The Invasion
Indoraptor Year 1269, December, Shangri (Wuxing system), Adaria city outskirts...
"Admiral Ender, sir."
"At ease, Ludvik. Have a seat. I've got an urgent message from your friend back on Lemuria and I don't think you're going to like it."
Agent Ludvik recalled vividly the day when his favorite admiral summoned him and some half a dozen other agents for an emergency meeting. He hoped it was related to the ancient relics, but the news the admiral brought from his contacts was terrible.
Alien pirates under the employ of the Sylvons' Council of Elders were attacking the Union territory more frequently than usual, and that was due to an unexpected Intel leak on the existence of the Red Lotus artifact. No one knew precisely who leaked the data, when, or how, but one clear thing was the alien pirates' intention to invade Union space en masse. The fucking mollusks thought they could pay pirates big money if they can take the Red Lotus and other related artifacts away from the Indoraptors. The higher-ups, on the other hand, speculated the pirates would be more interested in capturing Indoraptors alive to be sold as slaves instead of raiding museums or other historical sites.
Thus, the agents went to Shangri together, mixing in with standard grunts brought in by the Grand Fleet for protection and anonymity…
If there was anything Raizex disliked about his new duty on Shangri, it'd be his patrolling schedule, scouting the outer rim of Shangri's capital city for weeks in anticipation of the pirates' invasion. Normally, Raizex would be tasked to analyze data like he had been doing for three months prior, but for unexplained excuses, his current leader, an apathetic captain, decided to have him work on patrol missions.
Well, look at where it got him. Some military base camp just outside the capital city of Adaria, where performing solo patrol duty, away from his fellow agents, his friend Lea, and even Lieutenant Malia sat squarely on the top of his '10-reasons-why-this captain-sucks' list.
When the young agent brought the issue of his lack of assistance to his captain, the damn guy couldn't be bothered to listen to his complaints correctly. What the young agent got in response was a group of three 'loser' Indoraptors. Each was handpicked by the captain under the assurance that they were all competent. In reality, they were not.
Seriously, those three were as green as a military private!
To begin with, there was the Attention Seeker, who enjoyed flaunting his abilities despite having never worked on live missions before. Then there's the Slutty Girl, with her blatant carnal vigor and a habit of wearing provocative armor suit on duty. Finally, there was the vain Gadget Guy who spent too much time raving about cutting-edge technology and not enough time to practice his self-defense skills. Obviously, these little Indoraptors didn't pass their boot camp back on Terra Prima and were 'banished' to elsewhere, so to speak. As much as he hated it, Raizex did his best to educate the ragtag bunch of weirdoes, but it did little to change their unpleasant attitudes, even after weeks of mentoring them. Well, shit.
Raizex swore, once this was all over, he'd stick close to his best friend and girlfriend for the rest of his life.
So, in one misty morning, having approached the limit of his patience, Raizex announced his desire to go back to working alone to the captain, who was feeling a bit sleepy like a drunk triceratops. As soon as he was done giving the older male a piece of his mind, the young agent let his legs carry him away from the base, choosing to approach the city's border gate. Soon, new guards would wake up and resume their jobs as if nothing ever happened.
The surrounding scenery looked nice, he confessed, even with those bleak-looking security towers overlooking Adaria. To the south was a small clearing dotted with yellowish flowers where Raizex and a few others would practice their shooting skills. An oval lake spanned the northeast side of the base camp, full of alien fish and other freshwater creatures deemed edible for Indoraptors. Rolling hills with tall, viridian trees covered the western side of the base, whereas Adaria city lay on the east; some 300 meters away from the base camp. Raizex sniffed the air for any special scents and was felt a bit surprised to smell somebody familiar. This person must be somewhere nearby!
He trailed his fingers across the right side of his armor and relaxed at the thought of carrying his concealed glaive along.
Lately, Agent Ludvik had been getting weird feelings the more time he spent at the colony. The air seemed to warn him of an impending bloodbath as he breathed in them each passing day. He shared his thoughts more than once to certain Indoraptors at night, and unsurprisingly they agreed with him. For alien pirates to grow bolder in their monthly incursions, there had to be something that motivated them so intensely.
