What May Come

Part of the Plan

Fourteen Years Later

Nura rolled her shoulders in discomfort. She disliked wearing combat armor and much preferred her standard uniform. The armor was lacquered gray, and her rank insignia was embossed in gold on both her shoulders. Three crescents surrounding a nine-point star, a lieutenant-commander in the Confederation Service.

She strode towards the command center, a grandiose name for a pre-fabricated structure hastily erected on the stony plains of this planet. She held a rifle against her stomach with her left hand, while her right scrolled through the relevant information loaded on her datapad.

The Jikarrans weren't backing down. Confed's response to the attempted annexation of this system had been swift. Too swift. The forces sent ahead were now cut off from supply lines.

Nura pressed her lips together into a grim line as she read. It was a strange experience reading a sterile analysis of the fact that she was likely to be surrounded and annihilated by the armies of a hostile state.

The situation was punctuated by another volley of artillery fire from over the nearby plateau. The shells didn't have the range to reach the Confed structures, but she saw several marines flinch and duck their heads all the same.

Most of the soldiers were Ordug. They were used to arid worlds, swift over rocky terrain, and as tough as they came. General Trem had asked for them specifically.

Nura came to a halt as a squad marched double-time up the path, their sergeant calling for them to make haste. The long dreadlocks spilling from beneath their helmets bounced in time with their steps. "Your pardon, LC," the sergeant said as her squad passed.

"As you were, Kemmos," Nura replied absently. Once the marines were by, Nura resumed her course.

Jenitar was technically a garden world. The air was thick and oppressive, though there was hardly a plant to be seen on this continent. There was animal life, predominantly insects and arachnids that grew as large as a meter in length. The only thing making Jenitar worthy of notice, and the reason the Jikarrans wanted it bad enough to try taking it by force, was the wealth of exodite and other exotic minerals buried beneath its surface. Nura didn't find anything particularly special about the rocks she'd been shown, but the experts assured her they were necessary for the replication of a host of HI-Tech constructs.

She keyed open the pressure hatch of the command center and slipped inside. Two soldiers stood guard just within, not Ordug but Moirans, part of the general's personal guard.

"Commander daj'Lera," General Trem said in greeting. "Take a place."

Nura put away her datapad and approached the table console that Trem and her staff gathered around. A map of the surrounding plains was displayed on the table's viewscreen, and there were many more red icons than blue. Confed was dramatically outnumbered.

Colonel Clernum made room for Nura to stand beside him. He slid a datacard towards her. "How are the wounded?" he asked, his dour Moiran face at odds with the concern in his tone.

He made no mention of the datacard he offered, and the rest of the staff pointedly ignored it. As far as Trem and the rest of her people were concerned, they were never involved.

It should not have been as hard as it was to get evidence on Confed officers abusing their position; there were few things that offended Nura to the core more utterly. But, this was a fight for another day. The Jikarrans were a more immediate threat than the upswing in missing sapient reports wherever Grand Admiral Bo sent his fleet.