Charmaylarg Dufrain
🎖️ Game Master
- RP Date
- YE-46.3
- RP Location
- Osman
2300 Hours
Anvil Basin before the conquest of Osman by Ragnarok and the OsO had been a podunk town of roughly 5,000 whose main reason for existing was swine hearding and the exportation of a steady and ongoing supply of alcoholic farmers to neighboring counties until the moment Ragnarok had noticed it almost in passing on a map.
Situated above sea level on a nearly level flat plain-basin in the shape of its name that made it quite possibly one of the single most ideal pieces of realestate on the entire planet in which to situate a starport.
A decade later its population was close to one hundred times its number all crowded inside the flats and dedicated to the operation of three Starship-grade cradles able to take and repair, albiet slowly, a small to medium-sized ore hauler or bulk cargo transport with the entire population and that of neighboring settlements dedicated to the continued existance and operations of the terminal with each and every load of Osmium offloaded from Anvil Basin making even the now much larger population that much richer down to even the simplest urchin as the scraps of finance that trickled down from the endevor worth pennies elswhere in the sector might as well by all the money in the world.
With the re-arrival of the NMX the population of Anvil basin more closely resembled its original numbers while as the Osman Liberation Campaign ticked over into its seventh month the city of Anvil Basin was barely more than rubble.
A city that spanned close to five miles in every dirrection looked now like a massive blast had hit it starting at the Starport and spread outwards. FSC sponsored skyscrappers were toppled, warehouses and factories leveled. Entire blocks reduced to piles of brick and mortar.
But no single piece of ordinance had created such a scene. Instead it was the collateral of the final efforts of the Liberators to take down the R'kk that still sat like a fat beached whale on the remains of the three former starship cradles it now crushed and that even penetrated into its belly. The massive battlecruiser, small by the standards of its class was two kilomiters long and a third that wide, made of brown-purple bio-organic flesh and armor with a devestating broadside and an apocolyptic-scale particle gun on its nose.
The R'kk was the flagship of the NMX efforts in the osman system. A tyrant and battlelord it had dueled against the best of the liberation-efforts fleet and come out on top every single time and had almost been the death-knell in the entire campaign a week before when it broke the back of the Liberation fleet and moved in for the kill on the Stupedemonia, the flagship of the liberators, that had just managed to pull away mid-slingshot around one of Osmans moons where the R'kk had waited for it to come about to its doom unable to descelerate.
Instead the R'kk had fallen into an ill-planned trap of the liberators own. As a multitude of smaller vessles; All previously damaged in prior engagements but left to fluff the fleets numbers lay dormant and adrift in space with the same holes left in them from battles past to prove their mark.
There had been no overwhelming the battlecruisers shields with any sustained firepower to that point. Too large and too powerful the R'kk was in a class all its own.
But the coalition didnt plan on outgunning the battlecruiser.
With enough salvaged tractor beams and webbers from mining instalations and vessles and powerplants to keep them running a douzen ships engines came to life for the first time and wrestled the mighty enemy flagship into the planets gravity while those few ships that remained hammered into it from the flanks to keep it from manuevering.
When they pulled it into the planets gravity every single vessel had been an anchor to it and pulled the R'kk sideways into the planets atmosphere where even its shields couldnt compensate against the planets friction and nearly tore the battlecruiser apart.
Nearly.
Bio-organic armor was melted away and fused along the hull, and critical systems and components had fried but still the ship was able to right itself and avoid somehow not crash landing planetside. But no longer able to make orbit under its own power and losing altitude even if slowly the R'kk had made for the closest facility under NMX control able to provide even the basic repairs it would need to break orbit again and finish off the interloping liberators on their last legs.
The Coalition threw everything it had at the grounded ship at Anvil Basin to make sure it would never see the stars again...
"FIRING!" Somebody echoed as the call went from building to building and from any who could hear it as the Kairaiger heavy mecha obscured between the two buildings three blocks over fired the HAG anti-starship heavy assault gun again as everything for a hundred meters around the mecha was deafened as the projectile passed nearly from the end of the long barrel of the mecha to the side of the R'kk in less than the blink of the eye as night teporarily became day as the Plasma-bolt detonated against a wash of shields followed by a half douzen other displays as simular platforms across the city joined in the barrage.
The Kairaiger let off a stream of several missiles as it stomped slowly backwards but not fast enough as a secondary from the R'kk flashed and turned the entire block the mecha had been situated on and another behind it into glass.
There was the breifest silence across the city and then the tracers and lights kicked off again as the remainder of the coalition fought tooth and nail to hold back the NMX forces in the city and those descending from the ship to hunt down the last of the anti-ship batteries plaguing it from being able to drop its shields and conduct critical repairs.
Just a few hundred meters east of the destroyed Kairaiger and their dwindling heavy ordinance platforms a command building was situated in a long since abanoned warehouse. Boxes and crates pushed aside the holo-table was dim by nessecitiy but still showed a grim picture of Anvil Basin as the last of the coalitions forces that had yet to abandone their cause when the funding dried up or the casualties got too high when the NMX went on the offensive huddled around as the map was updated with a new, very much confirmed X over the mecha to their west.
"Five anti starship batteries left." The Colonel of the Moholi, Kibbits, intoned gravely, the two companies that had been set up as a blocking force infront of the Kairaiger also being lost dropping their availiable forces into the low five-digits.
"It's time we cut our losses while we still have the forces to sustain a retreat. Hit this place with everything we have left from orbit and scatter in every dirrection to get outsystem before that thing is able to make the black and chase us down." Kibbits offered, the warehouse shaking slightly as something exploded close enough to kick dust off the rafters and muddle the hologram momentarily.
Lt. Commander Darius Srisai grimaced as the remainder of Charlie Company/1st Expeditionary Battalion providing local security for the Kairaiger were vaporized. Save for the Combat Logistics Battalion, fractions of combat Companies and the Cranes of the Aviation Battalion, there wasn't much left of the 1st Fujiko Expeditionary Unit anymore. He was quite certain higher command in Fleet had already ran as attempts to establish communications have been failing for the last week. But there was still a connection to the at the edge of the system acting as a black box of sorts. They had been regularly uploading situational data, echo impressions, and reports to be sent in their inevtiable destruction.
"In that, I am in agreement for once. But our forces in orbit still seem to be in total disarray after their stunt to bring down that beast in the first place. We are going to need a force to either go in and delay them from conducting repairs long enough for our forces to be far enough giving chase isn't worth after we pummel them or we are going to need to delay with to give time for them above to get their act together. Regardless, a portion of us are not making it off this cesspool of a world."
"I am afaid that while your tactical assesment holds merit it fails to meet the parameters of the Frontier Service Corporation's primary directive. This planet can not be occupied by Misshuvurthyar forces," Mr. Donovan chimed in, "in the event of total strategic failure to maintain the ownership of Planet Osman to it's natives it is our directive to deny this planet to the extent of total annihilation of this stellar body, regardless of consequences or cost. We still have options, but none that will benefit the native population. I advise we begin considering them."
"And what options might those be? Turn this place into the next planetary nebula, Kikyo style?" Darius asked half seriously, departure from his normally stoic demeanor. Unlike Force Commander Stevenson, Darius lacked the gift of diplomacy and he was tired of watching his subordinates die for nothing and getting nothing out of it. At least the FDC got their bare minimum results at least it seems as he looks at the Rudy serving as his assistant since his previous one died.
"That would be acceptible," came Donovan's terse response.
Stepping into the warehouse after apparantly checking on her forces outside, Lt. Marigan quickly shut its door against the dusty winds kicked up by the troops massing outside. Her platoon of Minotaur Variable Tanks were some of the last that the Duskerian troops had left planetside, Bulldog tanks having borne the brunt of high-intensity fighting for the Duskerians.
Dusting her uniform off as she approached the holotable and caught the last of Donovan and the Reds' exchange, she piped in with her own opinion. "If we're going to go all scorched earth on this place, at least give my people a chance to evacuate whoever's left on the surface civilian-wise. We didn't cross the sector just to give up with nothing to show for it, and our task force's flagship is big enough to move civilians."
"That is preferable," came another robotic and terse reply, "if possible I would prefer that we free this planet and rebuild its defences. Unfortunately this outcome's odds have become infinitesimal to the point of being considered 'impossible'. The planet has lost nearly 69 percent of its original population not counting those abord Howard Station, leaving more civilians than your available fleet assets can carry, even if you abandon your own forces. In theory, the station could house another few million, but even then the station is not capable of outrunning the enemy fleet. In short, people will be left behind in the event of a retreat and the condition of denying this planet to the Mishhuvurthyar will result in the fatality of those left behind. I am projecting the deathtoll to be in the low millions if given ideal conditions, though they will be spared the torture of NMX treatment."
"Assuming you are even going to be able get off Osman to free them. We don't have air supremacy and that beast is still has teeth out there. Wouldn't it be better to die on your home flipping off those freaks of nature than die running fueled on only hope of possibly making it out?" Darius said, looking towards Lt. Marigan. "If you want, the 1st FEU deposited several message probes in the outskirts of the system to convey our telemetry, mission reports, and deeds back to Fujiko in the high probability that we were in over our heads in this endeavor. You only learn in doing after all. If you want, we can convey something similar and last messages to be sent back to the NDC or whoever. Just make sure the juicy parts are encrypted." he continued. While he was looking at Marigan, it was an offer for all present at the holotable. He wondered for a moment how they could address that if they had an anti-starship artillery battery of some sort. But that up to the idiots at Nepleslian Research and Manufacturing at this point.
"Now if we do manage to get a majority of our craft to the black drink, our fleet could assist with that as well. But we haven't been able to contact them for quite awhile. So back to scorched earth for now." Looking over at the Donovan. "Just how massive is that station of yours?"
"Howard Station's mass is measured at about 30 quadrillion kilograms. In regards to the implication of using it to destroy Planet Osman I am afraid it will only cause an extinction level event, however, overloading its reactor to explode upon impact could cause the planet surface to be inaccessible for landing over the course of the next several years. The stellar body would still exist and as such NMX fleets could still use the planet as a rally point, though only in an orbital capacity."
Captain Samson spoke up, indignant at the idea, "yeah, 'only an extinction level event'. You spacemen are forgetting that we have innocent people here! You want to execute them for the crime of being dominated by monsters even Star Empires can't put down? I'd rather fight to the last man, woman, and child than watch my people be euthanized like an injured horse!"
