Three Square Meals Ch. 134

The Nymph tapped her thumb button and fired back at the closest cruiser, hitting it with the Raptor's twin Tachyon Lances. The dual beams throbbed with power as they demolished the Brimorian shields, then carved a glowing trench through the doomed warship before blasting out the opposite side. Internal detonations wracked the 500m vessel until it exploded outwards, killing the entire crew in a devastating reactor core meltdown.

After that shocking display of formidable firepower, the rest of the cruisers seemed to lose any interest in provoking the Raptor. Retro-thrusters flared along the hulls of those ships, as they tried to get out of the Raptor's path. Jade ignored them after that, concentrating on guiding the gunship through the turbulent sea of debris. She banked to starboard to avoid the broken stern of a shattered Brimorian destroyer, its engines still flaring on full power, then pushed down on the flightstick to duck under a cruiser's lifeless hulk.

As they drew closer to Kinta, John watched a pair of Brimorian battleships rapidly ascending towards low orbit, the two capital ships heading directly towards them. Jade didn't seem to have noticed them as she raced towards the Imperial palace and had stopped making any evasive manoeuvres.

"Careful, Jade," John warned the Nymph pilot. "Watch out for those battleships, they're on an intercept vector."

"It's alright, John... just watch," Alyssa said, patting his arm.

As the battleships left the planet's atmosphere, John saw air being vented from the airlocks dotted along their hulls. The Raptor flew between the two huge Brimorian vessels as a stream of convulsing crewmen were ejected into space, Jade narrowly avoiding the ghastly flotsam.

"Irillith..." John murmured in sudden understanding.

"She's pushing herself hard," Alyssa said, nodding in confirmation. "There's another three under her control and heading for space."

John watched the suffocating Brimorians as the Invictus raced past, feeling no sympathy for the crew that had been mercilessly bombarding civilians only minutes before. "It's a shame we couldn't hand them over to the Kintark for war crimes tribunals."

Alyssa shrugged. "Calara figured the Kintark would prefer being handed fully operational Brimorian battleships."

He looked at her in surprise then broke out into a laugh. "Yeah, I think she may be right."

His laughter died as they entered Kinta's lower atmosphere and John could finally see the extent of the destruction the Brimorians had wreaked on the city below. Any large structure, be it an office tower or majestic temple, had been devastated by the alien bombardment, leaving half of Xen-Martek reduced to rubble. Fires raged out of control as Brimorian particle beams ignited the leafy jungle that grew throughout the city, turning the shattered ruins into a nightmarish hellscape.

The only imposing building left standing was the Imperial palace, which was built on a ridge of hills overlooking the city. It was dusk in this region of Kinta and landing lights illuminated the Brimorian dropships that had deployed on the palace grounds. Hundreds of marines could be seen moving to secure the location, the bright flashes of yellow particle bolts a grim warning that combat still raged around the drop site.

John gently squeezed Jade's shoulder. "Put us down right in the middle."

"Will do," she agreed, angling the Raptor towards the centre of the battlefield.

He pulled on his Lion helmet, then left the cockpit with Alyssa at his side. They descended in the grav-tube and rejoined the girls in the forward loading room.

"We're going in hot," John said, unshouldering his Tachyon Rifle. "I'll help secure the landing zone, then I'm going to head directly to Tamolith. The Brimorian commander said that Athgiloi wanted the Empress 'broken and humiliated', so capturing her must be their main objective."

"That doesn't sound good," Dana said, her expression grim.

John shook his head, then glanced at Alyssa. "Can you help me track her down?"

"I'll sweep the area as soon as we land," she replied, her eyes already glowing with a radiant light.

"Are we taking prisoners?" Rachel asked quietly.

"I'll leave that to your discretion, but don't let prisoners slow you down," John replied, meeting her troubled gaze. "Our number one priority is to stop the Brimorians killing Kintark civilians."

The girls nodded their understanding and readied their weapons.

Jade's gentle voice echoed through John's mind. *Touching down in 10 seconds...*

The loading ramp began to descend, the whine of hydraulics drowned out by whistling winds. Artificial gravity kept the team level and stable as the Raptor dropped out of the sky, the Null-inertia Gyroscope negating over 10Gs as Jade pulled the nose up hard. Retro-thrusters roared as they levelled out the plummeting gunship, dramatically announcing the Lion's arrival.

