The Human division along with their Cainth brothers had totally massacred the Plants attacking their lines and Colonel Crandon contacted General Dorg and asked if he would go out and burn any plant that could possibly regenerate. He was taking his division and sending half of it down the east side and the other half down the west. He had just had his troops change to the anti-personnel hornet back packs and had recharged their blasters. General Dorg said that he would make sure there were none to regenerate.
The Two Human regiments turned and began moving down the two sides of the square formed during the SR drop. They spaced each marine 30 yards apart and the regiment with its 10,000 troops moved along a sixty mile front into the Plants flanks. As they rolled down the sides the troops in the lines moved out and killed anything that was on the plain that could regenerate. Finally the two regiments met at the southern line and turned and encircled the remaining plant warriors. The Plants seeing that they were encircled milled around in the Middle. The Vgrig Warleader called upon the Plants to surrender and avoid any unnecessary killing. He felt certain that the Plants didn’t understand him but they should understand the message because the SR troops had stopped firing.
The Ground Leader of the Plants was in the Middle of the mass and saw that they had no chance. He used his wrist frequency generator and reported to the leaders on the home world that his tools had been totally destroyed and that he was surrounded and that the strangers were calling for him to surrender. The Elder Leaders said, “Then finish your job. We don’t communicate with any creature but the common.”
With that the Ground Leader ordered the remaining Plants to attack and they were all blown away before they could reach their enemy. The war on the ground was over except for mop up operations that would continue for the foreseeable future.
Chapter 13
K osiev and Admiral Dorg were on board the Moscow watching the feeds from the Fleet and land battle. The victory left them both exhausted; especially the land battle. “Those forts are incredible,” Dorg said. “That Algean fleet had no chance once it came as close as it did. Maybe they’ll think twice before attacking again.”
Kosiev shook his head and said, “What would you do if you had just lost half a million ships to our forts. Would you go away and forget about it?”
Dorg said, “Of course not and you’re right, neither will they.”
“They will do exactly what we would do in their place. They’ll go back to the scientific drawing board and develop something to offset our advantages,” Kosiev mused. “Their screens and ant-matter weapons concern me. If they develop screens that can last longer after a hit, then fleet actions can become really dangerous.”
Dorg thought a moment and said, “We also don’t know the scope of this enemy or where their central planets are located. I think we need to do some scouting around ourselves to get an idea.”
Kosiev thought about what Dorg was saying and then had an idea. We know the direction they came from. Just line up the Dremels planet with the Pydres and follow it in toward the center of the galaxy.”
Dorg nodded and took another bite of popcorn. “There’s something else that has me concerned.”
“What’s that?”
“We need to rethink the command structure of our ground forces.” Kosiev looked at him quizzically and Dorg continued, “I’ve been talking with my brother about what he has seen during the battle and he readily admits that the Humans are twice as good as his best warriors.”
Kosiev said, “He’s exaggerating.”
“Let me explain why he feels that way. My warriors, the Glod, and the Vgrig have had a long history of traditions revolving around single combat. We nearly lost the land battle when the Vgrig left their line for single combat glory. The Glod also looked to fight single opponents during the break in their lines. The Plants didn’t care; they just swarmed anything they could eat. We are not well equipped or have the temperament to fight well as a group. Even our Navies look for single combat unless ordered to attack together and even then it’s not well coordinated. I’m sure you saw this in our earlier conflicts.” Kosiev shrugged and then nodded. “We need to sit down with the leaders of our warrior members and discuss what we learned here.”
Kosiev looked down at his bag of popcorn and then put it aside. “My friend, will you set it up and I will try to get the Royal Couple to attend. I also need to speak to McAllister and see if he can beef up the screens of the forts.”
Dorg tilted his head to the right and shrugged both sets of arms, “Why, I thought they performed well?”
The Algean fleet did not launch a massive missile attack but take a look at this.” Kosiev then showed where an anti-matter missile struck the screen and the entire screen went red briefly.
“I haven’t seen that.”
“What do you think would happen if they managed to crash a ship loaded with anti-matter into our screen?”
Dorg just looked off and said, “Show this to McAllister. We need to work on this immediately.” Dorg looked out the viewport at the millions of stars and said, “What do you think the Plants will do next?”
“If I had to guess, they’ll design some new ships to fight us. I don’t think they are mindless; their technology belies that, so I don’t think they will throw more ships away. We need to relook at our own ships and think about where our next development will be. The Megaships will continue to roll off the assembly line but we need to get our scientists and engineers to see if we are maxed out right now on our capabilities. I may be wrong, but would you continue attacking an enemy that you can’t run from and every weapon you have is too slow to hit them?”
“Put like that, no I wouldn’t. So you think we will have a period of no attacks.”
“I think that if they were going to continue with their offence, then the fleet would already be here. I almost wish they would; I’m worried about what might show up next time.”
Dorg only nodded.
Danielle was on the air again addressing all the citizens of the Stars Realm. Most every planet had heard about the battle at the Pydres Planet and there was huge interest in what she was going to say. It was also the second time that everyone was going to see her new child which was reason enough for a massive viewing audience even if the battle had not taken place. Then there she was on everyone’s display.
“Good evening, to everyone on all your worlds. I thank you for taking time to allow me to share some things with you. As you can see, this is Rose Luanna Gardner and she has grown a lot since our last conversation,” Danielle held her up so the recorder would have a clear view. “Thanks to those of you who have sent your well wishes and after our battle with the Algeans, I feel somewhat better about her future and our defenses. However, I am asking for all of you to support the following changes. First of all, I am making Ross the Capital of the Stars Realm. It is literally the birth place where our union began. The Colonists, soldiers, and sailors that were killed there gave their life’s blood to cement the building blocks of our new civilization. Their sacrifice on Ross ultimately led to all of us coming together. It is only appropriate that we honor them with making that hallowed soil our Capital. The Government of Ross has donated one of the Northern Continents that is now unpopulated to our new union.”
All the billions of citizens were amazed at her choice. Everyone had expected it to be one of the first three members with the majority expecting Earth to be the first choice. The choice of Ross was perfect. Every race respected what the Humans did after they confronted the Cainth after they had killed the colonists but then allowed them to survive and embraced them as brothers. It was known by all that you could actually insult a Cainth and get away with it but it was fool hardy to say anything bad about their Human brothers. A fight always followed. Those deaths on Ross bound the two of their races together for all time.