Star Force: Temple Wars by Aer-ki Jyr (books to read in a lifetime txt) 📕

guarantee they would win out against their opposites, especially when there were twice as many ships in play to send boarders over from, so all of his crew was being assigned to assist, including himself. This ship could not fall. Plausious was depending on it, and if a fight had to occur hand to hand, the pent up ire of his ship’s crew at the obnoxious overbearing Overseer’s previous actions already had them spoiling for a fight that was long in the making, but one that no one ever thought would actually happen.

Yuer didn’t have time to get into a Berserker suit, nor did he want to deprive the brawlers of one, so like the rest of the crew he grabbed a negation staff and began to charge it with their personal Essence on the way to the 6th shell where the fighting had broken out. When he got there a wall of Neofan were absorbing Essence attacks on their overlapping staffs, each of which created an aura around it that would deflect or shield against anything coming their way, including energy or physical attacks of speed, but would not interfere with slow moving attacks such as punches, kicks, or grapples.

The staffs were an easy way to negate an enemy’s advantage for a short period of time, and right now his crew ahead of him just looked to be trying to hold the hallway as they were slowly walking backwards under the assault.

He couldn’t see what was ahead. Too many grapple fields overlapping for him to sense through, but his telepathy and theirs was working once he made contact, and he was able to see through the eyes of those in the front row as several fallen crew were visible being trampled by their opposite number, all of whom were equally armed with no Berserker units.

“Make a hole!” he yelled, charging his way to the center of the line and going through with two others following him who had not yet fought. They were fresh and could have the most impact, and he knew this was no time to be conservative, so he ran with his staff held out in front of him vertically as he charged the two ends into glowing topaz crystals that had nothing to do with Essence, but rather were stun nubs.

As soon as he got into the gap his staff took hits, each glowing red in an umbrella of energy before him, but they didn’t slow his movements and he shot through the gap so fast that he was up to the opposing troops in three heartbeats, with him dipping his staff down and jabbing it forward at full run with his target taking a step back in shock…but that was all the opening he needed.

The staff made contact with the other’s body and delivered the massive dose of stun energy required to render him unconscious in a single blow…after which Yuer swung the staff around to parry a jab at him, following by many more interlocking slashes and uppercuts trying to move his staff out of position so they could get to his body, but he was too experienced in this form of combat to lose to this Truven trash.

The two Neofan with him did less well, but the focus was on Yuer and he used that to their advantage, punching through their three deep rows by using his staff as a ram, holding it horizontally and just pushing forward. Nobody could use Essence attacks at this close range, for the staffs would negate them, so they all fought hand to hand and frantically tried to make strikes against each other.

And many did, for the bodies were hitting the floor rapidly, but Yuer was older than Plausious and not one of the more subtle commanders. He kept himself physically fit beyond the minimum standards, and it was paying off now as he got behind their lines and downed several before they even realized he was behind them…then the attrition started as his own crew were dropping as fast as the enemy, with his presence being the deciding factor.

Soon the hallway was quiet, with 6 of his crew remaining conscious, but there were many other points of contact where fighting was happening in the ship and any one that broke through could eventually gain access to the critical systems and disable or commandeer the ship.

“Stay here and restrain them,” he told his crew. “Once down, I don’t want them returning to the fight. When our people wake up, stay here until called for. This may be a long fight.”

One of his crew picked up the staff of the enemy that appeared to have ample charge still in it, and tossed it to Yuer. He nodded his thanks and took off running with a staff in each hand backtracking the enemy’s movements by the scattering of bodies laying around, few of which were dead, but some Essence attacks had landed, and he couldn’t tell from the tattered uniforms to which ship they belonged…

Plausious watched the warship battle from below ground using the Temple systems. The ships loyal to him had outperformed his expectations, but they were not winning. It looked to be more of a stalemate as the boarding actions were taking place on almost all vessels, but very few of Truven’s because he had more people to board with.

But this was also happening almost directly above them, which meant they were in range to send help if the shields were down…and Plausious had been waiting for the right opportunity to move as even more Gjardans were heading their way, having to travel slowly across the center of the Temple or more rapidly around the outer curve. Either way, it was gradual travel with so little gravity, and before long it looked like most of the 73 warships were going to be involved, though two were still holding position far off, perhaps not