Approaching the city gate on foot, Raizex was greeted by curious security guards whose orange eyes watched him with suspicion. He chose to walk closer and identified himself as Raizex Ludvik, an agent working for the Grand Fleet's Intelligence Sector.
"Ludvik, hmm? I heard an Aviren was looking for you; he's working as a liaison or something from their Polity," a security guard voiced his interest.
"An Aviren, sir? What's the name?"
"Let me check… He goes by the name Xivena. Is he a friend of yours?"
The young agent's eyes widened in delight as he recognized his avian friend's name from the Polity of Laritem. He nodded enthusiastically as the guard led him into a tower to meet the Aviren. He was expecting Xivena to be waiting for him at the topmost floor of the tower, but since the alien was found seated in a private room on the first floor, allegedly at his request, he surmised the meeting invitation could be important.
"Hello again, my friend," Xivena greeted him with a nod.
"Oh hey! It's nice to have you here after all this time."
"Why that is? Are you feeling lonely without your friends?"
"Eh, not really, but ever since our last meeting, I guess I need a little catching up."
Raizex sat down on a plush sofa opposite of Xivena, scratching the back of his neck. "I'm surprised to see you're here! Isn't you Polity busy with this multi-species cooperation thing?"
Nodding solemnly, the red-feathered alien spoke calmly, "A foul plot is about to unravel, Raizex, and I believe it has something to do with the ancient artifacts your people have dug up previously. I think it's a miracle the Polity is willing to offer assistance almost immediately." Alarmed, but interested, Raizex wondered if the Aviren Polity mentioned anything about the Union's secret projects including talks regarding the Red Lotus...
"Are you here to help us protect the Red Lotus relic?"
"Moving the relic away from this planet is more expedient in my opinion," said Xivena, to the approval of the young agent. He gestured the bird alien to talk more.
"You are suspicious of something, am I correct? I can see your eyes darting here and there as if waiting for a predator to jump on you," the Aviren asked him suddenly.
"I know, right?" Raizex nodded. He felt a little safer now in Xivena's company, but he could never be too certain. "For weeks, I've been sniffing the air and got this strong sense of trepidation. You know, like wild animals when a disaster is about to strike. What news is available on your side?" Raizex asked in turn. "More whispers, believe it or not. There are mentions of pirate fleets bearing foreboding names such as 'Sailing Specters' or 'Dauntless Corsairs', but I believe there could be more pirates out there, secretly paid by the Sylvon Assembly to provoke the Union and the Polity to wage an open war," Xivena whispered.
"Damn..."
"That's why I'm here," Xivena explained further, "My government has pledged to send in special ops snipers and small shoals of corvettes to fortify your army, but they need extra eyes on the ground to scout the perimeter. Based on what little data we have, the pirates might split themselves in three; one army to engage you at the outskirts, another one to ransack the city in search of the relic, and the last one will hide somewhere to serve as a backup army." At this information, Raizex inwardly felt grateful towards the Union's closest ally, and even more so toward the spies who risked so many things just to buy the three-way alliance more time to gather combatants and resources.
"Oh yeah, how about the humans? Will they be participating in the battle in any capacity?"
"Don't worry, my friend, I've got it covered!" Said Xivena confidently as a male human unexpectedly entered the room.
Raizex's widening eyes scanned the human as he stepped closer and introduced himself as Liam O'Brian, a special ops soldier from the Republic of Earth's space navy. Tall, blond-haired, blue-eyed, fair-skinned, this human guy looked almost too much like the people in his dad's bedtime stories, except that he seemed quite friendly and trustworthy.
So the Human Republic agreed to pitch their hands in this? Perfect!
"Sure, sure, why not? I never thought we could drag the humans and their Republic into this, but here they are," Raizex welcomed Liam's presence in their little meeting, knowing he'd need to collect data and allies to survive. Thirty minutes passed as the young agent and Liam shared as much information as they could, occasionally forwarding ideas like using sign languages during the battle or setting up hidden safe zones or grouping together should things went awry, with Raizex promising to let his superiors know of the three-way alliance's plans before parting ways with the human and his Aviren friend.
-x-x-x-x-x-
Raizex remembered heading straight to the base camp to talk with the captains, lieutenants, and specialists who were present after leaving the security tower.