"Go!" John called out as he took the lead, bounding down the loading ramp with his Tachyon rifle at his shoulder.

He activated his psychic speed and the world around him seemed to slow down as his reactions were enhanced to superhuman levels. Two-dozen Enclave dropships had landed in the palace grounds, each one carrying a hundred Brimorian marines. The soldiers wore fully enclosed combat suits, the blue and purple armour plating shaped to look like shimmering fish scales. Shocked by the Raptor's dramatic entrance, the closest marines had whirled around with their long rifles at the ready. John could see their startled expressions through the bubble-like helmets they wore, and realised that their bodies were completely submerged in water within the suit.

Aiming his Tachyon rifle at the closest, John squeezed off a shot, launching a hyper-accelerating slug at his torso. To John's surprise, the 10mm bullet rebounded off a shimmering personal shield, leaving the alien trooper unscathed. Switching to pulsed tachyon fire, John fired off a burst at the Brimorian marine, obliterating his shields in an instant.

The tachyon bolts struck the trooper mid-chest, blasting holes the size of dinner plates through the Brimorian's body. Smashed backwards by the force of the impact, the marine's liquefied internal organs were sprayed in a bloody arc behind him, dousing his comrades in a steaming shower of gore. They didn't have a chance to react as John gunned down the rest of the squad, killing half of them before the first dead Brimorian had even hit the ground.

The girls fanned out around him, joining in the slaughter. Sheets of blue tachyon bolts swept across the battlefield, carving a bloody path through the squads assembling in the drop zone. Behind them, Jade lifted the Raptor off the ground, its turreted Tachyon Cannons opening up on the parked dropships.

The glowing blue energy bolts from those weapons were powerful enough to punch through cruiser plating, so the lightly-armoured transports stood no chance of resisting them. Jade strafed the closest dropship with a burst from the cannons mounted in the chin turret, the dual stream of bolts punching straight through the parked craft and out the other side. As tachyon bolts ripped through the engines, they ignited the fuel tanks and the dropship erupted in a thunderous explosion.

Alyssa ignored the alien troops and vehicles being blown to pieces all around her, focusing instead on the eldritch energy that whirled around her arms. The lights on the ships dimmed around the drop zone, then flickered erratically as she tapped into greater levels of psychic power. Crouching down, Alyssa thumped the ground with both fists, sending a shockwave out across the grounds.

The dazzling pulse of light swept over startled Brimorian marines, bathing them in a sinister crimson hue, then surged onwards into the palace itself. Alyssa concentrated intently on the hundreds of minds she touched, delving deeper into those alien subconscious' than ever before to ensure there were no false readings this time. She was able to build a snapshot of their personality, sensing the wants and needs that drove them... and cringed away from the ugliness she saw there.

Unable to detect Tamolith's presence within the circumference of her psychic pulse, Alyssa pushed herself harder, channelling more energy to enlarge the range. Her judgement aura expanded outwards, the radiance making contact with every Brimorian and Kintark located within the palace grounds. She groaned with the strain and was about to release the pulse, when she suddenly detected hundreds of Brimorians below the palace structure.

The Enclave troops were moving at a hurried pace, the marines' excitement at the thrill of the hunt, tempered by a substantial amount of fear as they hunted their ferocious quarry. Alyssa furrowed her brow and channelled the pulse further, then sighed with relief when she encountered a cluster of very different minds. Having plumbed the depths of Baledranax's subconscious during the Battle of Terra, she instantly recognised their distinctive draconic outlook. Tamolith and her brood were similar to the Kintark, but their intellect and drives had been heightened by meticulous genetic engineering.

Dropping to one knee, Alyssa panted for breath. *Tamolith's trying to escape underground. The Brimorians are chasing her through the tunnels.*

*Why didn't she just fly away?* John asked, frowning in confusion.

She looked up at him, her expression troubled. *She's protecting her children... the Brimorians are hunting them.*

*Shit!* he cursed, turning to look at the imposing palace. *Can you guide me down there?*

Alyssa quickly nodded. *Go! I'll give you directions.*

Handing his Tachyon Rifle over to the blonde, John drew his runesword and set off at a sprint towards the main entrance. He passed several defensive emplacements but the bunkers were deserted, showing no signs of battle damage. Frowning in confusion, he pressed onwards, wondering why the Kintark hadn't used the fortifications to hit the Brimorians when they were most vulnerable.