Darius eyed Samson for a moment. "Oh I haven't forgotten, nor have I forgotten that everytime we go to try rescue a settlement, the entire population is missing. But if you want to go out in a blaze of glory in some vain hope of saving them, go for it. That will require us to strap the meanest piece of steel we have and cut a blazing path into the beast and blow its reactors to knock out its guns from within to open up a window for transports to leave, balls to walls kind of action. It is going to make repairing her even more painful for them. But do you really want to chance subjecting the people you oh so care about to the horrors they will inflict upon them when that highly likely fails? But you get to die a stinking hero I suppose.
Between the stories from bakenekos who used to be under their control and vets who faught against both the SMX and NMX, I rather there be a back up plan." he said before standing up from where he was sitting, stretching his massive frame as if bored of the subject. Samson wasn't wrong, but their inability to coordinate with each other while fighting and reserves left made him much prefer the scorched earth method more. Take as many of the ugly bastards with them as possible.
The warehouse shook as close-range ordinance screamed overhead a split second after the brief streaks of orange zipped past towards seen through a tear in the sheet metal roof as they passed towards the distant ship from a pair of missiles cutting the conversation briefly followed by the ear-scratching whine of un-lubricated joints of the industrial-grade garage door as it slowly rose, unprompted, a meter to expose several loitering vehicles outside both local and coalition idleing as various shilhouetted shapes ran about in the controlled chaos.
Not openning nearly enough an armored hand massive enough to encompass the entire head of any present in the command theater placed three massive fingers on the garage door and hefted the several-hundred kilogram hunk of folded metal up two more meters to its massive height of three meters and easily half that across in bulk as the rhino-centric Mutant held the door open while several others strolled through now unhindered.
Mostly drones of the Shasta No Sekai corporation inhabited by sentient Fairy AI by their more aware and human-like gaits the three now very familiar recon special-forces drones strode in with their criss-cross tan and gray-white cloaks, while two likely mutants via context clues of their company came in wearing the same in the corporations Barghest hardsuits they used for heavy armor. Armed unecessarily to the teeth with a hodge-podge of weapons of various coalition and even some NMX particle weapons the five made way for one of the easy to identify Commander-type drones the corporations leadership-fairys inhabited that too bore a well-worn stealth cloak with a fresh set of still smouldering holes in one side that laid flat against its side eluding to a missing arm.
The commander type, walked in past her parted entourage as the massive mutant ducked in and dropped the door back to the ground with a teeth-numbing crash before mumbling a rather soft and abashed apology while rubbing his cybernetic jaw.
"Sorry i'm late." The cutesy-girlish voice from the commander-drone appologized, the youth of the AI's appearence they all had toeing an unspoken line about child soldiery by their appearence and tone if not attitude often represented though the Intelect and processing ability eluded that it was more coded into them than representing any actual age.
Over the campaign many of the commanders had been able to work in tandem with the corporation enough to make out the differences in voice, tactics, composition, and quirks that made up each of the four frontline commanders of the SnS corporation and the warmaster that led them.
Just from the simple statement and her voice, the slight way it cracked and her tone the commander-type before them was inhabited by 'Slayer'; One of the 'Pledias' or prime fairys who specialized her company in a variety of scouting, demolitions, and skirmishing.
Without further ado the fairy pulled out a small canister and, only having one arm, waited for one of her strays to crack the canister open with a hiss. Not unsettling having seen it done dozens of time wherever the corporation settled to fill with their brand of nanites the invisible-microscopic nanites imedietly began to glow, not waiting to fully fill the area as they took on the holographic form of another commander-type in much better condition than Slayer and the very edges of a starships bridge enviorment.
The hologram of the drone turned to face the group as from Slayers drone body a familiar voice of the Coalitions Warmaster, Abigail, began to speak.
"The Free-Captains Alliance ships have broken formation as of 1961 local time." She informed of the grave news of the desertion of the largest remaining portion of their fleet before continuing.
"Siegfrieds, Commander Fentch, and Colonel Malbricksons groups are departing the flagship as we speak and are consolodating forces to from a new unit using several of the new salvaged vessels but will not be continuing operations with the Coalition."
She reported seven more such desertions or departures of both small and more signifigant parts of the coalition to break away or even outright abandon them including a small contained mutiny on the flagship itself to seize it.
"The loss of most of our funding for the expedition has proven a considerable setback and dominoe effect in that most-" She paused, looking and nodding towards Kibbits who nodded back grimly, "Of our more monetary and prize-centric members have chosen to cut and run while the NMX fleet is still scattered and it's flagship grounded."
The death knell of the coalition would be so comical from her childish tone if the weight of it wasnt delivered with such finality.
As murmurs began to rise the Warmaster cut over them and continued to drive the proverbial knife even deeper.
"The Stupendemonia is still under its own power but on my orders is being evacuated of all non-essential personnel to remaining vessels. The slingshot manuever around the moon Fleetmaster and my predictions give a 32% chance of the stress breaking the ship apart.
If the flagship manages to survive I am ordering it on a collision course with your position-" The now abundant nanites created an image of the massive 5-mile long hauler turned mothership and a few small escourts slingshotting around the moon and following a small curved dotted line past Dawn station and right onto a circle and X-mark shaped an awful lot over an Anvil-shaped landmass.
As she continued to speak, with the casual tone of a passing conversation, a slowly scrawling block of data and text started to scrawl.
"The ship will no doubt break up in orbit but our predictions place a 78% chance of retaining enough mass to overpower and destroy the R'kk."
And with the detatched personality and finality the same the Warmaster turned away and her hologram dissapeared leaving the commander center silent as the grave. Slayer stood their, doing suprisingly well despite not having a face to show emotions of looking rather reluctant while ecological data of a new massive tear in the planets ozone layer and the kinetic force and blast of a ship that size and a rather concerning but still slowly rising number in the average global tempeture rising by several percent; Much like dropping dawn station being a much slower apocolypse to Osman as without extreme terraforming, cleanup, and repairs would leave the planet uninhabited within a half decade but only IF the resulting antimatter explosion didnt implode but instead went toroid and would tear a hole large enough in the atmosphere to vent enough oxyogen to make it unliveable within months.
And then it started into the seismic and volcanic agitation data of the fault line the anvil found itself on.
"Um..." Slayer began but was cut off as the shouting began.
Darius upon hearing the Warmaster's plan, he started thinking of what needed to be sent with the Cranes to save from the 1st FEU. But his analysis went to the background with the ruckus being made by the others. He just thought of an ancient Nepleslian Red haiku that seemed apt for the moment.
Trust in the Reds,
Blood of our blood, forged in fire,
Others soon betray.
"Has this already been run up the chain?" Lt. Marigan asked the Warmaster with a healthy dose of skepticism and borderline hostility in her tone. "This place was our home, and now you're blowing it up, so I'd at least hope you've cleared this with Duskerian HIGHCOM first."
"The Frontier Service Corporation only tally's the votes and goals of local defenders based on the percentage of units they have contributed to the war effort. Should the Duskerians wish to move back to Osman and rebuild the Osman government in an ethical manner we would gladly integrate with their chain of command," Mr. Donovan explained in a tone as literal and flat as reading an expense report, "alternatively, they could lend enough support to change the course of the war effort. Doing so would change the odds of losing Osman rendering our need to destroy it unnecessary and would effectively give them a vote."
"All right bucket of bolts, I wasn't asking you and yours. I don't know if you've noticed, but neither your owners nor the Duskerian command seem to have had much of a say in the strategic choices being made here." Marigan snapped as she swivelled her head to look at Donovan.
"And this isn't a democracy, I don't think anyone's taking count of votes on anything. Besides, we've brought as much to bear as you or anyone else here, or have you forgotten about the troops we've had on the ground or task force out there in the system?."
She scoffed at the automaton as she finished her thought. "This planet was our home, my home, before any spacers came and ran us off it. We have just as much say here as a jumped up company."
Mr. Donovan took the string of insults with a stone face. No emotion. No response for several long seconds. "Erroneous conclusion, but I understand it comes from a state of emotional sentiment. To clarify, while your people abandoned Osman in the height of economic turmoil brought about by Section 6's overspending WE of the FSC foresaw not only the financial collapse but invested every resource into ensuring the populace would suffer as little as possible. While your faction founded a new government on a new planet, WE of the FSC tolerated the military junta and upheld our mission to fortify the planet as much as possible before the invasion. Again, one more calamity WE of the FSC were here to aid while your faction built elsewhere. Perhaps the NDC has turned to propoganda to justify a guilty concience so I will share with you cold, hard statistics," Mr. Donovan adjusted his cape with a subtle nod of his robotic head, a holographic display began showing the true state of the war effort from long before they'd requested help, "billions in every manner of currency have poured from our coffers into this war, something unheard of by any corporation in history. Millions are still being defended in our holdouts and bunkers, structures built specifically by the FSC for this very reason. Hundreds of thousands of our men have died prior to your arrival, not counting the Osman military of the junta which turned to us as their command chain collapsed."
"So no, you have not, and could never possibly support Osman the way WE of the FSC have because we have stayed through thick and thin. You by your own choice have become one of us 'Space men' and regardless of your feelings you of the NDC are a foreign power," Mr. Donovan concluded, his hologram fizzling out, "with that out of the way, the FSC is interested securing more support from the NDC, should they provide it, although at this point it would need to be extremely significant so as to turn the tide even slightly."
Mr. Donovan took the string of insults with a stone face. No emotion. No response for several long seconds. "Erroneous conclusion, but I understand it comes from a state of emotional sentiment. To clarify, while your people abandoned Osman in the height of economic turmoil brought about by Section 6's overspending WE of the FSC foresaw not only the financial collapse but invested every resource into ensuring the populace would suffer as little as possible. While your faction founded a new government on a new planet, WE of the FSC tolerated the military junta and upheld our mission to fortify the planet as much as possible before the invasion. Again, one more calamity WE of the FSC were here to aid while your faction built elsewhere. Perhaps the NDC has turned to propoganda to justify a guilty concience so I will share with you cold, hard statistics," Mr. Donovan adjusted his cape with a subtle nod of his robotic head, a holographic display began showing the true state of the war effort from long before they'd requested help, "billions in every manner of currency have poured from our coffers into this war, something unheard of by any corporation in history. Millions are still being defended in our holdouts and bunkers, structures built specifically by the FSC for this very reason. Hundreds of thousands of our men have died prior to your arrival, not counting the Osman military of the junta which turned to us as their command chain collapsed."
"So no, you have not, and could never possibly support Osman the way WE of the FSC have because we have stayed through thick and thin. You by your own choice have become one of us 'Space men' and regardless of your feelings you of the NDC are a foreign power," Mr. Donovan concluded, his hologram fizzling out, "with that out of the way, the FSC is interested securing more support from the NDC, should they provide it, although at this point it would need to be extremely significant so as to turn the tide even slightly."
