Fight only when you need to, and avoid what you can. If you fight every battle the enemy sets before you, you are no longer following your own strategy—but his.
The fight was going well.
Perhaps too well, thought Commander Longsun.
He was one of the few within the cadre who could see the entire tactical picture, and with that information he issued orders to the la'rua leaders—directing some to engage targets and others to bypass them entirely. Those threats left unengaged were handed off to his battlesuit teams. He had deliberately broken them up to operate as individuals, even separating his own bodyguard. None were so distant that they could not support one another, but within the tight confines of a Gue'la ship, single suits operated far more efficiently than clustered teams struggling for room to maneuver.
Longsun kept his attention fixed on the tactical map, searching for something—anything—that would explain the Gue'la's behavior. They were resisting, yes, but it was disorganized and easily routed. The cadre had already cut down well over a thousand defenders while suffering minimal casualties. He knew from experience that a single cadre, properly supported by drones, could take an entire ship of this size.
He had done it before.
As a young Shas'Ui, he had boarded a Gue'la vessel during his first off-world campaign. He remembered that fight vividly—how brutal it had been, how fiercely contested every corridor was. That ship had been smaller than this one.
The Gue'la were the most stubborn species the Tau had yet encountered. That stubbornness had become a defining feature in Fire Caste doctrine.
Which made this engagement wrong.
The defenders would engage, yes—but the moment pressure was applied, they broke and fled. Even in hopeless situations, the Gue'la had always fought to the last.
Longsun set the thought aside for the moment and focused on the present. He had reached the target he had assigned to himself.
With a flick of his eyes, he ran a full systems check.
Gold across the board.
He drew a slow breath and stilled his mind. At the same time, he coiled his body, tension flowing through his muscles. The battlesuit mirrored the motion instinctively—leaning forward, shield generator raised on the left arm, cyclic ion blaster leveled beneath it on the right.
In his younger days, Longsun had often wondered at the peculiar way battlesuits responded to both physical and mental input. The suit could engage its hydraulics and thrusters without this preparatory stance. Earth Caste engineers had tried—repeatedly—to remove the requirement. Every major update included some attempt to streamline the process.
Each time, pilot performance worsened.
An Earth Caste psychologist had eventually offered an explanation: the bond between Tau and machine. When a pilot felt the suit as an extension of himself—rather than merely a weapon, like a tank—his effectiveness increased dramatically.
Longsun exhaled and emptied his mind completely. He waited. Waited for some hunter's instinct to tell him when exactly to strike his prey. He breathed as slowly and gently as he could manage.
Then it came.
Now.
His eyes snapped open. He released the tension in his legs and the battlesuit surged forward, hydraulics roaring to life. The cyclic ion blaster spun up to maximum output and he fired into the wall concealing his target.
The bulkhead melted as if it were ice.
His shields flared as he burst through the molten metal and into the chamber beyond. No one inside had expected the wall itself to become the point of entry. The Gue'la froze, staring up at the towering XV8 battlesuit looming over them. A few recovered enough to raise their weapons—others simply gaped.
Longsun did not pause.
He leveled his burst cannon and fired.
Three sweeping arcs of plasma crossed the room.
In less than a rai'kor, he was the only living being left inside.
He pivoted smoothly and launched himself back into the corridor, already pulling up the tactical map as he moved toward his next objective.
The thought returned.
He let it out of its box.
Victories should never feel effortless.
They were nearing the first major bulkhead. Beyond it lay the gunnery deck. His memory returned to that first boarding action—the wide, open space of the gun deck on that ship. Cramped, yes, but open enough for battlesuits to leap freely, to strike behind enemy lines and shatter formations.
Longsun skidded to a halt.
The realization struck him all at once.
Their destination.
The scattered resistance.
The ease of the advance.
It was a trap.
He located the icons of the two Pathfinder leaders within the cadre and pulled them into his command channel with a flick of his eyes.
In their headsets, his symbol flared in bright gold—the unmistakable mark of a commander's priority call. Eventually it would override all other communications and force compliance, but it almost never came to that.
Both Shas'Ui responded nearly instantly.
"Shas'Ui," Longsun said, his voice calm and precise, "I apologize for interrupting your hunt—but it is necessary to update you on the tactical situation."