"So the news was correct, then? The three-way alliance is going to pour their resources to stop the pirates?"
"Good thing the humans finally grow a spine or two!"
"I know we can trust the Avirens to bring everyone together."
"With more hands on the deck, I believe we should be able to weather out the incursion without too many casualties."
Raizex remembered talking about his meeting with his Aviren fellow, once in a while cross-referencing his story with what the higher-ups already had.
"Only a team of snipers and military-grade AI units? Aren't the humans supposed to send more than that, like ships for example?"
"I'm curious about the Navari aliens, will they be contributing anything for the defense fleets or armies?"
"Our latest Intel indicated the presence of a new mercenary group… the Little Brother Army if the translation is correct."
"The Sylvons and their mysterious council must've paid the space pirates big money to invade us."
For the first time in forever, Raizex was feeling very thankful to have people he could trust. The entire day was dedicated to setting up spots where foot soldiers could maneuver and where artilleries could be placed down. The young dinosaur had to go patrolling all over the premises by running on all fours as the preparation became more frantic, only stopping for a while to redirect younger Indoraptors to wherever they were needed. Guns and bombs were safeguarded, artilleries were calibrated, special gadgets were handed out to those permitted to use them, every preparation was done following the new Intel. Raizex volunteered to check and recheck everything just in case they required something else.
The sun began to set when a small battalion of Aviren soldiers, accompanied by human and Navari soldiers, arrived on the base camp at the behest of the Prime Minister and his contacts, asking to speak with whoever was in charge of the base camp. Raizex served as a temporary mediator between the multiple species as they traded information and bits of advice.
There were nine Indoraptors including Raizex, seven Avirens including Xivena, ten humans, and four Navari. Each of them represented their respective militaries and were prepared to join forces with each other. The atmosphere of the meeting was quite tense, to be frank. Everyone did their best to stay civil and polite during the meeting despite the intermittent dark humor during downtimes. The young agent didn't know that Xivena was also serving as a mediator to keep everybody focused on the topic, but he nevertheless felt happy to have his acquaintance aiding him until late at night.
Nobody noticed Raizex as he slipped past the congregation of soldiers walking in every direction. Nobody looked at him as he got himself ready to sleep for a short while in his bunk. As the sky grew progressively darker, he decided to only sleep for an hour or two, keeping his equipment close with him just in case he had to wake up in an instant...
Three hours later, harsh whispers filled the air like a swarm of angry bees, prompting the sleeping young agent to wake up with a quiet gasp. Night had fallen, but no one outside was sleeping as he did.
Why were the people outside whispering so agitatedly?
How did the multi-species meeting progress? Have they reached a consensus?
Had the alien pirates reached Shangri yet?
BOOM! BOOM! BOOM!
Fuck, they're here already?
The sound of explosions jolted him awake, not that it startled him as Raizex was already donning his combat armor in haste while listening to the wild noises.
The night sky was suddenly filled with so many lights coming from every direction.
Grabbing his guns and glaive from below his bunk and some ammunition, Raizex rushed outside the camp to see where the blasts came from and by whom. He suspected the Sylvon pirates did it first. Preparing to fight back, violently if he had to, and with other Indoraptors around him setting up covers against more explosions, Raizex took a position on the far side of the amassing soldiers, close enough to run for cover between the adjacent vegetation. He jumped on a large rock where he could witness the invading army bathed in glistening lights; hundreds upon hundreds of Sylvons, some by foot, some others by armored military vehicles, charging straight at the base camp. As he turned around, Raizex heard someone, likely a commanding officer, bellowed for the soldiers to open fire, either by using those heavy artilleries to incapacitate the vehicles or rapid-firing guns to pick the invaders off one by one while they're still far away.
There was no turning back now.
"Listen, if we flank them from the open field at the east it'd be easier to bring them down quickly since they'll be- AAAHHH!" Ah, there he was again, the Attention Seeker trying to make a miscalculated judgment in front of his team, only to get himself blasted by a pirate cannon.
Good God, kid, only several minutes in, and he was already gone. Rest in peace, Attention Seeker… or not.