Darius just listened as to the pair speak, clearly not qualified to even touch the history behind both of their comments. "This is getting us nowhere." He said before looking over towards Slayer. "You were saying something?"
With only one arm the drone waved casually for attention, then frantically, then started joining in one some of the shouting as well but was drowned out. A hand, large enough it could encompass Slayers entire mechanical head gently patted the top of the Pledias' metal head but still carried enough force that the entire drones servos in her neck fought back in protest by the sheer weight as close to a thousand pounds of bulkish mutant stepped forwards as his own fairy materialized an avatar of a dull holographic silver almost comically small as she rested on his shoulders and with a casual gesture took control of the latent mirage nanites in the command center as the Rhionocerous-adjacent mutant roared loud enough through his cybernetic jaw at the very same moment Darius piped up.
"SHUT YER DAMN TRAPS YE HIGH-BNROW GITS. WE AINT DONT HERE AN SLAYAH GOT SHITE TO SAY SO PIPE DOWN ALREADY!" His cybernetically enhanced voice was enough to nearly deafen as for effect he slammed a massive trunk-like foot on the floor with enough force to make the holo-screen flicker.
"Thank's Rhindol, Mr.Darius." Slayer sounded almost abashed like the suddenly embarassed child facade the AI put on.
"Thanks." She said again, seemingly more collecting her thoughts as the nanites in the room supplanted the holo-table to expand the combat theater at waist-level encompassing a good chunk of the surrounding warehouse.
The picture was grim. While the R'kk didnt carry enough ground forces to counter the coalition outright the air itself was swarming with little red outlines of powered armor while large groups of red-icons were steadily pushing the NMX area of influence against the more spread out coalition forces.
The squids had the upper hand on firepower, coordination, doctorine, and a much more consolodated command structure while the coalition were holding on by sheer force of numbers against a much more veteran and coordinated force and it showed.
"We havent lost yet and Abi- The Warmaster hasnt written us off either. She's given us a time table." The Pledias explained. "As we speak the Stupedemonias escourts are burning ahead of the flagship to clear debris and counter any potential NMX vessels regrouping in orbit where they will take up positions in high-orbit, here-"
The map changed to a set of defilade on the far side of the coalition-controlled portion of the anvil,
"My sister is instructed to land a number of LHD vessels and begin the loading of our wounded and any non-essential personnel. The ships have enough to carry most of the coalition but will be under the guns of the enemy flagship as soon as they try to take off.
She has proposed we begin scaling back operations in preperation for a pre-evacuation while consolodating our forces around three of the major highways out of the basin we still control around three sets of two each of our remaining anti-starship platforms." The map zoomed back in to make three large pockets of blue in a triangle formation oposite of the R'kk with an anti-starship battery front at each position and one off to the side and behind while a considerably smaller but more condensed battle line took shape blocking the hypoethetical enemy forces that couldnt as easily displace them once they hunkered in.
Predicting the train of thought, Kibbits of the Moholi spoke up.
"She wants us to buy time by having the flagship target our anti-ship assets while allowing us to pull our forces back."
"Yes sir." Slayer confirmed.
"But this formation isnt a withdrawl line. It will still leave half our companies engaged and unable to withdraw. The Warmaster doesnt intend us to retreat, does she?" He asked, no judgement or reproach but instead an underlying curiocity.
"This is actually 'my' plan," Slayed admitted as the map consolodated but very pointedly off to the side of the new proposed positions where, through a very new red-area of operations predicted to be under NMX control a dead-black outline of a unit taken off the board glowed yellow as an outline formed around it.
'Big ANThony' Hovered over in bright letters of the disabled seige mecha of the corporation and the largest piece of ground equipment the coalition had fielded to date.
A seige mecha that had very pointedly taken several hits on its fortress shield array before one had penetrated and gutted the entire mecha from front to back as was evident by the diagnostic hologram showing the entire torso as just black with RED all around that.
Except not all the mecha was down, it seemed. While the mecha had been essentially engine-killed a highlghted cell-matrix on one side of it still red in the YELLOW with lines leading off of it to a very GREEN set of anti-ship grade laser storm array and three tubes with the unmistakeable universal symbol for NUCLEAR on them on the oposite side.
"Thats ma' mech." The massive mutant identified as Rhindol announced half proud half distraught at its state.
"The Ant suffered an engine kill early into the fight when it was identified by the enemy as a high-priority threat that it's marines couldnt counter due to it's mobile starship-grade shield array. Due to the terrain the corporation opted to move it into a more favorable firing solution for it's main laser array which proved rather effective due to it's sustained fire but was untilmately disabled early on." Slayer explained.
"While the frame itself is disabled the laser storm array is still charged and connected to one of its cell-matrix that wasnt destroyed and can sustain a continuous fire that my readings predict may be enough to throw the flagships shields over the edge from an attack on a blind side and open it up to bombardment from orbit."
"So essenitally you want those that will be sacrified to distract and keep the squid kitties occupied long enough to do whatever you are planning to do with Big Anthony. Is that the gist of the plan I am getting? If so, you have what's left of the 1st FEU's combat forces. Our logistics units will be more useful handling who ever is evacuating." Darius said after listening and briefly being distracted by the AI's emotions. If they were geniue or not, there is no way for him to know. He walked up to the target area and studied it a bit.
"There seems to be enough cover that our remaining IFVs can hull-down and deal with those flying fleabags if we use them to cut a path to Big Anthony. Echo Battery can provide what support they can for the ground before they are eventually taken out by counter-battery. They can only keep up firing and scooting before they figure out their pattern." he continued pointing to various locations for the IFVs and their self-propelled howitzers in the far rear. He wished they had not lost track of the Demon Squad sometime after Alpha Company secured their first settlement. It is assumed they were KIA or captured.
"Just how many individuals can thse LHDs carry?"
Antiarchon Theoni Philothamnus, or Archon Philo commander of the Interstellar Patrol's
Expeditionary Force Alpha finally spoke up. "The Instellar Patrol will help our allies evacuate. Despite the 'mess' in orbit, our cloaking devices will allow us to get down to the planet and back again. We have the ability to use our computer systems as a ST copy lifepod. We have febricated addtional storage systems and processing equipment. We estimate that we can process roughly ten thousand an hour at max rate for the troop ship, plus an addtional five thousand when we have to leave. The gunships are smaller, providing an addtional one thousand per hour at max rate with an addtional thousand when we leave. That is in addtion to our own troops. Actual numbers will likely be less than that, but we are commiting to saving as many of our allies and civilians as we can."
"Wait, the Yammies let you use their ST tech? We... nevermind, there are more important things to worry about." Darius said, trying to re-focus his mind after the realization dawned on him. Not that the Nepleslian Reds had any particular need for it with an inferior version of continuing memories in use. Maybe it was time to embrace the empire a bit more he thought to himself.
"Actually, Darius, we do posess Yamataian ST technology but only a single unit. If it were possible, we could attempt an 'ST Evacuation' of the populace. We unfortunately do not possess the technology needed to perform a mass ST but would attempt it if available," Donovan explained, "is there anyone who can make this possible?"
"We have the technology, but not the manufacturing capacity to make a signifigant amount of addtional units. We could make perhaps an addtional dozen or so an hour, but wouldn't have anywhere to place them. More efficent processing methoods would make a much larger diffrence." Theoni said.
"Well the evacuations kinda a backup plan." Slayer admited, sounding like she was squinting at the commanders while using her sole remaining arm to scratch at her optics. "We move the wounded and non-essentials shipside that would otherwise require a lengthy process to exfiltrate. Our doctorine will shift idealy towards a bastion-style of static but overlapping defense emplacements that should prove impossible in the time remaining for the enemy to encircle. With the enemy forces on hand in the numbers we've counted the NMX will have to go from a mobile skirmisher force to a concentrated effort and wont have the numbers to spread out their combat formation like they have now to break it.
They will have to concerntrate their entire force and most of their blocking forces on our defense while we can move several small teams through the now cleared parts of the city towards the Mecha. We only need one team to make it to the objective, aim, and fire the ordinance; We have enough understrength and scratch companies to draw from that we can have just a few companies send a couple competent men each for the raid without taking away from our combat strength.
If the city remains occupied and they are unable to make the objective we begin leap-frogging our defensive positions towards the exfiltration craft. With allied ships on hand we can accomodate roughly seven thousand of the remaining nine thousand active, non-wounded and accounted for of the coalitions forces though a lot of equipment and vehicles may have to be left behind to accomodate that many my estimates are we should have more than enough room by that time should we have to evacuate.
Either way we need to take down that ships shields when our allied ships reach high-orbit or we will have to break contact with the enemy flagship and evacuate for shipfall when the warmaster makes orbit shortly after."
The hologram lingered on the theater map with the crippled siege mecha still highlit in the center. The enemy flagship was there too, taking up an imposing amount of space comparatively like a giant red eyesore.
Slayer seemed to pause and dwell for a moment as if unsure if she should say any more but decided to anyways.
"I don't want to feel like we've wasted the past months here for nothing, to have lost so many of my friends that cant just revive and come back like my sisters and I can. All those... People... That they killed, and all our war buddies just to lose now. My sister, the warmaster, she's a sore loser but only says we've lost because she only cares about the big picture because we don't have enough ships anymore to keep the NMX out.
But their 'Big Squid' is on that flasgship! Their general or admiral or commander or whatever! That's their biggest, and baddest, and last capital ship they have left with their toughest troops! Maybe we did lose in the end by some metrics of grand stratedgy but we can make sure they don't win either; They already dont have the ships to hold Osman either without their flagship as an anchor if we don't let it up and I bet without their big-boss-squid they won't be regrouping either. We can't win but we can keep them from winning either all without..."
She paused, the still evident dotted line of the Coalition flagship and it's collision course with the planet filling in the gap.
Quietly, conspiratorially, and with a savageness that should never be made from such a young sounding girl slayer said, "Fudge my sister, and fudge the big-squid in his ship too and their grand strategy. I want to win on OUR terms, right here."
"This campaign has not been a loss for us, part of our objectives have been to get practical field experiance. We've been rotating troops home and new troops in as we can. I agree, we end this on our terms. Not theirs." Theoni said.
"Unless you print people that learn from mission reports and memories, most are not going to see that as an objective." Darius merely remarked. He then looked at Slayer with a smirk. "I am already committing what remains of our combat element in the 1st FEU. Fighting is what we do. I can ask for volunteers from our logistics element, but they are better suited it the evac."
Lt. Marigan gave the others a glance before sighing. "We didn't cross an entire sector and change to give up now." A small smile grew on her face as she spoke her next piece, "Besides, we Duskerians have our own ways of cheating death. Let's stick it to the squids, even if we don't have the time to get out the old fashioned way."
