StarFight 1: Battlestar Read Online Free Page B

even suffered the loss of their egg-laying Matron. A cohort without leaders and guidance became chaos. It then became a simple matter to impose his pheromones on the new arrivals and add them to his home nest. So he had invited the meeting, had created a nesting site, had sent down a small cohort of defective Servants, and then waited for the invaders to arrive. The memory of the perception images of the new beings had nearly emptied his inner gut. His breathing spiracles had become erratic in their pumping of air. Nausea had filled him as he realized the new arrivals were the worst type of Soft Skins. They were two-legged scavengers who resembled smaller soft skins on his world of Nest. Those tree-dwelling beings were known as crafty thieves. Clearly these larger Soft Skins, who had only four limbs rather than the normal six, intended to steal Warmth from the grasp of the Swarm.
    The invaders had arrived. Transports from each of their ten flying nests had touched down on the empty meadow far below his ship. Close to four six-groups had walked in on just two legs. They had attempted to communicate with the defective Servants he had sent down. Those Servants knew their duty. They had pretended to cooperate. After one flying transport left the meeting site, giving him worry that some Soft Skin leaders might escape, he’d sent down a second transport. It carried the Storm Bringer floating globe. The globe, once deployed, rendered inoperable all signaling devices, whether pheromone or radiation-based. An added benefit came when the globe burst. The plasma created by its eruption incinerated all that lay below it even as the magnetic field created by the globe drew in local storm clouds. Those clouds covered the meeting site, making it invisible to normal perception imagers. While he could have destroyed the Soft Skin leaders with a particle disruption device, such weapons left behind deadly radiation residues that lasted for many lifetimes. He had no desire to sully the pure lands of Warmth. So the Storm Bringer globe had been deployed. And it had worked well.
    “Hunter!” came an alarm pheromone from a Servant who occupied the bench which analyzed perception signals from the monitor globes they had dispersed in orbit above Warmth. “A Soft Skin monitor globe has cast a hard scent beam down on the meeting site! The beam will reveal our second transport.”
    Around him the other eleven Servants who operated the systems and devices that controlled the operation of his flying nest now flared their antennae. Their mandibles moved as if cutting through an enemy. Their spiracles pulsed in anticipation of his response pheromone.
    “Have the Soft Skin flying nests changed their position above Warmth?” he scent cast, adding a food trail pheromone to entice quick response.
    The Servant spread his wings. “They have not. The intruder flying nests remain in their cluster formation, acting like—”
    “Alarm!” interrupted a releaser pheromone from a different Servant who monitored radiations from the cold of empty space. “The largest Soft Skin flying nest has released a small device. The device is a . . . a flying fabrication. It now enters the air of Warmth and flies toward the meeting site.”
    Hunter emitted a calming pheromone and spread it across the chamber by way of his wings. He followed it with an inhibitory pheromone to forestall hasty action by any Servant. “Servant,” he scent cast to the one who had scent spoken. “Send a pheromone signal to the flying nests of our Support Hunters. Advise them of the monitor globe action and the flying device. Have them awaken their Fighter Leaders.”
    Sudden scent silence came from those about him. The Servant who had reported the Soft Skin flying nest behavior now emitted a releaser pheromone, signaling his intent to change his behavior. His front limbs touched the control panel that lay in front of his bench. “Signal pheromones sent. May I add perception images from our