Eve of battle

Eve of battle

"Standby all combat personal, report to your action stations!", repeated the Horizon's speakers. The sound of thousands of boots thundered on the decks of as military personnel poured into the cargo holds.

The Horizon's officers along with senior commanders of the various arms of the military contingent gathered on the flight deck, watching on the big screen of the bridge, the hustle and bustle of last minute preparations for combat taking place in the holding bays. Troops were assembling in their various units.

Plaska was well within sensor range as the Horizon sped through the space time continuum towards the planet. The was a tense atmosphere on the bridge as the super lifter's crew were on high alert eagerly keeping a close eye for any surprise attacks. Recent experience had taught them that they could expect the now familiar sight of the wedge shaped alien starships to suddenly pop up at any time.

Already the Horizon had been attacked twice on separate occasions. Each attack had been calculated and well thought out, displaying a high degree of cunning by someone very intelligent.

One positive that had come out of those skirmishes was the aliens had proved they could be defeated.

Pilots leapt into the cockpits of their fighter craft as more soldiers packed into the various landing craft and armoured personnel carriers ready to go to war.

The Horizon powered Plaska and inevitable war on an alien world. Stars raced past

the Horizon like shooting stars. The figures on the bridge watched, on the big screen, the blue earth like planet come into view initially as a tiny mass in space, gradually becoming bigger and bigger.

Each individual was quietly wrapped up in their own solitary thoughts as the superlifter raced through space and time bringing them closer and closer to the planet and their mission.

On the planet's surface the progress of the Horizon was being monitored by the aliens with a keen sense of interest and a measure of apprehension by the aliens. General Amzda of the thudrasian galactic empire, sitting on the bridge of his flag ship, Kravaza had been aware of the massive starship bearing down on the planet ever since it left Earth's orbit and despite his efforts to launch a couple of surprise in deep space had failed to stop it advancing any further towards the planet . He decided on a change of strategy to make him for the earlier defeats and was issuing last minute instructions to the officers of the invasion force.

"We are not going to launch another attack on them, there 'll be expecting that. Instead we 'll let them come to us". We already lost too many ships in the first attack. We need to avoid stretching our remaining starships and so we can concentrate all our forces on attacking them upon entering the planet's atmosphere. See to it that all starships carry out the order !", Amzada concluded with a fierce growl.

"Yes general", shouted back the holograms of the officers standing before him with a growl.

His communications officer had traced a transmission from the palace to a planet in the orion belt of the milky way. From that source they had learned of the massive vessel coming to attack them.

He had chosen to take a gamble and try to capture the last remaining elements of resistance by the inhabitants of the planet hiding deep beneath the planet's surface. If he could manage that he would be able to marshall all the thudrasian forces to fight the massive starship, which was even then bearing down on the planet.