The palace itself was an ancient granite structure, the walls and columns beautifully constructed by skilled artisans to be as imposing and majestic as their draconic overlords. The grounds were similarly adorned in magnificent sculptures, the ancient stone dragons depicting the extensive pantheon of the Kintark Empire. As he got closer, John saw that the statues had been vandalised by rampaging troops, the priceless Kintark artefacts blown to pieces by particle rifles.

He grimaced when he saw the senseless destruction, fearing that the Brimorians' contempt for the religious iconography of their former allies would foreshadow worse to come inside the palace. Sure enough, when John ran through the sundered doorway, he found the site of a bloody massacre, scores of palace staff gunned down in the broad foyer. John glanced down at one of the dead Kintark, who was wearing soil-encrusted overalls and appeared to be unarmed. His body was peppered with scorch marks from particle bolts, the terrified gardener shot in the back as he ran from the invaders.

*It's a bloodbath in here... the Brimorians are slaughtering everyone,* John muttered as he picked his way around the corpses.

*Look for a stairwell 400 metres ahead of you on the right,* Alyssa told him, the tension in her voice palpable. *The entrance to the tunnels is two levels lower, at the back of a big room.*

Up ahead, he heard the eerie thrum of particle rifles being fired, yellow flashes illuminating the side corridors. Shrill cries of fear and agony reverberated in their wake, the terrible sounds harrowing proof of the atrocities being committed by the Brimorians. It was galling not being able to intervene, but John knew he couldn't afford to be distracted.

*I need you in here ASAP,* John said as he sprinted across the foyer. *You're our best shot at saving the Kintark survivors in the palace. You'll be able to wipe out the Brimorians much faster than any of us.*

*I'm on my way,* his blonde matriarch replied grimly.

John moved in a blur as he sprinted down the huge hallway, the floor strewn with the corpses of dead Kintark. Up ahead he saw scores of Brimorian troops marching deeper into the palace, the squad laughing amongst themselves as they revelled in the carnage. With his psychically enhanced speed, he was travelling far faster than them and quickly closed the distance. As much as John wanted to take out his rage and frustration on the cruel Enclave forces, hacking them to pieces would take time that he couldn't afford to waste.

He focused his will into the runesword and felt the embedded glyphs respond, feeding off the psychic energy that charged them with power. The blade glowed with a fierce blue light, reflecting the potent destructive forces constrained within the ancient weapon. John brought the sword around in a sweeping slash, the razor-sharp Crystal Alyssium edge whistling through the air as he unleashed a telekinetic arc.

The Brimorians had personal shields and were also protected by thicker plating than the lightly armoured Kirrix drones he'd fought previously. However, the projection of his psychic might proved to be just as devastating against the Enclave forces. The deadly psychic projection thundered down the corridor and scythed through the Brimorian ranks before they'd even had a chance to turn around. Their shields were incapable of resisting the force arc and it sheared through their body-armour at the waist. Rather than exploding in a shower of limbs like the Kirrix drones, the Brimorians were disembowelled, collapsing to the ground in two separate chunks.

John strode amongst the dying troops, their callous laughter replaced by screams of pain, or silenced completely as they stared up at him in mortal shock. Leaving the mangled squad to wallow in a sea of salt water and their own bloody entrails, he ran onwards, searching for the stairs that would take him deeper into the palace.

***

"The Brimorians are slaughtering everyone. John wants me to head inside and help rescue the Kintark in the palace," Alyssa informed the girls. *Jade, can you provide covering fire for Tashana?*

The Raptor jinked so that it was flying directly over the Maliri pistoleer, its turrets pouring unending streams of tachyon bolts into what was left of the stunned Enclave forces. *I'll watch over her.*

Tashana holstered a pistol and flickering flame sprites burst into life on the palm of her gauntlet. "Don't worry about me, I'll have plenty of company."

She held out her hand and a quartet of fiery elementals leaped away, spinning through the air to land on the ground. With a roar of flames they grew larger, until they were as tall as the Maliri pyrokinetic they cavorted around. Alyssa and Tashana exchanged a nod, then the Maliri turned and sprinted towards the outskirts of the grounds where they'd seen numerous yellow flashes from particle rifles. Her fiery entourage spun and danced as they kept pace, leaving a trail of burning footsteps behind them.

