|
#9
OCT 11 |
 |
“Planetary Strike” Part Nine
The Stormrider- The Magus’ Command Ship
200 Miles Outside Uranus’ Orbit
The Magus sat back on his throne and looked out of the bridge window to the confrontation that was awaiting him. The large bulk of Earth’s fleet was here to oppose him along with their powerful defensive system on Uranus.
He had tried to think of a way to avoid this battle because he had never been one for large, unnecessary incursions, but he soon realized there was no way to avoid this. Earth was too heavily guarded for subterfuge to be effective, but he was still confident about this course. He had the Earth ships outnumbered three to one and that would be enough to deliver a crushing blow if he could disable Uranus.
Uranus had always been in the back of the Magus’ mind ever since the defensive system was put into place. He had tried again and again to put spies into place to sabotage its construction, but the weapon eventually came online. It stood out like a defiant wench begging for him to slap her. Today would be the day he delivered that abuse and it had been a day long in coming.
This would be the beginning of the end for Earth and their allies. Once that green and blue rock fell then it would not be long before the rest of the galaxy crumbled and the Magus’ new empire would begin.
One of the ship’s navigators, a gangly Kree, bowed in front of the Magus and said, “We will be in Uranus’ orbit in two minutes.”
The Magus appeared thoughtful for a moment. They should have already been under attack given the vast range of the Uranus defense network. Why was Earth holding back? “I want only a third of the fleet to move forwards and have everyone else stay back. The humans are up to something.”
“Yes, Milord. It will be done,” the navigator said as he feverishly sped off to deliver the Magus’ command.
With just a thought, eight holographic interfaces surrounded the Magus in a semi-circle slightly above his head. The faces showing on the interfaces were those of his generals and three of his lieutenants. “We don’t have long so I will make this quick. Something is wrong in how the humans are going about this so we will disable Uranus as soon as possible. I want the ground invasion started now and have all ships focus their firepower on Earth’s capital ships.”
Arides, last of the true Kree supers and loyal general of the Magus, asked, “What of The Accusers?”
“Not yet. When I feel they are needed I shall tell you. You all have your orders. Let us bring an end to Earth!”
The Pantheon
“All my A.R.M.O.R. Agents are in their designated units and are ready for immediate deployment,” Captain Britain said as he walked onto the bridge of the Earth fleet’s largest and most potent ship; the Pantheon was easily three times the size of all the other Earth fleet vessels. Being on this world made Brian wonder if his Earth would one day produce such colossal vessels.
Vulcan looked back at the A.R.M.O.R. Field Commander and acknowledged his statement. "Swift work, Commander. I have good news as well. Omega Sentinel disabled the field surrounding Africa and our forces are headed there now.”
Brian moved closer and was able to see through a large holographic screen the full scope of the armada that they were about to face. Nearly a thousand ships were barreling down on their almost three hundred. The numbers were against them. “You know they are going to try to flank us.”
“Of course. It’s what I would do, but your Graviton is going to prevent that from happening for as long as he can. Bit by then my surprise should have arrived.”
“Surprise? Something else the President didn’t tell me about?” Brian asked trying to mask the annoyance in his voice. He didn’t like being kept out of the loop; the smallest detail could help or hinder his strategy of attack, and T’Chaka holding back wasn’t going to benefit either one of them.
“The President doesn’t know about this. No one does except for me and you.”
“Why?”
Vulcan rolled back his shoulders as he tried to multitask talking and keeping track of how close the ships were getting. “Because I have long suspected that here were traitors in our midst and I wanted us to have some sort of assured trump card in the final battle.”
“Makes sense,” Captain Britain said without argument. He didn’t really feel like pressing the point. They were going to make contact with the Magus’ foes in thirty seconds. The Uranus defense network was already firing off shots and a number of fighters were headed their way. “I’ll dispatch the teams according to plan.”
“Very good. I’m going to take my place with Omega Sentinel and the Deathloks on the ground,” Vulcan said as he bent down to put a hand on Fleet Admiral Banner’s shoulder. “You are now in charge of the fleet. Press the offense. We’ll do everything we can to keep your ships from being damaged.”
Banner saluted. “Yes sir. Be careful out there, sir.”
“I will. Keep our men alive.”