The defenders' first salvo blasted those armored vehicles with cannons away, but they had suffered from noticeable casualties too. Undeterred, they loaded up their artilleries for another salvo. For every cannon the Indoraptors fired, the alien pirates fired their own as reckless as they possibly could, seemingly as an intimidation tactic. Combatants were falling from both sides as the aggressors became closer and closer to the capital city. The human and Navari soldiers carefully took turns in sniping the Sylvon pirates and their expendable goons as the Indoraptors and the Avirens regrouped.
A blast shook the ground just as Raizex shot a single Sylvon who dashed too close to where he stood. The young Indoraptor then spotted another of his kin lying on the ground. He approached the unresponsive person, briefly removing his helmet to find himself staring at the mangled body of Gadget Guy, blown away by the force of the detonation.
"Rest in peace," Raizex muttered, putting his helmet back on and closed the kid's eyes.
Analyzing the battlefield for a safe spot to hide in, Raizex instinctively thought of the forested hills. He knew for certain that the Sylvons would be more inclined to push for the city proper in their invasion rather than entrenching themselves somewhere, but they forgot something; there was a network of maintenance tunnels inside a secret bunker located in the forest with access all over Adaria city, giving anyone who could open it a chance to organize retaliation. Just as he reloaded his gun and prepared to make a run to the forest, a person or two called for his name. Raizex turned around to see Lea and that human guy Liam jogging closer, having retreated from the front lines. Nice timing!
"Hey, nice to see you all alive and kicking!"
"I'm sorry it took so long, pal!" Lea punched the young agent lightly on his shoulders, "I planned to take this guy back to the city. He's got people and AI robots ready to help us organize a counterattack!"
At Liam's eager nodding, Raizex forwarded his proposal, "Great idea! Listen, there's a bunker with maintenance tunnels that will take us to the city proper. It's located in the forest over there, but we have to access it before the Sylvons could! With luck, we'll emerge next to the place where the Red Lotus is kept, if not the location itself!"
Lea instantly recognized the place Raizex spoke of, "Aha, that old bunker, right? I think I've passed it twice before on my patrols! What are we waiting for?!"
Right after Raizex and the human guy voiced their agreement, a stray bomb was lobbed by a Sylvon pirate, unaware that his bomb failed to detonate at its intended mark. Liam swiftly fired his gun, some kind of assault rifle with laser aiming, at the pirate's chest, killing him shortly after. "Let's move, folks!" Raizex roared, narrowly avoiding shots from another emerging pirate. Dashing swiftly to the pirate, he wounded the alien's legs using his glaive and fired a shot to his head, stopping the alien dead in his tracks.
Raizex then surveyed the surrounding carnage briefly. Most of the invading Sylvons were dead, but another army could be seen coming from the distance, riding armored vehicles or weird animal mounts, and the defenders' strength was wearing down. But then they made a quick turn and were charging straight at the city gates instead. Liam better told the truth when he said his men and robots could keep the second pirate army from breaching the gates. As Raizex and his little team made their move, he could see lots and lots of these new Slyvons looking paler and blank-faced than the normal ones. Leading Liam and Lea closer to the forest, Raizex swiftly navigated the charred pasture. Once in a while, a blank-faced Sylvon or two would try their luck in gunning him down, but Raizex always got in closer first and shot them before they could do anything, although to their credit, these new Sylvons were more resistant to pain and a direct headshot from his shotgun or impalement was necessary to disable them. He reminded himself of what his team had to do; search where the bunker was, following Lea's description of the place, and use it to bypass the crowding pirates; hopefully, they could reach the Red Lotus' location before the enemy did.
A gunshot ringed behind him; Lea somehow detected two Sylvon pirates sneaking up on them behind a big tree and managed to put them down with only a bullet from his rifle. It didn't kill them, but enough to buy time for Raizex and his friends to continue their mission.
-x-x-x-x-x-
Raizex could feel a sense of trepidation creeping up his neck as the small team successfully reached and opened the bunker's hidden maintenance door. Every second they wasted in this place meant more good people falling in battle. If the sounds of the skirmish were not lying to him, then the Sylvons were still trying to get past the city's manned turrets and other defenses despite minutes of a constant barrage of gunfire and cannons from the city's defense army. Worse, as soon as they entered the tunnel, three Sylvon pirates found them and tried to enter the tunnel as well. Raizex quickly unloaded his shotgun on the pirates; one well-placed headshot for each of them. With the help of his teammates, the young Indoraptor closed the door to the tunnel, preventing anyone else from following them in. He felt glad at first but his thoughts quickly became uneasy upon learning that they had no map of the tunnel's layout.
