League of Planets Ch 8

This is basically an erotic love story and of course all characters are over 21. It will definitely not start out as a love story, but it will get there. The League of Planets Series contains BDSM, bondage, exhibitionism, and lots of kinky sex. If you don't like these things then this story may not be for you. Please vote often (fives are most welcome) and of course please leave constructive comments.

PS - This is the third entry in the League of Planets series. This will be the last of the Space Station Venus Series and will be available for purchase as a complete series.

If you have fantasies, ideas, etc for new stories please let me know, that includes twists on existing stories and I will see what I can do. Many of my stories have started out that way.

Chapter 8

John walked into the war room and stared at the celestial map that was zoomed in on the Trojans Asteroid belt. He saw swarms of red and blue dots intermingling along with varying sizes of black dots representing the asteroids. He grabbed a coffee off the table and demanded, "Tell me what is going on!"

The human general, Paul Markowski, had a pair of headphones cocked over an ear and began to narrate, "A group of miners working an asteroid saw a fleet of six Berserker ships enter their security zone and relayed the information to the attack ships scheduled to ambush the Berserkers. Apparently, the Berserkers were planning an ambush, but we found them, hid behind some asteroids and ambushed them instead."

"Our first volley took out two Berserker ships and since then it has been tit for tat. Every time we get one of their ships, they get one of ours. Our new weapons seem to be working well against their shields and weapons.'

John listened, then looked towards the Koresh and queried, "How did they get past all of our surveillance?" The Koresh looked away and didn't answer the question, so John scowled and went on, "Send notifications to all attack groups, trap groups and defensive groups that the Berserkers are finding ways to attack without notice. Everyone needs watchers stationed in areas we expect the Berserker ships."

John then turned to the group of Koresh's hovering over a computer screen, "What the hell is going on? We based much of our defense of the League on your information and now you're telling us you don't really know where they are. What the hell is going on?"

They huddled until John slammed his coffee cup on the table and yelled, "Talk to me, what is going on."

The Koresh turned and the best John could tell they were embarrassed. One of the Koresh stepped forward adding, "We just found a virus embedded in the signal that was affecting members of the League and creating the malady. This virus skewed our readings of distance and location of their fleets. We rebooted our systems and flushed the virus. We are confident that our current readings are accurate."

John's face turned red as his anger grew, "Okay, then what are your current readings on the Berserker fleet?"

"One quarter of the Berserker fleet is engaged with our fleet in the Trojans asteroid belt. Another quarter of their fleet is about to engage our fleet in Hildas asteroid belt. The remainder of their fleet is coming out of the asteroid belts, and some are even in Mars orbit. We should have the first scouts of their fleet reach us in two days."

John turned to the Reon and asked, "Do we have communication with our fleets in the Trojan and Hildas asteroid belts and the miners in the asteroid belts?"

The Reon responded, "Yes, but the delay is hours behind and so far, the battles were fairly even until the miners entered the battle and their insurgency has turned the battle in our favor. The last time we heard the Trojan battle is almost over and we appear to have won. The Hildas battle was still on-going, but it appeared that we were winning that one as well. I will keep everyone apprised of the on-going battles."

John soaked in the report, then turned, "Okay, half the Berserker fleet is tied up and hopefully will soon be destroyed, but that leaves the other half of the Berserker fleet trying to surround the heart of the League. We need to marshal our forces to confront the on-coming Berserker fleet. Let's get busy and get our forces in position to wipe out the threat."

John turned to the Koresh, "We need current positions on every Berserker ship. You messed up before, now is the time to correct your blunders." He turned to the rest of the crowd and continued, "Once we know where the Berserker fleet is we need to come up with a new plan for the defense of the core of the League." Next, John turned to the Reon and stated, "We need to issue an urgent recall for all League ships not currently engaged in a battle with the Berserker fleet."

John watched as everyone split up working to handle their tasks and John said a silent prayer that they had enough time. As he was thinking of anything he may have forgotten, his phone chimed. He looked at his screen and saw it was from Lisa. As he put his phone to his ear, he heard Lisa say Erika had been struck by the erotic malady. His face turned white as he turned and ran to his family. It took John ten minutes to reach their apartment and Lisa was crying uncontrollably.