Darius returned a devilish grin. "I am glad someone else wants to party the hard way."
0200 Hours - .2km From Objective Big-A
There was a starke contrast of a city at war when the actual fighting was elswhere as 'Back-Stabbin Michael Trent' of Taskforce-3 peered through the criss-cross of semi intact trelice and lattice at the distant sun made up of the new front line as, in the near pitch-black of true dark the arc of tracers and laser flashes glinted off his goggles only to be replaced by a massive plume of fire as something big exploded not that he could tell what or where but only that it illuminated the sky briefly as forms zipped and danced about in a secondary conflict of duels and bouts before the fireball receaded.
"Yerp." He smacked his lips on the shared coalition proximity comms before slinking back through the second floor of the foundationally unstable remains of the building and into the street where several forms coalessed from the dark to be made out only barely by the moonlight and low-light vision optics as the final of the three taskforces assembled.
"They's stuck innit alright." Michael pulled his mask off enough to spit something thick and tar like onto the ground as the less than two-score infantry and handful of powered armor idled anxiously in the dark.
"Then it's time we move out." The one armed commander-type drone nodded from the shadows, the only sign of her under her dark black cloak being the soft glow of her optical lense. Around her were two others of her Strays contingent and four other MK-II commando-type drones all in simular camoflagued ponchos and cloaks over their normal strays brigandine armor to break up their shilhouettes while looming menacingly from the dark of an alley the bulky barrel-like form of a Psycho-frame makeshift powered armor frame watched with seeming indifference, the douzen-odd glowing lenses of it's optical plate a soft red in the night.
"Taskforce-3 check in." Slayer comm'd to the other scant forces of the all but suicide mission and those who had chosen or been chosen to lead it.
"Wángshì Zhī Yǒng Squad reporting in, 6 strong and ready to wreck mayham." A particularly gruff voice replied with the 1st FEU's IFF code encoded in the transmission. Wángjìng Zhī Yǒng, meaning Courage of Doomed Soldiers in Lianjia Speech, was a fitting name for the five volunteers picked by Lt. Commander X. Lacking in power armored assets, the 1st FEU's pioneers tapped into Nepleslian Red ingenuity and their Lieutenant's prior work with Crooked Demons to make their own makeshift version on Osman.
A hodgepodge of salvaged NMX Rippers, Reapers, gutted Ironblood IFV components, and a fabricated Durandium Alloy shell to provide protection for the pilot sitted to the front; two of the ugly creations were hunched down behind cover, ready to move out. Along with each of them and to the front in cover were the three cloaked Rudy Drones providing local security. But unlike the standard Rudy seen in use with the 1st FEU, there was a hint of sapience in the pair's movements as they checked their surroundings and what was ahead with great caution.
But the one that stood out were not the compact frames or the Rudy drones, it was the cloaked figure that was located in the middle of them. With a clearly feminine figure, not much else could be gleamed beyond the NRM Type 45 Partifle Beam Rifle she held at the low ready.
"Specialist Greyson, refrain from releasing premature information." she sternly said to him. Not really blaming the man since all he could was talk about the "legendary battle" that was to occur ever since he was matted with on of the Mk2 Crooked Demons. A vet of the Mk1, she was certain he was going to lose himself in the heat of close combat as his kind were known for.
"Status report." the cloaked woman said. A chorus of status updates came in, their voices flat and professional, but each with an undercurrent of tension.
"Rudy One, perimeter secure. No movement detected ahead. Adaptive camo at full efficiency," reported one of the drones with an eerie, almost human-like cadence.
"Rudy Two, holding position, cycling sensor scans," came the second drone, its tone clipped, precise, reflecting its more advanced programming.
The makeshift Crooked Demons adjusted slightly, their hulking forms blending into the cover, their patchwork exteriors showing the desperation of their creators. Inside one of the frames, Specialist Greyson shifted, impatience rippling through his voice despite his superior’s reprimand.
"Greyson in position. Crooked Demon Mk2 prepped, weapons hot. Just say the word," he said, a grunt accompanying the sound of weapons powering up. His eagerness was barely restrained, but it was a familiar energy that the cloaked woman had learned to manage. He was always like this before a fight.
The second Crooked Demon pilot, quieter and far more reserved, spoke next. "Specialist Harper, all systems green. Ready to advance on your command." Harper’s voice was calm, focused—likely the only thing keeping Greyson from barreling headfirst into the chaos that awaited.
The cloaked woman, took in the situation with a practiced eye. Her own Rudy drone chimed in quietly, "Rudy Three, optimal conditions for advance detected, but suggest recalibration of beam weaponry to compensate for incoming interference."
The woman’s cold eyes narrowed behind the visor of her cloaked helmet. Her thoughts raced ahead, calculating their battle plan and lines trying to anticipate what the NMX were going to do in response to their actions. She glanced at her rifle, the sleek NRM Type 45 Partifle Beam Rifle and begun adjusting its weapon sight and final charge of particles leaving the weapon, favoring a more neutral charge.
“Good. Rudy Three. Greyson, Harper, hold formation. On Slayer's mark, we move.” she said, her voice carrying finality in it, typical Nepleslian fatalism. She knew what was coming, but it had to be done. She changed her communication channel to the 1st FEU battle net.
"Red-actual, this is Wángshì-six. All combatants are in position and present." she said.
"Excellent work. I do not need to stress to you the importance of this operation is, especially as you and your team have been choosen to undertake this critical task with our allies. Remember that you do not do this just for your fellow Reds but for others to live another day. We were bred to fight and fight we shall. May the strength of your progenitors flow through you."
The two variable tanks of the Duskerian forces commited to this venture adjusted their track pods in seeming anticipation of the coming action, Lt. Marigan popping the hatch on one of the units to survey the other remaining forces, and the fireteam of infantry that had been assigned to work with her tanks.
"Drop-Bear Actual to Task Force Three. We'll give you firepower so long as you keep us clear of crunchies." She spoke over the radio, tacitly acknowledgin the limitations of her remaining forces. Tanks were all well and good for scaring off the less brave NMX forces, but could be swarmed easily if they weren't supported.
"Hey boss, you figure we'll last long enough to get our synch off before we go pop?" One of the other tankers asked over the platoon's local network, prompting a response from the lieutenant.
"I give us 50/50 odds." She answered frankly. "But at least we'll be dying where we were born, that's something no one can take away from us, eh?"
There was little back and forth as through an unspoken command the taskforce passed the line of departure. Other than a few ambient light sources on equipment there was no outwards illumination as most relied on low-light optics and equipment which made the initial advance slow at barely a walking pace.
They were, however, cloaked in more than just darkness as Slayers commandos ranged ahead, deploying at intersections and large gaps in the road where troops would need to expose themselves to navigate small canisters that released their corporations invisible at the moment mirage nanites that pre-programmed as there were deployed a ceiling-cover of pitch-black and sensor-absorbing nanites to cover not only their IR and visual signatures but also muffle any heat or energy and radiation signatures while the clouds covered like a canopy above them instead of a cloud of smoke.
Being less than a kilomiter from the objective they saw it not long after departing in the distance. Taller than most of the at-most two-story buildings around it the siege mecha even splayed on the ground was twice and even half again the tallest object within several kilomiters. It's silhouette lit up by the crackling glow of the distant battlecruiser and any number of fires and short-lived explosion flares it looked like a flat, three-sectioned surface with six multi-jointed legs that were positioned as if it had simply flopped down to take a rest but was poised to shoot back up at a moments notice.
Not that it could. Even unable to see it in any light the Mechas shape had a very pronounced and unnatural U-shape to it from their angle where the battlecruisers particle-lance had smashed through it's bastion-shield and carved through its armor like a thermal lance through butter. On heat and energy readings the spot where it burned through so efortlessly still glowed faintly from the damage hours before.
As they approached a kilomiter turned to eighthundred meters, turned to five hundred and then four without incident. The fighting, distant but furious had even the few mecha or suits of powered armor or rare flying formation of Neko stricken with tunnel-vision as the distant fires and bright-flare of centralized combat felt impossible to look away from with even the most focussed of the third taskforces' troops stealing glances when they passed by a junction or rose a crest and could get a short-lived vantage to see it.
But no plan ever survived contact with the enemy for long...
It started as a 'feeling'. A superstitious tug in the gut that if put to the task a scientific or medical sort could have attributed to the body biologically reacting to a negligible pre-shift in the local gravity. Then an itching of the teeth and gums as the air filled with precharged protons. Finally the near-paranoia feeling of wrongness caused by innate pressure.
All these things happened in the span of a couple seconds to cause what the canny and attentive might have consdered a sixth sense. They called out warnings, or to take cover, or even declared contact through thankfully nobody had pre-fired their weapons at non-existant enemies. But none the less the change came rapidly and less subtle as the air charged with arcs of static in the air and surfaces and briefly the very gravity within several kilomiters to one side of the battlecruiser lessened causing dust and small light debris like paper or fabrics and even small pebbles to vibrate and lift into the air.
All sound disapeared as it happened. Be it radio or vocal the vibration in the air like all the oxyogen being sucked out of an open airlock was the only sound as from start to finish over the course of just a few seconds the battlecruiser R'kk charged and then fired point blank a particle-carving lance meant to strike out at small starships tens of thousands of kilomiters away. The world ignited briefly as a collum darker than the night but filled with an endless stream of stars and cut at the edge with event horizon bathed the city in a blacklight glow as men and women of the third taskforce suddenly found the gravity reversed and began to lift off the ground as though suddenly experiencing the neko-genes flight. Many clung to debris on the ground, buildings, or whatever they could; Some unlucky few flailed and fell into the sky for the brief couple seconds the lance burned being just long enough as the weapons battery; Unable to traverse enough to hit the actual distant coalition battle lines but doing devestating damage none the less just by firing over it, cut off just as quickly as it started and right on time for a half douzen men of taskforce-3 to fall from twenty-meters in the air back down to the ground.
They hit the corners of buildings and landed in jagged piles of debris. Some simply landed flat back on the pavement and shattered most of their lower bodies or broke their backs or even necks. It wasnt enough to kill. But it was enough to cripple two of the Reds, three of the Duskerians, and a member of the Moholi.
Distant as they were from the lance the damage to the coalition battle line that it fired right over was likely unimagineable.
"We don't have time." Slayers bell like tinny voice called over the command frequency. Her next words were underlined with meaning and implication while lacking in sympathy for sounding so young.
"We move on." She declared, walking right past a Fujiko Red surrounded by his fellows as he thrashed and screamed at the near 45-degree angle that his lower body was currently fashioned in compared to the normal straightness of his spine.