Uranus
Karima found the Deathloks to be suitable partners, but she knew that the Prime Sentinels would have been more effective. It wasn’t bias, but simply fact. The Omega Sentinel had long been incapable of such human things. All she saw now was probabilities and percentages. What had once made her human was awash in a sea of numbers. Though when Vulcan had called her Karima for a moment the machine could have almost sworn it was…angry...
[[Unit Packs A1-B4, guard the western perimeter. Unit Packs C2-D88, follow my lead. Enemy forces are moving in fast over the methane lake to the north.]]
Vulcan materialized above the Omega Sentinel in a large flash of orange light. A dozen Deathlok rifles were pointed at him until they were able to identity who he was. For just a moment, only a brief moment, Karima felt that tinge of anger again. [[Our ships are engaged.]]
“Yes. Now, have you established an effective defensive perimeter? Icarus is coming in with a thousand Kree.”
[[It is foolish to waste all these troops on fighting off only a thousand Kree. An obviously inferior species.]]
“Normally I would be inclined to agree, but they’re all wearing armor based off some of the technology used to create you.”
[[Again you fail to mention details. Organics and their lack of clarity. That trait will not help us succeed here today.]]
Vulcan smirked for a moment. “You might find that you’re wrong about that.”
In the distance, the roar of the Kree jetpacks could be heard ripping through Uranus’ volatile atmosphere. Normally, the gas powering those machines would have frozen solid, but terraforming technology had reduced the planet’s harshness significantly. Unfortunately, the machines were not yet done doing their makeover, but Vulcan had long ago stopped needing to breathe oxygen. Karima saw when she looked at him that he no longer had a heart, either.
[[Enemy units are on their way. They will make contact in exactly two minutes fifty seconds.]]
Vulcan rose into the air and enveloped himself in a magnetic force field. “Unit Packs D89-F1, serve as reinforcements for Karima’s front line. Everyone else form defensive barriers around the system communication towers in groups of thirty.”
The system communication towers were what allowed strategic orders and patterns to be fed into the Uranus defense network. If those were taken out, then there would be no accurate way to aim the many weapons lining the planet’s surface and atmosphere. Vulcan had guessed correctly that those would be the Magus’ first target.
Vulcan flew above Karima and her designated Deathloks as they charged forward to face Icarus and his Kree soldiers. It was only thirty seconds before they sighted each other.
Icarus was at the lead of the soldiers. His appearance was angelic with milky white skin, golden blonde hair and light blue eyes, but he was anything but an angel. He was garbed in a thick white breastplate trimmed with gold and in both of his hands he was carrying large energy rifles. Each rifle had three barrels about the size of an apple. His grey wings were flapping wildly to maintain lift in the thick Uranus atmosphere.
Leaping into the air, the Omega Sentinel kicked off her own rocket boosters under her feet and slammed right into Icarus. The two went slamming through a few of his Kree soldiers before crashing into the ground. Vulcan wasted no time taking advantage of the momentary confusion by unleashing a magnetic wave of energy at the Kree soldiers.
Chunks of their white armor broke off and exposed their skin to the harsh, cold Uranus air. Many of them cried out from the exposure and sought frantically to find some way to keep their skin from suffering frostbite. That was when Vulcan shouted, “Attack!”
The Deathloks rose up their laser pistols and a sea of red strips cut through the Uranus atmosphere and into the Kree soldiers. The Kree who had sense enough to try and fire back were soon cut down by the laser fire while most were cut down in the agony of their flesh being turned to rock by the cold air. Most of the fire struck the Kree helmets, as Deathloks were programmed to attack for the maximum amount of damage.
Meanwhile, Icarus pushed the Omega Sentinel off of him and fired his riles at her in close range. The blasts knocked Karima back a number of yards, but did nothing except singe her outer armor. Icarus snarled at the woman. "They must have gotten really desperate to let you out of your cage.”
Accessing her historical records, Karima saw the instrumental role that Icarus had played in the defeat of her master, Bastion. [[A battle between us has been long overdue.]
Icarus fired off four more shots at rhe Omega Sentinel while deflecting shots from the Deathloks with his invulnerable wings. Karima nimbly dodged each blast and launched two rockets from panels below her neck. The rockets cut through the air at Icarus and he had to take to the air. Narrowly escaping the attack, Icarus was about to fire his rifles again when he was struck across the face with a fist from Vulcan.