John ran into Erika's room and found her thrashing on her bed. Her face had a blank far-away stare but bliss in her eyes while her body writhed in what appeared to be rapturous ecstasy. Lisa stood in the doorway watching in horror. She looked over at John and whispered, "It's one thing to go through it, or experience it yourself, but something else entirely to see your child going through this agony."

John had just been thinking the same thing. He turned to look at Lisa and asked, "Has Dr. Peck seen her and have the nanite techs been here?"

Lisa nodded her head. It was obvious that she was crying to hard to answer. In a few minutes she spoke up, "Dr. Peck said it was indeed the malady and the nanite tech rebooted the nanites. Dr. Peck said in an hour she should begin her recovery."

John and Lisa hugged and Lisa went to bed. John sat in a chair in Erika's bedroom with his e-reader. He sat thinking of the Berserkers and the upcoming battle and only became more confused. He opened his e-reader and scanned some of the titles he had stored there, then he ran across a book he read during the original Venus Ascending revolution.

The 48 Laws of Power

by Robert Greene had given him lots of ideas then and maybe the book could again.

He began reading again and the whole battle began to clear his mind. Law 3 was something they had tried to do with the trap Domes and it worked to a degree, but they needed more. There were eight points that John thought could be useful and he thought about them.

Law 3 :

Conceal Your Intentions

:

Always hide your true intentions. Camouflage. If you keep your foe off-balance and in the dark, they can't oppose you.

Law 5 :

So Much Depends on Reputation

— Guard It with Your Life

: If you have a reputation as an honest straight shooter, then when you tell someone there will be consequences for their actions they will believe you. You may conquer your foe without firing a shot if your reputation is strong enough.

Law 6 :

Create an Air of Mystery

: Be wantonly scandalous, cryptic or even inscrutable and create an aura of mystery. Any attention — positive or negative — is better than being disregarded.

Law 9: Win through your actions, never through argument:

As the old saying goes, actions speak louder than words. So let your actions yell forcefully.

Law 15: Crush your enemy totally:

Never leave your enemy with any ability to fight. Annihilate your enemy and leave them with no power, no self-self-confidence, no future and no capacity to oppose you again.

Law 17: Keep others in suspended terror, cultivate an air of volatility:

Too much unpredictability will be seen as a sign of indecisiveness, or even of some other kind of psychic problem. Paradigms are powerful, and you can terrify people by disrupting what they think are your perceived patterns. Such power should only be used judiciously, wisely and cautiously.

Law 28: Enter action with boldness - Lions circle the hesitant prey.

The bolder the lie the better. Boldness strikes fear, fear creates authority. Hesitation creates gaps, boldness obliterates them. Audacity separates you from the herd.

Law 29: Plan all the way to the end

After his quick pursual of the

Laws of Power,

John looked in on Erika and Lisa. Both were asleep, seemed calm and the nanites calmed Erika's body. He went back to his chair and began to jot down ideas based on the Laws of Power he thought were pertinent. After he had five pages of ideas, he called his friend and confidant Wes to discuss the concepts. After an hour of discussing the thoughts, he had a plan he could bring to the Leagues Board then setup aa meeting for tomorrow morning.

Before he took his nap John called Wes and Bahati of the Jageet. He needed to tell someone what he was going to do, so he set up a meeting for early the next morning. John set his alarm for a four-hour nap and went to sleep in his easy chair. When his alarm went off, he grabbed a cup of coffee, gathered his things, left a note for Lisa and left to meet his friends at the 'slut hut'.

John was on his second cup of coffee when Wes and Bahati arrived. John looked at both of them and began, "What we are going to talk about here is not to be discussed. I want to change tactics mostly because I think we have a spy that is feeding information to the Berserkers, or they have some technology we need to circumvent. I need both your help to pull this off."

John stopped and stared at his confidants. Both looked stunned but then their faces turned angry, so John continued, "Their attacks were precise, and they knew where our ships were. While some of our new weaponry turned the tide, how did they know where our ships were and how did they know where the League's core was?"