The night was slightly brighter now as blacklight stars hung in the air, slowly dissipating like a luminous mist spreading out and falling down harmlessly to the ground where they winked out again. One such particle landed on the spine of the warmask of a nightmare as she watched at a distance as two of the Moholi held down their injured comrade, her ears picking up his distant screams of abject pain and horror even as one of them tried to muffle his mouth as a second drove a blade through a gap in the injured mans body armor and silenced him ruthlessly. She faded into the dark silently as where she had been her cohort did the same.
At this time of night, the low hum of the inertialess drives of the Duskerian vehicles were all that could be heard of them, the remaining infantry riding atop the two fighting vehicles and using them as makeshift hover-transports, though they were not built for sustained hover flight in their lower profile vehicle configuration.
However, burning out the drive units had been deemed acceptable in exchange for avoiding making noise with the treads on the vehicles. Only the two tank pilots and three of the infantrymen were left of those commited to the suicidal venture.
The Duskerians hadn't spared too much time for mourning after the deaths, the men who had gone down thrashing for only a moment before growing still unnaturally quickly, followed by one of the Duskerians seeming to make a call on long-range comms before giving a thumbs-up to the CO.
It seemed like their "synch" had worked, whatever that meant.
Anvil Basin before the conquest of Osman by Ragnarok and the OsO had been a podunk town of roughly 5,000 whose main reason for existing was swine hearding and the exportation of a steady and ongoing supply of alcoholic farmers to neighboring counties until the moment Ragnarok had noticed it almost in passing on a map.
Situated above sea level on a nearly level flat plain-basin in the shape of its name that made it quite possibly one of the single most ideal pieces of realestate on the entire planet in which to situate a starport.
A decade later its population was close to one hundred times its number all crowded inside the flats and dedicated to the operation of three Starship-grade cradles able to take and repair, albiet slowly, a small to medium-sized ore hauler or bulk cargo transport with the entire population and that of neighboring settlements dedicated to the continued existance and operations of the terminal with each and every load of Osmium offloaded from Anvil Basin making even the now much larger population that much richer down to even the simplest urchin as the scraps of finance that trickled down from the endevor worth pennies elswhere in the sector might as well by all the money in the world.
With the re-arrival of the NMX the population of Anvil basin more closely resembled its original numbers while as the Osman Liberation Campaign ticked over into its seventh month the city of Anvil Basin was barely more than rubble.
A city that spanned close to five miles in every dirrection looked now like a massive blast had hit it starting at the Starport and spread outwards. FSC sponsored skyscrappers were toppled, warehouses and factories leveled. Entire blocks reduced to piles of brick and mortar.
But no single piece of ordinance had created such a scene. Instead it was the collateral of the final efforts of the Liberators to take down the R'kk that still sat like a fat beached whale on the remains of the three former starship cradles it now crushed and that even penetrated into its belly. The massive battlecruiser, small by the standards of its class was two kilomiters long and a third that wide, made of brown-purple bio-organic flesh and armor with a devestating broadside and an apocolyptic-scale particle gun on its nose.
The R'kk was the flagship of the NMX efforts in the osman system. A tyrant and battlelord it had dueled against the best of the liberation-efforts fleet and come out on top every single time and had almost been the death-knell in the entire campaign a week before when it broke the back of the Liberation fleet and moved in for the kill on the Stupedemonia, the flagship of the liberators, that had just managed to pull away mid-slingshot around one of Osmans moons where the R'kk had waited for it to come about to its doom unable to descelerate.
Instead the R'kk had fallen into an ill-planned trap of the liberators own. As a multitude of smaller vessles; All previously damaged in prior engagements but left to fluff the fleets numbers lay dormant and adrift in space with the same holes left in them from battles past to prove their mark.
There had been no overwhelming the battlecruisers shields with any sustained firepower to that point. Too large and too powerful the R'kk was in a class all its own.
But the coalition didnt plan on outgunning the battlecruiser.
With enough salvaged tractor beams and webbers from mining instalations and vessles and powerplants to keep them running a douzen ships engines came to life for the first time and wrestled the mighty enemy flagship into the planets gravity while those few ships that remained hammered into it from the flanks to keep it from manuevering.
When they pulled it into the planets gravity every single vessel had been an anchor to it and pulled the R'kk sideways into the planets atmosphere where even its shields couldnt compensate against the planets friction and nearly tore the battlecruiser apart.
Nearly.
Bio-organic armor was melted away and fused along the hull, and critical systems and components had fried but still the ship was able to right itself and avoid somehow not crash landing planetside. But no longer able to make orbit under its own power and losing altitude even if slowly the R'kk had made for the closest facility under NMX control able to provide even the basic repairs it would need to break orbit again and finish off the interloping liberators on their last legs.
The Coalition threw everything it had at the grounded ship at Anvil Basin to make sure it would never see the stars again...
"FIRING!" Somebody echoed as the call went from building to building and from any who could hear it as the Kairaiger heavy mecha obscured between the two buildings three blocks over fired the HAG anti-starship heavy assault gun again as everything for a hundred meters around the mecha was deafened as the projectile passed nearly from the end of the long barrel of the mecha to the side of the R'kk in less than the blink of the eye as night teporarily became day as the Plasma-bolt detonated against a wash of shields followed by a half douzen other displays as simular platforms across the city joined in the barrage.
The Kairaiger let off a stream of several missiles as it stomped slowly backwards but not fast enough as a secondary from the R'kk flashed and turned the entire block the mecha had been situated on and another behind it into glass.
There was the breifest silence across the city and then the tracers and lights kicked off again as the remainder of the coalition fought tooth and nail to hold back the NMX forces in the city and those descending from the ship to hunt down the last of the anti-ship batteries plaguing it from being able to drop its shields and conduct critical repairs.
Just a few hundred meters east of the destroyed Kairaiger and their dwindling heavy ordinance platforms a command building was situated in a long since abanoned warehouse. Boxes and crates pushed aside the holo-table was dim by nessecitiy but still showed a grim picture of Anvil Basin as the last of the coalitions forces that had yet to abandone their cause when the funding dried up or the casualties got too high when the NMX went on the offensive huddled around as the map was updated with a new, very much confirmed X over the mecha to their west.
"Five anti starship batteries left." The Colonel of the Moholi, Kibbits, intoned gravely, the two companies that had been set up as a blocking force infront of the Kairaiger also being lost dropping their availiable forces into the low five-digits.
"It's time we cut our losses while we still have the forces to sustain a retreat. Hit this place with everything we have left from orbit and scatter in every dirrection to get outsystem before that thing is able to make the black and chase us down." Kibbits offered, the warehouse shaking slightly as something exploded close enough to kick dust off the rafters and muddle the hologram momentarily.
Lt. Commander Darius Srisai grimaced as the remainder of Charlie Company/1st Expeditionary Battalion providing local security for the Kairaiger were vaporized. Save for the Combat Logistics Battalion, fractions of combat Companies and the Cranes of the Aviation Battalion, there wasn't much left of the 1st Fujiko Expeditionary Unit anymore. He was quite certain higher command in Fleet had already ran as attempts to establish communications have been failing for the last week. But there was still a connection to the at the edge of the system acting as a black box of sorts. They had been regularly uploading situational data, echo impressions, and reports to be sent in their inevtiable destruction.
"In that, I am in agreement for once. But our forces in orbit still seem to be in total disarray after their stunt to bring down that beast in the first place. We are going to need a force to either go in and delay them from conducting repairs long enough for our forces to be far enough giving chase isn't worth after we pummel them or we are going to need to delay with to give time for them above to get their act together. Regardless, a portion of us are not making it off this cesspool of a world."
"I am afaid that while your tactical assesment holds merit it fails to meet the parameters of the Frontier Service Corporation's primary directive. This planet can not be occupied by Misshuvurthyar forces," Mr. Donovan chimed in, "in the event of total strategic failure to maintain the ownership of Planet Osman to it's natives it is our directive to deny this planet to the extent of total annihilation of this stellar body, regardless of consequences or cost. We still have options, but none that will benefit the native population. I advise we begin considering them."
"And what options might those be? Turn this place into the next planetary nebula, Kikyo style?" Darius asked half seriously, departure from his normally stoic demeanor. Unlike Force Commander Stevenson, Darius lacked the gift of diplomacy and he was tired of watching his subordinates die for nothing and getting nothing out of it. At least the FDC got their bare minimum results at least it seems as he looks at the Rudy serving as his assistant since his previous one died.
"That would be acceptible," came Donovan's terse response.
Stepping into the warehouse after apparantly checking on her forces outside, Lt. Marigan quickly shut its door against the dusty winds kicked up by the troops massing outside. Her platoon of Minotaur Variable Tanks were some of the last that the Duskerian troops had left planetside, Bulldog tanks having borne the brunt of high-intensity fighting for the Duskerians.
Dusting her uniform off as she approached the holotable and caught the last of Donovan and the Reds' exchange, she piped in with her own opinion. "If we're going to go all scorched earth on this place, at least give my people a chance to evacuate whoever's left on the surface civilian-wise. We didn't cross the sector just to give up with nothing to show for it, and our task force's flagship is big enough to move civilians."
"That is preferable," came another robotic and terse reply, "if possible I would prefer that we free this planet and rebuild its defences. Unfortunately this outcome's odds have become infinitesimal to the point of being considered 'impossible'. The planet has lost nearly 69 percent of its original population not counting those abord Howard Station, leaving more civilians than your available fleet assets can carry, even if you abandon your own forces. In theory, the station could house another few million, but even then the station is not capable of outrunning the enemy fleet. In short, people will be left behind in the event of a retreat and the condition of denying this planet to the Mishhuvurthyar will result in the fatality of those left behind. I am projecting the deathtoll to be in the low millions if given ideal conditions, though they will be spared the torture of NMX treatment."
"Assuming you are even going to be able get off Osman to free them. We don't have air supremacy and that beast is still has teeth out there. Wouldn't it be better to die on your home flipping off those freaks of nature than die running fueled on only hope of possibly making it out?" Darius said, looking towards Lt. Marigan. "If you want, the 1st FEU deposited several message probes in the outskirts of the system to convey our telemetry, mission reports, and deeds back to Fujiko in the high probability that we were in over our heads in this endeavor. You only learn in doing after all. If you want, we can convey something similar and last messages to be sent back to the NDC or whoever. Just make sure the juicy parts are encrypted." he continued. While he was looking at Marigan, it was an offer for all present at the holotable. He wondered for a moment how they could address that if they had an anti-starship artillery battery of some sort. But that up to the idiots at Nepleslian Research and Manufacturing at this point.
