The Mech Touch novel Chapter 4797

In a terrain as difficult and confining as this, it was impossible to sneak up on the upper floors.

No matter how primitive the pescans may be, they knew the importance of paying attention to what took place outside of their stronghold.

Ves along with other military leaders carefully observe the live feeds transmitted by the scouts. The feeds showed that hundreds of pescan soldiers began to man the walls and other defenses.

The indigenous aliens utilized fairly basic but practical weapons for the most part. There appeared to be a higher proportion of energy weapons among the troops, and a distressing number of them were transphasic in nature.

"The soldiers armed with transphasic rifles need to be eliminated first." Ves advised.

"Our sharpshooters have already received the necessary instructions." Major Alden Durant of the Davutan guard forces replied. "Their threat towards my men is much greater than your elite guard troops. The second-class combat armor cannot withstand sustained attacks from weapons of this caliber."

The good news was that a lot of alien soldiers were armed with more normal-looking small arms. The quality of these pescan troops were much more reasonable, though they could still pose a significant threat if dozens of them concentrated their fire on individual targets!

"Papa, there are so many of them. Can we win against the aliens?" Andraste asked with a touch of concern.

In order to allow his children to experience the upcoming battle on a more personal level, Ves had brought them along here. Everyone else tolerated the presence of the children as they considered it to be another part of the eccentric nature of the infamous Larkinson Patriarch.

"Of course we can, pumpkin." Ves turned towards his second daughter and grinned. "If we did not have the confidence to vanquish these aliens, we wouldn't have come here in the first place. Do you see all of the projections over here? That is all of the information we gathered on the enemy. Although we haven't figured out the full details of the pescans, we have confirmed that their tech is still stuck in a fairly primitive state. When the disparity in tech becomes too great, the differences in numbers don't play that big of a role."

Although Andraste could easily be fooled by this answer, her mother was not as easy to fool.

He carried Marvaine in her arms as she observed those same projected feeds with much greater concern.

"You do not know what the pescans have stored in the upper floors. Who is to say that their defenses here are representative of their full measures? This prison facility is large enough to fit combat vehicles such as tanks. In addition, these fixed defenses are difficult to destroy with small arms alone. We have to rely on heavy weapons to disable them, but they will run out if we encounter too many obstacles."

He understood these concerns well. "That is just a risk that we have to take. We are not going to allow those uncertainties to put us in a passive position. Tanks may be troublesome, but they are so large and cumbersome that they cannot navigate through the smaller corridors and entrances of this facility. Fixed defenses may make it hard to press much further, but since they are immovable, we can retreat and regroup without a problem."

The military officers had already considered all of these variables before. Even if they knew that they would have to pay a price in blood to defeat these formidable threats, they still chose to press on because the price of doing nothing may be far greater in the end.

As General Verle, Major Durant and the others exchanged their views and adjusted the orders of their troops, an unexpected development occurred.

Upon detecting that the humans had drawn closer, the pescans did not begin with opening fire or anything, but instead sent out a small bot down the large hallway.

"It's not a bot." Ves spoke as he analyzed the simple alien construct after he zoomed in. "It is a remote controlled construct."

His wife nodded in agreement. "It was recently built, possibly within the last hour. The alien that made it possesses great skills, and the tools he used are decent by our standards, but he or she had made it with so much haste that there are too many flaws."

By the time the small head-sized vehicle stopped a fair distance away from the humans around the corner, it began to project a tall, two-dimensional screen.

The tech was different, but its function was familiar. The screen portrayed a well-dressed pescan male who stood behind a display of aged stone and wooden ornaments.

Major Durant straightened his back. "That is Jaharon, the great chief of the city state of Davute! So this is how he has managed to escape our manhunt. He was hiding in this pocket space all of the time!"

This was not an unexpected development. Ves and General Verle exchanged brief glances with each other.

"What do you think this is all about?" Ves asked.

"I cannot say for certain, sir." General Verle softly responded. "This Jaharon alien may be desperate to negotiate a way out for him and the remnants of his race. It may also be that he is preparing to encircle us but needs to stall for time in order to close the net."

Ves did not take the former possibility seriously. These aliens deserved to go extinct for what they have done.

His side also deployed plenty of scouts and observation devices in the surrounding tunnels in order to guard against the latter possibility. This was one of the reasons why they did not rush towards the upper floor at their best speed.

The projected alien figure began to speak at this time.

[HU-MAN.] The tall but oddly-proportioned creature spoke. [WE ASK FOR DISCOURSE BEFORE CUTTING BLADES. PLEASE COMPLY.]

Great Chief Jaharon spoke in his native language, but it appeared that his people managed to develop a pretty good translation program over the years.

Of course, a human-developed translation program would probably be a lot more effective!

"I believe that this alien leader is waiting for one of us to step forward and open up a dialogue with him." General Verle spoke up. "Who among us will speak for our group?"

That was a difficult question.

Ves looked towards Minister Shederin Purnesse, who had been analyzing every scrap of data that the Davutans had on the pescan race.

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