ozone layer in equal measures, but the humans didn't care.
WE'RE NOT TRAPPED IN HERE WITH YOU! YOU'RE TRAPPED IN HERE WITH US!
The dropships and a handful of aerospace fighters reached the target zone. The houses were quaint, the streets all twisting, but the highways straight, and the land largely forested. There were only a handful of cities and those were separated by miles of forest or rolling plains. There were several targets in this part of the continent. Power plants, planetary defense shielding, orbital fire, and system fire batteries. They had to be knocked out if the Lanaktallan Great Herd had any chance of victory.
The ships landed and the crews breathed a sigh of relief. The nuclear dampeners were online, the nanite suppression fields, almost never used, at full power, and the EM warfare suites running.
Vehicles, infantry, and nearly five thousand warmeks left the bays of the troopships. The infantry began digging in rather than immediately pushing for the facilities they'd been tasked with destroying. The units to the south had all gone offline, one group that had attacked a major city just repeating "everywhere... they're everywhere..." before going offline.
The night was lit by the lights on the dropships and mechs and vehicles.
"Where are we?" the Great Most High of the Infantry, Mo'osto'o, asked.
"According to the data passed to us by the Most High Executor of Covert Actions, Yu'umo'o, we are in someplace called Chromium MechaKrautland," the Second Great Most High of Intelligence, Hu'udismo'o, said. He looked at the data in his map. "A largely peaceful area devoted to the manufacture of automobiles, clocks, small glass, and ceramic figurines, and alcohol."
Mo'osto'o pointed at the mountains that reached up into the sky to the east of them. "Taking that valley through the mountains, combined with the men down in the Rind-Metal Plains, shall cut this area in half and prevent reinforcements. The factories on this side of the mountains will not be able to assist the war fighting going on to the East."
"Harrumph, so much for their claims of being 'post-scarcity' if they still have manufacturing," the Great Most High of Armored Units, Erku'ul, replied, making a nasally sound of laughter.
"That has always been debunked," Mo'osto'o said. "Post-scarcity is impossible. There will always be resources that are scarce."
"If we had brought atomics this fight would be over," Erku'ul laughed. "If a planet cracker did not depend upon accurate placement from orbit, we could have detonated one here and finished Terra once and for all."
"My men are looking forward to engaging the Terrans. They are confident in their abilities to defeat the Terrans," Mo'osto'o said. "I hope we see them soon so that I can get the satisfaction of destroying them. I wish to show them the might of the Lanaktallan Great Herd."
"Well, you should have the chance soon," Hu'udismo'o stated. "I'm assigning targets for your various units right now."
"I do not like proceeding without air support," Mo'osto'o said.
"We all have our burdens," Erku'ul snorted. "Don't let the fear prevent you from carrying out your mission," the other Great Most High sneered.
"I more worry about your artillery unit's poor performance killing my men," Mo'osto'o said. "Make sure they load the shells the correct way in their cannons this time. The pointy end goes in first."
"How dare you!" Erku'ul snarled. "I'll have you know..."
"Silence," the Great Most High of the section of the invasion force snapped, trotting up. "All of you, take your mission assignments and..."
Shots were beginning to be fired and the sound of several tanks firing made everyone turn around.
Warmeks. Giant warmeks were wading through the forest, the tops of the trees even with their waists. They were colored red, black, and yellow, moving forward in formation.
Mo'osto'o stared, his mouth gaped open, as the rear rank fired a rolling volley of missiles that hit the hastily set up Lanaktallan battle-screens. The shields flared and began to fail as the rear rank shifted forward and the previously forward rank stopped, obviously – to Mo’osto’o anyway - ran targeting solutions, and fired. The front rank was raking the battle-screens and the hastily seeking cover troops with weaponry.
Before Mo'osto'o could get his thoughts gathered, his brain trying to use parts that he didn't have due to the neural template overlays, the Terran aerospace elements came in, fast and low. They didn't just use missiles or their guns: they dropped munitions that exploded in flame and covered everything with plasma-enhanced fire that even melted endosteel and Lanaktallan battlesteel.
The combat lasted less than ten minutes, the mechs pounding the dropships and heavy armor, neutralizing the anti-air systems with directed fire. The napalm slagged even the tanks and personnel carriers.
Mo'osto'o got his wish.
But the Terrans have a saying: Be careful what you wish for.
-----
East of the burning napalm and plasma making up Mo'osto'o's pyre was forest. There were only a few cities, all of them heavily defended with shielding. The Corporate wave that landed found themselves under assault by heavy artillery that seemed to come from nowhere and everywhere.
A squad managed to video back what they'd found right before they were killed.
The squad had moved into a small clearing between buildings. Their suits were flashing "NANITE HAZARD" on their visors, but the nanite suppression fields were working according to specs and none of the squad had been killed by the shining metal needles that had ripped apart half of the first lander's dismount crew.
There was a fog that coalesced then puffed away to reveal small waist high robots. Robots that immediately began shooting hypervelocity projectiles and tiny missiles that blew big holes in armor and the Lanaktallan underneath. They targeted the nanite suppression field generators with their tiny missiles. Once the squad was dead, before the camera went out, the robots rolled up to each helmet, fired point blank into the top of it, then the robots puffed into dust.