"Now if we do manage to get a majority of our craft to the black drink, our fleet could assist with that as well. But we haven't been able to contact them for quite awhile. So back to scorched earth for now." Looking over at the Donovan. "Just how massive is that station of yours?"
"Howard Station's mass is measured at about 30 quadrillion kilograms. In regards to the implication of using it to destroy Planet Osman I am afraid it will only cause an extinction level event, however, overloading its reactor to explode upon impact could cause the planet surface to be inaccessible for landing over the course of the next several years. The stellar body would still exist and as such NMX fleets could still use the planet as a rally point, though only in an orbital capacity."
Captain Samson spoke up, indignant at the idea, "yeah, 'only an extinction level event'. You spacemen are forgetting that we have innocent people here! You want to execute them for the crime of being dominated by monsters even Star Empires can't put down? I'd rather fight to the last man, woman, and child than watch my people be euthanized like an injured horse!"
Darius eyed Samson for a moment. "Oh I haven't forgotten, nor have I forgotten that everytime we go to try rescue a settlement, the entire population is missing. But if you want to go out in a blaze of glory in some vain hope of saving them, go for it. That will require us to strap the meanest piece of steel we have and cut a blazing path into the beast and blow its reactors to knock out its guns from within to open up a window for transports to leave, balls to walls kind of action. It is going to make repairing her even more painful for them. But do you really want to chance subjecting the people you oh so care about to the horrors they will inflict upon them when that highly likely fails? But you get to die a stinking hero I suppose.
Between the stories from bakenekos who used to be under their control and vets who faught against both the SMX and NMX, I rather there be a back up plan." he said before standing up from where he was sitting, stretching his massive frame as if bored of the subject. Samson wasn't wrong, but their inability to coordinate with each other while fighting and reserves left made him much prefer the scorched earth method more. Take as many of the ugly bastards with them as possible.
The warehouse shook as close-range ordinance screamed overhead a split second after the brief streaks of orange zipped past towards seen through a tear in the sheet metal roof as they passed towards the distant ship from a pair of missiles cutting the conversation briefly followed by the ear-scratching whine of un-lubricated joints of the industrial-grade garage door as it slowly rose, unprompted, a meter to expose several loitering vehicles outside both local and coalition idleing as various shilhouetted shapes ran about in the controlled chaos.
Not openning nearly enough an armored hand massive enough to encompass the entire head of any present in the command theater placed three massive fingers on the garage door and hefted the several-hundred kilogram hunk of folded metal up two more meters to its massive height of three meters and easily half that across in bulk as the rhino-centric Mutant held the door open while several others strolled through now unhindered.
Mostly drones of the Shasta No Sekai corporation inhabited by sentient Fairy AI by their more aware and human-like gaits the three now very familiar recon special-forces drones strode in with their criss-cross tan and gray-white cloaks, while two likely mutants via context clues of their company came in wearing the same in the corporations Barghest hardsuits they used for heavy armor. Armed unecessarily to the teeth with a hodge-podge of weapons of various coalition and even some NMX particle weapons the five made way for one of the easy to identify Commander-type drones the corporations leadership-fairys inhabited that too bore a well-worn stealth cloak with a fresh set of still smouldering holes in one side that laid flat against its side eluding to a missing arm.
The commander type, walked in past her parted entourage as the massive mutant ducked in and dropped the door back to the ground with a teeth-numbing crash before mumbling a rather soft and abashed apology while rubbing his cybernetic jaw.
"Sorry i'm late." The cutesy-girlish voice from the commander-drone appologized, the youth of the AI's appearence they all had toeing an unspoken line about child soldiery by their appearence and tone if not attitude often represented though the Intelect and processing ability eluded that it was more coded into them than representing any actual age.
Over the campaign many of the commanders had been able to work in tandem with the corporation enough to make out the differences in voice, tactics, composition, and quirks that made up each of the four frontline commanders of the SnS corporation and the warmaster that led them.
Just from the simple statement and her voice, the slight way it cracked and her tone the commander-type before them was inhabited by 'Slayer'; One of the 'Pledias' or prime fairys who specialized her company in a variety of scouting, demolitions, and skirmishing.
Without further ado the fairy pulled out a small canister and, only having one arm, waited for one of her strays to crack the canister open with a hiss. Not unsettling having seen it done dozens of time wherever the corporation settled to fill with their brand of nanites the invisible-microscopic nanites imedietly began to glow, not waiting to fully fill the area as they took on the holographic form of another commander-type in much better condition than Slayer and the very edges of a starships bridge enviorment.
The hologram of the drone turned to face the group as from Slayers drone body a familiar voice of the Coalitions Warmaster, Abigail, began to speak.
"The Free-Captains Alliance ships have broken formation as of 1961 local time." She informed of the grave news of the desertion of the largest remaining portion of their fleet before continuing.
"Siegfrieds, Commander Fentch, and Colonel Malbricksons groups are departing the flagship as we speak and are consolodating forces to from a new unit using several of the new salvaged vessels but will not be continuing operations with the Coalition."
She reported seven more such desertions or departures of both small and more signifigant parts of the coalition to break away or even outright abandon them including a small contained mutiny on the flagship itself to seize it.
"The loss of most of our funding for the expedition has proven a considerable setback and dominoe effect in that most-" She paused, looking and nodding towards Kibbits who nodded back grimly, "Of our more monetary and prize-centric members have chosen to cut and run while the NMX fleet is still scattered and it's flagship grounded."
The death knell of the coalition would be so comical from her childish tone if the weight of it wasnt delivered with such finality.
As murmurs began to rise the Warmaster cut over them and continued to drive the proverbial knife even deeper.
"The Stupendemonia is still under its own power but on my orders is being evacuated of all non-essential personnel to remaining vessels. The slingshot manuever around the moon Fleetmaster and my predictions give a 32% chance of the stress breaking the ship apart.
If the flagship manages to survive I am ordering it on a collision course with your position-" The now abundant nanites created an image of the massive 5-mile long hauler turned mothership and a few small escourts slingshotting around the moon and following a small curved dotted line past Dawn station and right onto a circle and X-mark shaped an awful lot over an Anvil-shaped landmass.
As she continued to speak, with the casual tone of a passing conversation, a slowly scrawling block of data and text started to scrawl.
"The ship will no doubt break up in orbit but our predictions place a 78% chance of retaining enough mass to overpower and destroy the R'kk."
And with the detatched personality and finality the same the Warmaster turned away and her hologram dissapeared leaving the commander center silent as the grave. Slayer stood their, doing suprisingly well despite not having a face to show emotions of looking rather reluctant while ecological data of a new massive tear in the planets ozone layer and the kinetic force and blast of a ship that size and a rather concerning but still slowly rising number in the average global tempeture rising by several percent; Much like dropping dawn station being a much slower apocolypse to Osman as without extreme terraforming, cleanup, and repairs would leave the planet uninhabited within a half decade but only IF the resulting antimatter explosion didnt implode but instead went toroid and would tear a hole large enough in the atmosphere to vent enough oxyogen to make it unliveable within months.
And then it started into the seismic and volcanic agitation data of the fault line the anvil found itself on.
"Um..." Slayer began but was cut off as the shouting began.
Darius upon hearing the Warmaster's plan, he started thinking of what needed to be sent with the Cranes to save from the 1st FEU. But his analysis went to the background with the ruckus being made by the others. He just thought of an ancient Nepleslian Red haiku that seemed apt for the moment.
Trust in the Reds,
Blood of our blood, forged in fire,
Others soon betray.
"Has this already been run up the chain?" Lt. Marigan asked the Warmaster with a healthy dose of skepticism and borderline hostility in her tone. "This place was our home, and now you're blowing it up, so I'd at least hope you've cleared this with Duskerian HIGHCOM first."
"The Frontier Service Corporation only tally's the votes and goals of local defenders based on the percentage of units they have contributed to the war effort. Should the Duskerians wish to move back to Osman and rebuild the Osman government in an ethical manner we would gladly integrate with their chain of command," Mr. Donovan explained in a tone as literal and flat as reading an expense report, "alternatively, they could lend enough support to change the course of the war effort. Doing so would change the odds of losing Osman rendering our need to destroy it unnecessary and would effectively give them a vote."
"All right bucket of bolts, I wasn't asking you and yours. I don't know if you've noticed, but neither your owners nor the Duskerian command seem to have had much of a say in the strategic choices being made here." Marigan snapped as she swivelled her head to look at Donovan.
"And this isn't a democracy, I don't think anyone's taking count of votes on anything. Besides, we've brought as much to bear as you or anyone else here, or have you forgotten about the troops we've had on the ground or task force out there in the system?."
She scoffed at the automaton as she finished her thought. "This planet was our home, my home, before any spacers came and ran us off it. We have just as much say here as a jumped up company."
Mr. Donovan took the string of insults with a stone face. No emotion. No response for several long seconds. "Erroneous conclusion, but I understand it comes from a state of emotional sentiment. To clarify, while your people abandoned Osman in the height of economic turmoil brought about by Section 6's overspending WE of the FSC foresaw not only the financial collapse but invested every resource into ensuring the populace would suffer as little as possible. While your faction founded a new government on a new planet, WE of the FSC tolerated the military junta and upheld our mission to fortify the planet as much as possible before the invasion. Again, one more calamity WE of the FSC were here to aid while your faction built elsewhere. Perhaps the NDC has turned to propoganda to justify a guilty concience so I will share with you cold, hard statistics," Mr. Donovan adjusted his cape with a subtle nod of his robotic head, a holographic display began showing the true state of the war effort from long before they'd requested help, "billions in every manner of currency have poured from our coffers into this war, something unheard of by any corporation in history. Millions are still being defended in our holdouts and bunkers, structures built specifically by the FSC for this very reason. Hundreds of thousands of our men have died prior to your arrival, not counting the Osman military of the junta which turned to us as their command chain collapsed."
"So no, you have not, and could never possibly support Osman the way WE of the FSC have because we have stayed through thick and thin. You by your own choice have become one of us 'Space men' and regardless of your feelings you of the NDC are a foreign power," Mr. Donovan concluded, his hologram fizzling out, "with that out of the way, the FSC is interested securing more support from the NDC, should they provide it, although at this point it would need to be extremely significant so as to turn the tide even slightly."