John paused and let his questions sink in before he continued, "I propose a long- and short-range attack preceded by a propaganda campaign that creates a mysterious reputation of all or nothing."

Wes spoke up with a quizzical look on his face, "I don't follow, what are you talking about a mysterious reputation propaganda campaign?"

John explained the

48 Laws of Power

and combining three laws, three, five and six, "We need a propaganda campaign that creates an aura of mystery about who we are and our capabilities, while developing a reputation of fearlessness, strength and tenacity. All of our propaganda needs to push there will be crushing consequences if they attack our home. All of this needs to happen while camouflaging or hide everything we are doing."

"We need secure unhackable communications with all our ships, now. We need to create a wall of firepower to face the Berserker fleet heading towards us, with long-range and short-range weapons. Then we need all the trap ships to rush back here as fast as they can, create a second wall of firepower behind them, so they are trapped, and we can decimate them. The front and back firewalls need to be coordinated, with long-range first followed by short-range as we move in. Remember to think in 3-dimensional or create a sphere and not a line. We must crush them completely."

"While our ships are moving into position, we will be trying to convince the Berserkers that our stand will be here on Venus Ascending. We know they can listen to our communications, so the propaganda needs to start now. We need to convince them that it will be a fight to the death, and we know it will be their death."

Wes looked confused and scared, while Bahati looked exhilarated and ready for a fight. John continued, "Bahati I need you to coordinate the forward and rear walls of firepower, but only give strategy to those that you absolutely trust. We don't want to give away any of our tactics and remember it is critical to conceal everything we are doing. If you have any doubts about anyone you talk to, then don't release any strategy."

John turned to Wes, "I need you to help me with the propaganda." John looked at his two friends and confidants and asked, "Are there any questions, because we need to get started?"

Bahati rose with a smile on his face and left the room, while Wes sat with a perplexed look on his face. "I still don't understand what we are doing."

"What we're going to do is make them question their resolve, make them hesitate and make them think we will never give up until they are destroyed. We are going to broadcast messages directly to them and keep our population out of this. We want to keep this as a 3-D chess game between us and them. If you and I can distract them until Bahati can get in place, we can win."

Wes looked at Johnn with new respect. This was well thought out and he never expected anything like this from John, "Okay let's get busy and see if we pull off this mind game you have planned."

John looked at Wes, mind game, he liked that. They first met with some of the marketing, sales and promotional personnel. They helped flesh out some rough drafts of propaganda and they tried it out on a group of close friends that were also discreet. Since this was propaganda, they decided to embellish a little and instead of the twenty-one species in the League they touted thirty-six species. When they thought they were ready they went to the Koresh and created a digital recording that would be broadcast continuously over and over in every known language. So began the propaganda.

"This is the League of Planets! We consist of thirty-six different species, all working together to create a cooperative of trading, amusement, scientific exchange and common defense. Twelve of our species have encountered your brutality before and we know your capability. With our combined defensive and offensive capabilities, you don't stand a chance. By a majority vote you're not welcome here. Remove yourself from this and surrounding solar systems or face the consequences."

"The penalties of non-compliance will be total obliteration. We will not fight you, defeat you and leave you able to fight us again at a future date. You will be crushed, annihilated, left with no power, no future and no capacity to oppose us ever again. If you withdraw now, we will not pursue or engage you. However, this is your last and only warning. If you withdraw and return at a later date you will be demolished with no warning."

"You have one orbit of our group of domes around the planet below to comply. If you don't submit you will face complete and total extermination."

John recorded the propaganda, let Bahati know the schedule and the message that will be broadcast. Bahati had a smile on his face as he left to make final preparations and John knew he was in his element. John personally notified all the League's board members that he trusted. He still felt that there were traitors on the board and he knew that they would get the word from the Berserkers, but he wanted to keep them in the dark as long as possible.

John sat in the conference room with Wes and tried to think of anything he was forgetting but couldn't. He grabbed a Buffalo Trace Bourbon on the way home but gulped it down before he got home. He grabbed Lisa, Erika and John Jr. the minute he saw them and hugged them tightly. Next, he went to the bedroom and lay with his head in Lisa's lap. She began to stroke his temples and within minutes his exhaustion took over and he was asleep.