“You were never very good at covering your behind,” Vulcan said as he struck Icarus across the face again.
Then he wrapped his hands around one of the barrels from each rifle and poured geothermal energy into the weapons, turning them into metal slag. Icarus dropped the weapons in frustration and kicked Vulcan in the stomach. "Same ol arrogant Gabriel, I see.”
As Vulcan flew back from the attack, Icarus clapped his hands together and created a sword of pure light. Hot as a sun and powerful enough to wreak havoc on Vulcan’s energy form if it got close enough. Icarus wouldn’t’ be able to get that close at the moment because he was still blocking and dodging attacks from the hundreds of Deathloks and Omega Sentinel.
If it wasn’t so annoying, Vulcan might have actually been impressed with Icarus’ aerial agility. That feeling was quickly replaced with one of dread as he felt a familiar energy tickle him in the back of his ear. Looking down to the Omega Sentinel, he said, “We have incoming!”
Dozens of white square portals opened up all around them and out poured more Kree soldiers.
Outside The Pantheon
Venom landed one of the enemy Kree fighters and expanded is body until he had covered the entire ship in slimy black symbiote. The Herald crumbled the ship until it resembled a ball more than a fighter. When he was done, he flew through the air and repeated the process on another Kree fighter.
Firelord flew under one of the capital ships and, with his fire staff, drew a line of steady fire along its bottom. When he pulled away from the line of flame, it quickly expanded until it was covering the entire ship. Escape pods frantically were trying to pull away, but the Herald made sure that they were coated in his intense frame as well. He wanted there to be no survivors. That was the way of his former master.
Iceman had completely frozen another Kree capital ship and, with his Power Cosmic, he pushed the ship right into another one creating an explosion of ice and fire. He quickly flew away from the carnage and began to zap fighters left and right like they were bugs. Streams of energy fire that were headed at the Pantheon he simply turned into ice spikes that he then hurtled at other enemy ships.
Morg was eagerly hacking away at the fighters that were coming from rhe Magus’ customized fleet. Each ship was about thirty feet long and resembled a scorpion given wings. The Herald's axe cut and cut until he cleaved some ships in half. He leapt from ship to ship with a blood-drunk smile on his face.
Captain Britain watched all this from the deck of the capital ship and felt a bit better about his chances of making it out of this alive. Turning to Fleet Admiral Banner, he said “Time for the next part of this plan to kick in.”
Banner nodded. “I have confidence in our people. Graviton is still maintaining so they should have an opening for a little longer.”
Brian put his wrist communicator towards his mouth and said, “All Command Ship Attack Groups, you have permission to deploy and engage. Take down primary targets and, if possible, move to assist others with targets once done.”
Tapping his wrist for a private line, Brian said, “Blue Marvel? You there?”
««Loud and clear, Field Commander.»»
“Your orders are going to be slightly different. You are to get Skaar off his ship and planet side.”
««Any one in particular?»»
“You have your pick there. Just get him away from the ship. Then your team is to take command of his vessel and ram it into the Magus'.”
««I’m not comfortable sending my team on a suicide mission.»»
“They have every permission to get off that ship as soon as it’s on a course for the Magus’. President Stark assured me that the Argonauts could handle this assignment.”
««And we can. Blue Marvel out.»»
Brian sighed as the communication came to an end and he watched the Heralds continue to rip through any ship they encountered. He really wasn’t cut out for all this and he knew it. Every effort was being made on his part to keep his hands from shaking. He wasn’t any more scared than normal in these situations, but this one had him more than nervous. All of the M.D.A. was looking at him to succeed.
|
|
|
|
|
|
To Be Continued...
Next: In A.R.M.O.R. #10: The war continues onward! Amiri and the Nubian try to hold their own against the White Gods hoping for help to come. Well, they won’t have to wait long because here comes Josiah Rage and Fire Mage!
Kree Ship Fleet Captains
Cpt. Vlornan Mod
Cpt. Noril Stirr
Cpt. Sinora Manoi
Cpt. Vinorsa Iodirr
Previous Issue | Next Issue