Mr. Donovan took the string of insults with a stone face. No emotion. No response for several long seconds. "Erroneous conclusion, but I understand it comes from a state of emotional sentiment. To clarify, while your people abandoned Osman in the height of economic turmoil brought about by Section 6's overspending WE of the FSC foresaw not only the financial collapse but invested every resource into ensuring the populace would suffer as little as possible. While your faction founded a new government on a new planet, WE of the FSC tolerated the military junta and upheld our mission to fortify the planet as much as possible before the invasion. Again, one more calamity WE of the FSC were here to aid while your faction built elsewhere. Perhaps the NDC has turned to propoganda to justify a guilty concience so I will share with you cold, hard statistics," Mr. Donovan adjusted his cape with a subtle nod of his robotic head, a holographic display began showing the true state of the war effort from long before they'd requested help, "billions in every manner of currency have poured from our coffers into this war, something unheard of by any corporation in history. Millions are still being defended in our holdouts and bunkers, structures built specifically by the FSC for this very reason. Hundreds of thousands of our men have died prior to your arrival, not counting the Osman military of the junta which turned to us as their command chain collapsed."
"So no, you have not, and could never possibly support Osman the way WE of the FSC have because we have stayed through thick and thin. You by your own choice have become one of us 'Space men' and regardless of your feelings you of the NDC are a foreign power," Mr. Donovan concluded, his hologram fizzling out, "with that out of the way, the FSC is interested securing more support from the NDC, should they provide it, although at this point it would need to be extremely significant so as to turn the tide even slightly."
Darius just listened as to the pair speak, clearly not qualified to even touch the history behind both of their comments. "This is getting us nowhere." He said before looking over towards Slayer. "You were saying something?"
With only one arm the drone waved casually for attention, then frantically, then started joining in one some of the shouting as well but was drowned out. A hand, large enough it could encompass Slayers entire mechanical head gently patted the top of the Pledias' metal head but still carried enough force that the entire drones servos in her neck fought back in protest by the sheer weight as close to a thousand pounds of bulkish mutant stepped forwards as his own fairy materialized an avatar of a dull holographic silver almost comically small as she rested on his shoulders and with a casual gesture took control of the latent mirage nanites in the command center as the Rhionocerous-adjacent mutant roared loud enough through his cybernetic jaw at the very same moment Darius piped up.
"SHUT YER DAMN TRAPS YE HIGH-BNROW GITS. WE AINT DONT HERE AN SLAYAH GOT SHITE TO SAY SO PIPE DOWN ALREADY!" His cybernetically enhanced voice was enough to nearly deafen as for effect he slammed a massive trunk-like foot on the floor with enough force to make the holo-screen flicker.
"Thank's Rhindol, Mr.Darius." Slayer sounded almost abashed like the suddenly embarassed child facade the AI put on.
"Thanks." She said again, seemingly more collecting her thoughts as the nanites in the room supplanted the holo-table to expand the combat theater at waist-level encompassing a good chunk of the surrounding warehouse.
The picture was grim. While the R'kk didnt carry enough ground forces to counter the coalition outright the air itself was swarming with little red outlines of powered armor while large groups of red-icons were steadily pushing the NMX area of influence against the more spread out coalition forces.
The squids had the upper hand on firepower, coordination, doctorine, and a much more consolodated command structure while the coalition were holding on by sheer force of numbers against a much more veteran and coordinated force and it showed.
"We havent lost yet and Abi- The Warmaster hasnt written us off either. She's given us a time table." The Pledias explained. "As we speak the Stupedemonias escourts are burning ahead of the flagship to clear debris and counter any potential NMX vessels regrouping in orbit where they will take up positions in high-orbit, here-"
The map changed to a set of defilade on the far side of the coalition-controlled portion of the anvil,
"My sister is instructed to land a number of LHD vessels and begin the loading of our wounded and any non-essential personnel. The ships have enough to carry most of the coalition but will be under the guns of the enemy flagship as soon as they try to take off.
She has proposed we begin scaling back operations in preperation for a pre-evacuation while consolodating our forces around three of the major highways out of the basin we still control around three sets of two each of our remaining anti-starship platforms." The map zoomed back in to make three large pockets of blue in a triangle formation oposite of the R'kk with an anti-starship battery front at each position and one off to the side and behind while a considerably smaller but more condensed battle line took shape blocking the hypoethetical enemy forces that couldnt as easily displace them once they hunkered in.
Predicting the train of thought, Kibbits of the Moholi spoke up.
"She wants us to buy time by having the flagship target our anti-ship assets while allowing us to pull our forces back."
"Yes sir." Slayer confirmed.
"But this formation isnt a withdrawl line. It will still leave half our companies engaged and unable to withdraw. The Warmaster doesnt intend us to retreat, does she?" He asked, no judgement or reproach but instead an underlying curiocity.
"This is actually 'my' plan," Slayed admitted as the map consolodated but very pointedly off to the side of the new proposed positions where, through a very new red-area of operations predicted to be under NMX control a dead-black outline of a unit taken off the board glowed yellow as an outline formed around it.
'Big ANThony' Hovered over in bright letters of the disabled seige mecha of the corporation and the largest piece of ground equipment the coalition had fielded to date.
A seige mecha that had very pointedly taken several hits on its fortress shield array before one had penetrated and gutted the entire mecha from front to back as was evident by the diagnostic hologram showing the entire torso as just black with RED all around that.
Except not all the mecha was down, it seemed. While the mecha had been essentially engine-killed a highlghted cell-matrix on one side of it still red in the YELLOW with lines leading off of it to a very GREEN set of anti-ship grade laser storm array and three tubes with the unmistakeable universal symbol for NUCLEAR on them on the oposite side.
"Thats ma' mech." The massive mutant identified as Rhindol announced half proud half distraught at its state.
"The Ant suffered an engine kill early into the fight when it was identified by the enemy as a high-priority threat that it's marines couldnt counter due to it's mobile starship-grade shield array. Due to the terrain the corporation opted to move it into a more favorable firing solution for it's main laser array which proved rather effective due to it's sustained fire but was untilmately disabled early on." Slayer explained.
"While the frame itself is disabled the laser storm array is still charged and connected to one of its cell-matrix that wasnt destroyed and can sustain a continuous fire that my readings predict may be enough to throw the flagships shields over the edge from an attack on a blind side and open it up to bombardment from orbit."
"So essenitally you want those that will be sacrified to distract and keep the squid kitties occupied long enough to do whatever you are planning to do with Big Anthony. Is that the gist of the plan I am getting? If so, you have what's left of the 1st FEU's combat forces. Our logistics units will be more useful handling who ever is evacuating." Darius said after listening and briefly being distracted by the AI's emotions. If they were geniue or not, there is no way for him to know. He walked up to the target area and studied it a bit.
"There seems to be enough cover that our remaining IFVs can hull-down and deal with those flying fleabags if we use them to cut a path to Big Anthony. Echo Battery can provide what support they can for the ground before they are eventually taken out by counter-battery. They can only keep up firing and scooting before they figure out their pattern." he continued pointing to various locations for the IFVs and their self-propelled howitzers in the far rear. He wished they had not lost track of the Demon Squad sometime after Alpha Company secured their first settlement. It is assumed they were KIA or captured.
"Just how many individuals can thse LHDs carry?"
Antiarchon Theoni Philothamnus, or Archon Philo commander of the Interstellar Patrol's
Expeditionary Force Alpha finally spoke up. "The Instellar Patrol will help our allies evacuate. Despite the 'mess' in orbit, our cloaking devices will allow us to get down to the planet and back again. We have the ability to use our computer systems as a ST copy lifepod. We have febricated addtional storage systems and processing equipment. We estimate that we can process roughly ten thousand an hour at max rate for the troop ship, plus an addtional five thousand when we have to leave. The gunships are smaller, providing an addtional one thousand per hour at max rate with an addtional thousand when we leave. That is in addtion to our own troops. Actual numbers will likely be less than that, but we are commiting to saving as many of our allies and civilians as we can."
"Wait, the Yammies let you use their ST tech? We... nevermind, there are more important things to worry about." Darius said, trying to re-focus his mind after the realization dawned on him. Not that the Nepleslian Reds had any particular need for it with an inferior version of continuing memories in use. Maybe it was time to embrace the empire a bit more he thought to himself.
"Actually, Darius, we do posess Yamataian ST technology but only a single unit. If it were possible, we could attempt an 'ST Evacuation' of the populace. We unfortunately do not possess the technology needed to perform a mass ST but would attempt it if available," Donovan explained, "is there anyone who can make this possible?"
"We have the technology, but not the manufacturing capacity to make a signifigant amount of addtional units. We could make perhaps an addtional dozen or so an hour, but wouldn't have anywhere to place them. More efficent processing methoods would make a much larger diffrence." Theoni said.
"Well the evacuations kinda a backup plan." Slayer admited, sounding like she was squinting at the commanders while using her sole remaining arm to scratch at her optics. "We move the wounded and non-essentials shipside that would otherwise require a lengthy process to exfiltrate. Our doctorine will shift idealy towards a bastion-style of static but overlapping defense emplacements that should prove impossible in the time remaining for the enemy to encircle. With the enemy forces on hand in the numbers we've counted the NMX will have to go from a mobile skirmisher force to a concentrated effort and wont have the numbers to spread out their combat formation like they have now to break it.
They will have to concerntrate their entire force and most of their blocking forces on our defense while we can move several small teams through the now cleared parts of the city towards the Mecha. We only need one team to make it to the objective, aim, and fire the ordinance; We have enough understrength and scratch companies to draw from that we can have just a few companies send a couple competent men each for the raid without taking away from our combat strength.
If the city remains occupied and they are unable to make the objective we begin leap-frogging our defensive positions towards the exfiltration craft. With allied ships on hand we can accomodate roughly seven thousand of the remaining nine thousand active, non-wounded and accounted for of the coalitions forces though a lot of equipment and vehicles may have to be left behind to accomodate that many my estimates are we should have more than enough room by that time should we have to evacuate.
Either way we need to take down that ships shields when our allied ships reach high-orbit or we will have to break contact with the enemy flagship and evacuate for shipfall when the warmaster makes orbit shortly after."
The hologram lingered on the theater map with the crippled siege mecha still highlit in the center. The enemy flagship was there too, taking up an imposing amount of space comparatively like a giant red eyesore.
Slayer seemed to pause and dwell for a moment as if unsure if she should say any more but decided to anyways.
"I don't want to feel like we've wasted the past months here for nothing, to have lost so many of my friends that cant just revive and come back like my sisters and I can. All those... People... That they killed, and all our war buddies just to lose now. My sister, the warmaster, she's a sore loser but only says we've lost because she only cares about the big picture because we don't have enough ships anymore to keep the NMX out.
But their 'Big Squid' is on that flasgship! Their general or admiral or commander or whatever! That's their biggest, and baddest, and last capital ship they have left with their toughest troops! Maybe we did lose in the end by some metrics of grand stratedgy but we can make sure they don't win either; They already dont have the ships to hold Osman either without their flagship as an anchor if we don't let it up and I bet without their big-boss-squid they won't be regrouping either. We can't win but we can keep them from winning either all without..."