"When we get inside, you two take the left wing," Alyssa said, glancing at Dana and Rachel as they all jogged towards the palace. "Jehanna, you stay with me and we'll clear out the right side."

"What about the central section?" the raven-haired girl asked, gazing up at the enormous building with trepidation. "Shouldn't we be careful about dividing our forces when we're this close to an enemy? We're outnumbered and very vulnerable to a pincer movement. The Brimorians on the flanks could call for reinforcements, then one of our groups would be caught in a crossfire."

Dana raised an eyebrow and studied Jehanna curiously. "I thought you were a reporter for TFNN? How do you know all this squad tactics stuff?"

"My father taught me..." Jehanna replied, her expression turning sombre.

"Don't worry, we'll fix things with your family," Alyssa said, giving her a sympathetic smile. "You're right about being careful not to get surrounded... but I've got it covered."

She gestured ahead of them and a legion of telekinetic swords and axes popped into existence. The serrated blades looked wickedly sharp, gleaming with a sinister red hue as they reflected the flickering firelight. The floating weapons tilted forward with unnatural eagerness, then surged into the towering granite fortress ahead of the four Lionesses.

Dana saw Jehanna's shocked expression and grinned. "Yeah... we're about to fuck up someone's day alright."

Alyssa led the girls through the garden of shattered statues and their group entered the palace through the smashed gates. They paused at the disturbing sight of the massacre, where Brimorian Marines had clearly gunned down fleeing Kintark civilians.

Rachel's speculative gaze swept over the bodies. "I haven't seen any sign of Kintark troops, either here or outside. I wonder why they didn't contest the drop zone?"

"Yeah! Where the fuck are the palace guards? Shouldn't there be like... a royal garrison or something defending this place?" Dana asked, frowning at the piles of corpses.

"I don't know," Alyssa replied quietly, her expression bleak. "But it felt like nearly all the Kintark I detected nearby were civilians... so something bad must have happened to their soldiers."

There were several exits from the foyer and the girls split up to sweep and clear their allocated sections of the palace. Dana and Rachel started shooting as soon as they reached the left-hand corridor, their rifles spitting out a continuous stream of energy pulses. Moving confidently, they advanced while laying down a curtain of fire, disappearing out of sight as they unleashed a deadly azure storm.

Alyssa passed over John's Tachyon rifle to a pair of glowing disembodied hands, then unslung her own rifle and repeated the same actions. Flanked by both floating weapons, she strolled over to the corridor on the right, with Jehanna watching her in awe.

"Let's go, rookie," the blonde said, smiling at their newest recruit.

***

"Is it much further?" Tondax complained, panting as he trotted alongside his siblings. "I'm tired!"

"Not much further, my precious darling. Please keep going for just a little longer," Tamolith replied, anxiously twisting her long neck around to look behind her up the tunnel.

She could hear the sound of many booted feet running after them, the noise getting louder as the Brimorians steadily gained ground. The Kintark Empress knew that the Enclave troops would soon be upon them... unless she took steps to discourage their pursuit.

"Zulkayr, attend me a moment!" she called out to her eldest son who was at the front of their group.

He skidded to a halt, then bounded back to join her. "Of course, mother!"

Leaning in close, she whispered, "Guide the others onwards... we are not far from the exit. Seek shelter in the jungle, I will join you shortly."

Zulkayr looked up at her in alarm. "No, we should stick together, mother! Let me help you fight the Brimorians!" Puffing out his chest, he bared his teeth and snarled fiercely, "I will be like Tiemeth the Destroyer reborn!"

"You would be magnificent, my son," Tamolith agreed, her eyes shining with pride. "But I need you to protect your siblings and your future consorts. You will be Emperor one day and it is your duty to protect the Imperial family."

He turned and saw that his brother and sisters were looking back at them, fear and exhaustion written across their draconic faces. Ruvith and Ondyrth were watching him too, their expressions intrigued despite the dire circumstances.

Lowering his head in resignation, he nodded. "I will do my duty, mother."

"As I knew you would," Tamolith murmured, nuzzling him affectionately. Raising her head to tower over the rest, she declared, "I am going to bloody my claws with the Brimorian vermin. Do not worry, my precious darlings, I will not be gone long."