Va'arno'os, in charge of the Military Fleet landing zone, watched the video and swallowed thickly. Every other culture that allowed nanites in the atmosphere of a planet only used them to deal with biological threats, emergency medical services, and benign things, like lighting and pollutant control.
The Terrans apparently had other ideas, Va'arno'os thought to himself, watching each little combat drone puff back into black mist.
He had seen it over a dozen times, from a dozen different teams that had gotten wiped out.
Right now, he had ordered the nanite suppression fields pushed out to nearly a half mile from the vehicles and dug in troops. Even then little drones kept puffing into existence, firing off a volley of missiles, then dissolving, sometimes with an insulting little tune.
The missiles and bullets didn't dissolve. They hit like they hadn't been made of nanites only a few moments before.
Battle screens kept snarling as the drones continually probed the nanite field and the battle screens themselves.
Opening up another video stream Va'arno'os groaned. The damnable Terran "adaptive camouflage" was giving his men fits. Even civilians had it. Apparently, once they pulled up the hood and stretched a cloth across their faces from inside the hood, the whole thing just shifted into the background. They all had armor and, he had to admit, he was somewhat jealous of the armor's design and effectiveness.
He saw a short female take a plasma rifle blast straight to the chest and get knocked down. The flyspy cam followed her as she crawled around the corner, popped the damaged plate off and replaced it with a plate from her carry bag. She then dumped a vial of glimmering dust on the plate, wrapped it, and shoved it into her carry bag.
You shoved it in there to be repaired by nanites, he thought to himself.
Another flyspy cam had followed some Terrans down an alleyway. The six Terrans had not only knocked out an armored personnel carrier with shoulder fired rockets, they'd then used a crew served weapon to rake the Lanaktallan that had dismounted the vehicle. The flyspy had caught them tapping the side of the rocket launchers, causing them to turn to dust, then doing the same to the crew served weapon, turning the entire thing to black dust. It had followed them into a small town, down the alley, to the back of what looked like a bakery, of all things. Inside, they had moved up to what looked like a line waiting to get food from a food dispenser.
The inside of the food dispenser had glowed red, swirled with black, and, as Va'ano'os had watched, the people waiting in line drew weapons and equipment from the food dispenser. That annoying 'adaptive camouflage' first, a rifle, then a pistol, and then an equipment belt. After this, they drew rockets and parts to crew served weapons before leaving.
He'd ordered the flyspy closer and an airborne insect electrical zapper killed it.
He watched the video of the Terrans arming themselves again. The resolution was good, he could see the weave of the clothing, and see the dust in the air.
They use nanites to create objects with dedicated nanite factories, he thought, staring. They don't need lines. They have no supply lines. If this kind of thing is in a bakery it is present in every house, every business, every basement, every street corner. It could probably be used to create a reactor to power another one, or, at the very least, solar panels.
He scrubbed his face and checked another flyspy. The combat arms Most Highs wanted to rush the city, but he'd insisted on going through and running close in recon.
The flyspy was sitting on a windowsill, watching, as three people set up a crew-served weapon on the second floor of a building. They drew a square made of lines on the wall, then made diagonal lines across the square.
The wall shivered and the square was suddenly empty.
They put up two small holo-projectors to project an image of the missing section of the wall and a battlescreen projector that glistened like it was wet, then started moving bags of what looked like granulated silicate against the walls.
Va'ano'os snarled to himself. The silicate would cause the plasma rounds to liberate all their energy right there. There would be no penetration and no backblast explosion. It would just turn the silicate into glass.
"Are we attacking the city or not?" Mo'olo'op, the Great Most High of the Ground Combat Teams, asked.
"No. Not yet. There are complications," Va'ano'os said, watching through another flyspy as a laser emitter was activated across a street, connected to tripod mounted rockets. "They're waiting for you."
"Your centuries with the Executor Surveillance, and Security Forces are blinding you, Va'ano'os," Mo'olo'op sneered. "They may be able to put up a fight against an Executor Direct Action Team, but this is the military might of the Great Herd."
Va'ano'os looked at another flyspy. It was showing a team of Terrans placing large thick discs on the ceiling of a tunnel. He pointed at the screen and snapped his fingers, getting Mo'olo'op's attention.
"Do you see that? They have mined the entire street. Look at the design of those mines. They are not some poorly built creation made by a neosapient in the basement," Va'ano'os said. "Those are professionally built military grade mines obviously designed to blast upwards through the street. Knowing the Terrans, the street itself will be some kind of explosive enhancement, make the blast and the damage worse."
"So they'll destroy a few vehicles, so what?" Mo'olo'op sneered.
"And then the street collapses, turning the whole thing into an impassible area," Va'ano'os stated. "Making this street, right here, one of the main arteries to get into the city, completely impassible and preventing your troops from entering the city from that direction."
"Bah, one street. You delaying us is giving the Terrans time to think they can put up a resistance," Mo'olo'op snarled. "I'm tired of your delays. I will be ordering my men to advance into the city so that the shield generator can be eliminated."
"Then they will die," Va'ano's said, leaning back in his chair. "We did not arrive in time to prevent the Terrans from preparing to repel any enemy attack upon their system."
"When should we have attacked then, Great Most High?" Mo'olo'op asked, sneering on the title.