Holy fucking shit, man. Now it's just them and a dark, confined tunnel leading to Heavens-know-where.
Just as the young agent stirred to ask Lea whether he knew of the place's layout, his comms blared up.
"Ludvik, Vascon, come in! Please tell us you're not dead yet!" Aha, judging from the voice in his radio, the Indoraptor surmised it might be Xivena. "I'm here, Xivena. What's your status?"
"My colleagues and I are fine. Adaria city is still holding up well. We should be able to call in assistance from your Grand Fleet and whatever fleet is up there shortly. I think they are a bit bogged down from the pirates' battle fleets swarming them all over, but they survived the space battle with no more than scratches. What a surprising turn of events, don't you think?" Raizex mumbled happily on his acquaintance's survival. "Oh, pardon me, please stand by for a moment. I'll patch you up with Liam's AI friend."
"AI friend? Wait, are you talking about-"
"Greetings, gentlemen. My name is Unit 47, an army-grade Artificial Intelligence assigned as a partner of Commander Liam O'Brian. I will be guiding you through the maintenance tunnels so you may surface next to your prime destination," a synthetic voice took over Xivena's, clinical yet assuring in its tone. Raizex assumed that this must be the AI that his Aviren friend talked about. He then turned to give a thumbs-up to his friends.
"Okay. Are you guys ready?" Both Liam and Lea nodded.
"Acknowledged, you may lead the way, Unit 47. We're all set to go," Liam replied. With a curt nod, Raizex led his group across the dimly-lit corridors with their flashlights as the only illumination, guided by the voice of his new AI ally.
"You'll find a T-junction shortly ahead of you. Take a right and descend the adjacent staircase."
"75 meters from your current position, you should come across a circular bulkhead door. Find a lever nearby to open the bulkhead."
"Once you reach the top of the staircase, take a left at the junction."
"The long tunnel ahead of you leads to a large chamber just 120 meters away. Be careful, I'm detecting some movement in it."
While Raizex expected the journey to be difficult, if not outright perilous, he did not expect the place to be enemy-free, albeit the lack of proper lighting and the damp smell of this location kept him on edge. From time to time, Xivena would announce bits of news such as how relief effort was being rallied from the Union's other colonies and allies or the enemy's progress in breaching the city; as of now, the alien pirates were busy looking for secret passageways to avoid having to deal with the city's defense turrets.
After minutes of walking through the dim tunnels, the trio took a breather once they finally reached dry ground. The round chamber, full of boxes covered in tarp and piled on the corners of the room, seemed to suggest that people were just recently moving in it. Did the mollusk bastards find access to this place before Raizex's team could? The young agent curiously peered into an open box; some cheap-looking armaments were filling the box to the brim, yet only one or two of them were taken out, it seemed.
"Alert, I have received urgent news from our central government, Commander O'Brian!"
Liam stopped at his robot friend's sudden announcement, "Spill it out, 47."
"One of our colonies, Atlantis, is also under attack at this moment. The Defense Fleets have identified the invading Sylvon pirates as the Army of Little Brothers," Unit 47 elaborated. At Raizex's request, the AI continued, "Scans indicated the presence of over seven thousand foot soldiers being ferried onto the colony by pirate battleships. I have also received news that the Sylvon pirate army has set up a command center base within an island chain on Atlantis. " Liam cursed upon learning that the alien pirates had so many resources to stage a two-pronged war. Even the Indoraptors were unconfident of their ability to stop the invasion of Shangri.
"We better move. The Goddamned mollusks are getting on my nerves," at Raizex's instruction, the team marched further into the bunker, passing another dark hallway until they reached a more spacious chamber where the Sylvons had markedly passed through to sneak into the city. Boxes of ammunition and unidentified weaponry were left scattered all over the chamber. Small computers and other unknown electric devices littered the room, but they all had been deactivated, preventing the team from accessing them. As the three advanced to the center of the chamber, a burst of cold laughter emanated from a dark corridor before them.
They were not alone.
