Invasion of Kzarch Read Online Free PDF Page A

have three spaceships, over a dozen gunboats and several thousand men. You have a mere sixty.”
    For a second, the lieutenant was nearly as shocked as she was. From what little his briefing had said, the implication had been of only one ship; which had meant he had been assuming that the pirates would only have several hundred or so men. A thousand at most. The Blastfire attack as they headed in system had convinced him his numbers were on the low side, but nothing like this .
    Then he rallied. Or tried to at least. After all, he had already expected to be outnumbered, so, really, it didn’t matter much one way or the other. At least, that’s what he tried to persuade himself of.
    “Be that as it may, Ms. Mayor, I have my duty to perform. If possible, I ask that you share any possible information on and of the pirate scourge.” Frank heard a snort over the com from his sergeant, and gave a mental wince. He always tended to get overly stilted when nervous.
    “What? You can’t seriously expect to-”
    “I can, and do , Mayor Tho’mas. I know my duty.” She stared at him.
    “…As you will,” the mayor said in tired defeat. Mayor Tho’mas then proceeded to tell them of what she knew. It wasn’t much.
    After landing, and with the care that they had taken in doing so keeping all but one ship from being detected, the pirates had remained hidden for a time, the quiet lulling the planet into thinking it had just been a false alarm. So it had been nearly a complete surprise, when, six days after they were first detected, the pirates had abruptly swarmed the planet’s capital city over.
    Admittedly, it hadn’t been difficult. Kzarch barely had any defenses, and certainly none up to the job of taking on a powerful pirate force.
    Once they had seized the capital city, Newholm, they had killed the governor and anyone who had attempted to resist. Then, they had proceeded to every other city, town and village on the planet, systematically making sure the Kzarchians knew who the new people in charge were. As they did so, they had also destroyed anything they felt could cause them problems, including any communication towers.
    Which meant that any town knew little about what was happening in any other one.
     
    ***
     
    “…And so that’s about the size of it,” Frank concluded to his sergeants. He had called a meeting as soon as he had finished talking with the mayor, wanting to discuss the platoon’s next action.
    “However, she did say that she thought there was a, ah, ‘guerrilla’ encampment, in the mountains near Newholm.” There wasn’t even a moment of silence, Sergeant Lovel immediately speaking up.
    “Sir, I agree we should attempt to make contact with them, if they exist, and if we can find them. But I feel that our only realistic course of action is to wait for reinforcements to arrive. A single platoon is hardly enough to take on an army.”
    The lieutenant held down a flicker of annoyance at being argued with. He had already told them he intended to continue pursuing offensive operations as originally planned. But he had to admit the sergeant made a fair point.
    “I don’t quite agree,” he said mildly. “Yes, the odds are bad, on the face of it. But they won’t have much battlesuits, if any at all. Nor do they having our training. Along with the Kzarchian forces-”
    “It still isn’t enough.” Sergeant Lovel’s tone was still respectful, but getting less.
    “Aw, common, Georgeh, it ain’t that bad.”
    “Kate, it is that bad.”
    “They only have about a regiment, not an army,” pointed out Sergeant Abe Von Hervitz.
    “A regiment’s quite bad enough!” This was from the platoon’s q-squad’s sergeant, Martin Kanova.
    “I think that we need to find out more, about what’s going on,” opined the scout sergeant.
    Frank let the argument rage for several more minutes, then asked McKain, who had been fairly silent so far, “What do you think, McKain?”
    The rest of the sergeants fell