Space Odyssey: Spectre-Chapter 179: Evacuating Bastion

Jace kicked the wheel chair over and looked around. He walked toward one of the panels. He holstered his Pyre as he moved. He grunted in annoyance as he noticed the controls were in one of the Imperiums many dialects.

"Should we go after them?" Vana asked as the two of them stood on the other side.

"No, we completed our objective. Issue the notice. My comms are fried. We should get out of here quickly. How long did it take to get here by train?" Jace asked as he started taping on the interface.

"The trip took approximately fifteen minutes. But we were not able to all come here on one train. Then the trip from the crain station to the Anvil takes roughly ten minutes." Nina understood what Jace was asking about instantly.

"Then we will need to account for the injured as well. I want everyone off the planet in forty five minutes. Tell Hammers to get a complete account of all infantry, shock troopers, and Spectres. I do not want to leave anyone behind. Even if they are dead." Jace pressed a button and the shielding turned off. Then the glass wall slid open. Disappearing back into the wall where it came from.

"How did you cause the power to turn off?" Vana asked as Jace joined them and they walked towards an exit.

"It is part of my ability set. Just like how it looked like Nina was disappearing and could seemingly see the invisible enemies." Jace pointed out.

"You saw that?" Nina asked in surprise as she picked up speed as she ran.

"Yeah I was watching the cameras as I ran around sabotaging the ship systems." Jace followed suit and started jogging alongside the other two.

"Hammers, says he understands the order but he is confused why he is not able to find your location." Nina asked as they rounded a corner. Arriving at the airlock that had been ripped open. It was much easier since they were not running around aimlessly. Or in Jace’s case crawling around the crawl spaces in the space ship.

"Yeah..." Jace focused on his heads up display. The only things that had not broken on his armor was the personal shielding and the systems heads up display. Everything else had broken because he kept using his power to channel electricity through his armor. "This armor is basically scrap metal."

"What happened?" Vana asked as all three of them peeked out the open airlock. They were quite a distance in the air.

"Shot a few times. Fell out of a Chopper. Overclocked the motors on my suit. Then I used a weapon that was so powerful it would turn one of those blockheads into mist, that broke the sensors in my hands and the vibrations damaged the wiring in the rest of my suit. Then I got stabbed." Jace pointed at the hole in his armor. "Then the straw that broke my suit’s back was tripping and hitting my helmet on the ground. Since then just about all of my systems have been malfunctioning."

"How are we going to get down?" Vana asked.

Jace and Nina responded at the same time. "We jump."

"Jump?" Vana looked between them. "How would we survive a fall from this height?"

"We can survive easily. But you should use that grappling hook to break your fall." Jace answered before jumping out of the torn open airlock. Jace curled into a ball and he fell slamming into the roof of the facility. His yellow shields lit up before fading as he spread out on the ground looking up in time to see both Vana and Nina coming down.

Vana launched the grappling hook. Managing to get it hung on the edge of the roof’s opening. It went taunt as she fell through the opening. While Nina crashed into the ground near him.

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They watched the Anvil’s hangars close. Then Jace led the way to the elevators with the others following quickly behind him. Jace was leading the way as Spectre Nina, Spectre Dahlia, and Agent Vana followed behind him.

"How is our injured and death standings for this operation?" Jace asked as he stepped onto the elevator and began removing his helmet. He frowned as he realized one of the clasps were damaged and he could not remove the helmet.

"Seven injured Infantry soldiers. Thirty seven severely injured shock troopers. Twelve minor injuries for Shock Troopers. Three Spectres were injured, most of the injuries were minor. I would say you got the worst of it with getting stabbed through your armor. We were fortunate there were only ten of those invisible assassin biomechanical creatures." Dahlia explained as she held a datapad and read off of it.

"I’ll say. Completely caught me off guard and added an unfortunate scar to my skin." Jace chuckled in amusement.

"You know, most people would be dead after getting stabbed like that. A scar would be the least of their worries." Vana pointed out.

"Eh... How did our other objectives go?" Jace asked as he pulled off his helmet.

"Well as you know it was a secret but our only actual objectives were killing Lord Hoodwink and setting up the bombs. While we were up there going after Hoodwink, Dahlia managed to send out bombs to several different outposts and even planted one both under the main facility and the space port." Nina explained.

"Good then both out objectives were-"

"Wait? Both? I thought we had several objectives." Vana pointed out, interrupting Jace.

"That was a lie." Dahlia answered. "Jace was being extra cautious in case a spy managed to infiltrate the Anvil. So he lied about the objectives. Masking our main objectives among the half dozen objectives he gave out. All we really care about is removing Hoodwink from the board and destroying the planet."

"I understand killing Hoodwink. But why did you want to destroy the planet?" Vana asked.

"To remove all evidence and records of Lord Hoodwink’s experiments. We were worried that someone would try to recreate it. Which is why we are cleansing the planet." Jace answered.

"You keep saying destroy and cleanse. But I thought we were just causing damage on a massive level. I did not think we were actually destroying the planet." Vana pointed out as the elevator stopped.

Jace walked out moving towards the bridge. "No, we are also testing bombs that have been labeled as planet killers. Not to mention it would absolutely throw off both the Crystoph Federation and the Tyranus in the Vexical Empire."

They walked onto the bridge just as they felt the gravity increase. Hammers looked at them. "Welcome to the bridge. Jace I heard you damaged your armor... yeah that looks bad. How did you manage to do all that?"

"I will give my full report later." Jace answered as he walked forward. "Are we observing the rest of the planet with the satellites?"

Hammers nodded as the rest of them moved around the bridge. "We are." The screen in front of them was full of brown and gray particles, the gas layer of the planet. "Should we destroy all the spaceships that fly off the planet?"

"Are there a lot?" Jace began removing other pieces of his armor when a team of engineers ran in and began removing not just his armor but the others as well. The only one that was still fully armored was Vana. Only Jace was qualified to help her out of that armor.

"No, none of the ships on the planet have attempted to take off." One of the bridge officers answered.

"Then let’s focus on getting away from the planet, are all of our people accounted for?" Jace asked as he flinched as another piece of armor came off of him.

"Yes, we have a full crew back aboard the ship. The infirmary is full so the nurses and doctors are having to set up in hallways and the hangar." Another officer answered.

"We are coming out of the gas layer. Ten minutes before the bombs detonate." The first officer announced.

"What happened to the warship you found?" Hammers asked as he stood up from his captain’s chair.

"I grounded it. It will not be taking off." Jace answered. "If someone tries to take off it will explode."

"How did you manage that?" Vana was moving around in the armor uncomfortably.

Jace shrugged as the top part of his armor was removed. "I hooked up the warship’s reactor to various systems and basically had it overloaded if they tried to take off."

They waited several minutes before they were far from the planet. Once they were ready to leave is when the bombs on the planet detonated. The resulting explosions were blue flames that cut through the gas layer. Then the gas layer dispersed while chunks of the planet flew apart.

"We have a reactor signature. It’s coming off the planet. It is out of our range." The bridge officer’s announcement caused them all to stand at attention. They watched on the screen as it switched to a close up view.

"That is the ship that Hoodwink left Leonair in." Jace pointed out. "Ignore it. It is probably those twins. We will put a notice to keep an eye out for them when we arrive back in the Vexical Empire’s territories."

"You do not want to pursue them?" Hammers asked in surprise.

"We have activity from Orcus!" One of the bridge officers called out.

"Then that is it, let’s get out of here." Jace answered before walking off the bridge. "I will be in my cabin, getting some well needed rest and food. Tell the medics to only come when they are not busy."

The source of this c𝐨ntent is freewe(b)nov𝒆l