She paused, the still evident dotted line of the Coalition flagship and it's collision course with the planet filling in the gap.
Quietly, conspiratorially, and with a savageness that should never be made from such a young sounding girl slayer said, "Fudge my sister, and fudge the big-squid in his ship too and their grand strategy. I want to win on OUR terms, right here."
"This campaign has not been a loss for us, part of our objectives have been to get practical field experiance. We've been rotating troops home and new troops in as we can. I agree, we end this on our terms. Not theirs." Theoni said.
"Unless you print people that learn from mission reports and memories, most are not going to see that as an objective." Darius merely remarked. He then looked at Slayer with a smirk. "I am already committing what remains of our combat element in the 1st FEU. Fighting is what we do. I can ask for volunteers from our logistics element, but they are better suited it the evac."
Lt. Marigan gave the others a glance before sighing. "We didn't cross an entire sector and change to give up now." A small smile grew on her face as she spoke her next piece, "Besides, we Duskerians have our own ways of cheating death. Let's stick it to the squids, even if we don't have the time to get out the old fashioned way."
Darius returned a devilish grin. "I am glad someone else wants to party the hard way."
0200 Hours - .2km From Objective Big-A
There was a starke contrast of a city at war when the actual fighting was elswhere as 'Back-Stabbin Michael Trent' of Taskforce-3 peered through the criss-cross of semi intact trelice and lattice at the distant sun made up of the new front line as, in the near pitch-black of true dark the arc of tracers and laser flashes glinted off his goggles only to be replaced by a massive plume of fire as something big exploded not that he could tell what or where but only that it illuminated the sky briefly as forms zipped and danced about in a secondary conflict of duels and bouts before the fireball receaded.
"Yerp." He smacked his lips on the shared coalition proximity comms before slinking back through the second floor of the foundationally unstable remains of the building and into the street where several forms coalessed from the dark to be made out only barely by the moonlight and low-light vision optics as the final of the three taskforces assembled.
"They's stuck innit alright." Michael pulled his mask off enough to spit something thick and tar like onto the ground as the less than two-score infantry and handful of powered armor idled anxiously in the dark.
"Then it's time we move out." The one armed commander-type drone nodded from the shadows, the only sign of her under her dark black cloak being the soft glow of her optical lense. Around her were two others of her Strays contingent and four other MK-II commando-type drones all in simular camoflagued ponchos and cloaks over their normal strays brigandine armor to break up their shilhouettes while looming menacingly from the dark of an alley the bulky barrel-like form of a Psycho-frame makeshift powered armor frame watched with seeming indifference, the douzen-odd glowing lenses of it's optical plate a soft red in the night.
"Taskforce-3 check in." Slayer comm'd to the other scant forces of the all but suicide mission and those who had chosen or been chosen to lead it.
"Wángshì Zhī Yǒng Squad reporting in, 6 strong and ready to wreck mayham." A particularly gruff voice replied with the 1st FEU's IFF code encoded in the transmission. Wángjìng Zhī Yǒng, meaning Courage of Doomed Soldiers in Lianjia Speech, was a fitting name for the five volunteers picked by Lt. Commander X. Lacking in power armored assets, the 1st FEU's pioneers tapped into Nepleslian Red ingenuity and their Lieutenant's prior work with Crooked Demons to make their own makeshift version on Osman.
A hodgepodge of salvaged NMX Rippers, Reapers, gutted Ironblood IFV components, and a fabricated Durandium Alloy shell to provide protection for the pilot sitted to the front; two of the ugly creations were hunched down behind cover, ready to move out. Along with each of them and to the front in cover were the three cloaked Rudy Drones providing local security. But unlike the standard Rudy seen in use with the 1st FEU, there was a hint of sapience in the pair's movements as they checked their surroundings and what was ahead with great caution.
But the one that stood out were not the compact frames or the Rudy drones, it was the cloaked figure that was located in the middle of them. With a clearly feminine figure, not much else could be gleamed beyond the NRM Type 45 Partifle Beam Rifle she held at the low ready.
"Specialist Greyson, refrain from releasing premature information." she sternly said to him. Not really blaming the man since all he could was talk about the "legendary battle" that was to occur ever since he was matted with on of the Mk2 Crooked Demons. A vet of the Mk1, she was certain he was going to lose himself in the heat of close combat as his kind were known for.
"Status report." the cloaked woman said. A chorus of status updates came in, their voices flat and professional, but each with an undercurrent of tension.
"Rudy One, perimeter secure. No movement detected ahead. Adaptive camo at full efficiency," reported one of the drones with an eerie, almost human-like cadence.
"Rudy Two, holding position, cycling sensor scans," came the second drone, its tone clipped, precise, reflecting its more advanced programming.
The makeshift Crooked Demons adjusted slightly, their hulking forms blending into the cover, their patchwork exteriors showing the desperation of their creators. Inside one of the frames, Specialist Greyson shifted, impatience rippling through his voice despite his superior’s reprimand.
"Greyson in position. Crooked Demon Mk2 prepped, weapons hot. Just say the word," he said, a grunt accompanying the sound of weapons powering up. His eagerness was barely restrained, but it was a familiar energy that the cloaked woman had learned to manage. He was always like this before a fight.
The second Crooked Demon pilot, quieter and far more reserved, spoke next. "Specialist Harper, all systems green. Ready to advance on your command." Harper’s voice was calm, focused—likely the only thing keeping Greyson from barreling headfirst into the chaos that awaited.
The cloaked woman, took in the situation with a practiced eye. Her own Rudy drone chimed in quietly, "Rudy Three, optimal conditions for advance detected, but suggest recalibration of beam weaponry to compensate for incoming interference."
The woman’s cold eyes narrowed behind the visor of her cloaked helmet. Her thoughts raced ahead, calculating their battle plan and lines trying to anticipate what the NMX were going to do in response to their actions. She glanced at her rifle, the sleek NRM Type 45 Partifle Beam Rifle and begun adjusting its weapon sight and final charge of particles leaving the weapon, favoring a more neutral charge.
“Good. Rudy Three. Greyson, Harper, hold formation. On Slayer's mark, we move.” she said, her voice carrying finality in it, typical Nepleslian fatalism. She knew what was coming, but it had to be done. She changed her communication channel to the 1st FEU battle net.
"Red-actual, this is Wángshì-six. All combatants are in position and present." she said.
"Excellent work. I do not need to stress to you the importance of this operation is, especially as you and your team have been choosen to undertake this critical task with our allies. Remember that you do not do this just for your fellow Reds but for others to live another day. We were bred to fight and fight we shall. May the strength of your progenitors flow through you."
The two variable tanks of the Duskerian forces commited to this venture adjusted their track pods in seeming anticipation of the coming action, Lt. Marigan popping the hatch on one of the units to survey the other remaining forces, and the fireteam of infantry that had been assigned to work with her tanks.
"Drop-Bear Actual to Task Force Three. We'll give you firepower so long as you keep us clear of crunchies." She spoke over the radio, tacitly acknowledgin the limitations of her remaining forces. Tanks were all well and good for scaring off the less brave NMX forces, but could be swarmed easily if they weren't supported.
"Hey boss, you figure we'll last long enough to get our synch off before we go pop?" One of the other tankers asked over the platoon's local network, prompting a response from the lieutenant.
"I give us 50/50 odds." She answered frankly. "But at least we'll be dying where we were born, that's something no one can take away from us, eh?"
There was little back and forth as through an unspoken command the taskforce passed the line of departure. Other than a few ambient light sources on equipment there was no outwards illumination as most relied on low-light optics and equipment which made the initial advance slow at barely a walking pace.
They were, however, cloaked in more than just darkness as Slayers commandos ranged ahead, deploying at intersections and large gaps in the road where troops would need to expose themselves to navigate small canisters that released their corporations invisible at the moment mirage nanites that pre-programmed as there were deployed a ceiling-cover of pitch-black and sensor-absorbing nanites to cover not only their IR and visual signatures but also muffle any heat or energy and radiation signatures while the clouds covered like a canopy above them instead of a cloud of smoke.
Being less than a kilomiter from the objective they saw it not long after departing in the distance. Taller than most of the at-most two-story buildings around it the siege mecha even splayed on the ground was twice and even half again the tallest object within several kilomiters. It's silhouette lit up by the crackling glow of the distant battlecruiser and any number of fires and short-lived explosion flares it looked like a flat, three-sectioned surface with six multi-jointed legs that were positioned as if it had simply flopped down to take a rest but was poised to shoot back up at a moments notice.
Not that it could. Even unable to see it in any light the Mechas shape had a very pronounced and unnatural U-shape to it from their angle where the battlecruisers particle-lance had smashed through it's bastion-shield and carved through its armor like a thermal lance through butter. On heat and energy readings the spot where it burned through so efortlessly still glowed faintly from the damage hours before.
As they approached a kilomiter turned to eighthundred meters, turned to five hundred and then four without incident. The fighting, distant but furious had even the few mecha or suits of powered armor or rare flying formation of Neko stricken with tunnel-vision as the distant fires and bright-flare of centralized combat felt impossible to look away from with even the most focussed of the third taskforces' troops stealing glances when they passed by a junction or rose a crest and could get a short-lived vantage to see it.
But no plan ever survived contact with the enemy for long...
It started as a 'feeling'. A superstitious tug in the gut that if put to the task a scientific or medical sort could have attributed to the body biologically reacting to a negligible pre-shift in the local gravity. Then an itching of the teeth and gums as the air filled with precharged protons. Finally the near-paranoia feeling of wrongness caused by innate pressure.
All these things happened in the span of a couple seconds to cause what the canny and attentive might have consdered a sixth sense. They called out warnings, or to take cover, or even declared contact through thankfully nobody had pre-fired their weapons at non-existant enemies. But none the less the change came rapidly and less subtle as the air charged with arcs of static in the air and surfaces and briefly the very gravity within several kilomiters to one side of the battlecruiser lessened causing dust and small light debris like paper or fabrics and even small pebbles to vibrate and lift into the air.
All sound disapeared as it happened. Be it radio or vocal the vibration in the air like all the oxyogen being sucked out of an open airlock was the only sound as from start to finish over the course of just a few seconds the battlecruiser R'kk charged and then fired point blank a particle-carving lance meant to strike out at small starships tens of thousands of kilomiters away. The world ignited briefly as a collum darker than the night but filled with an endless stream of stars and cut at the edge with event horizon bathed the city in a blacklight glow as men and women of the third taskforce suddenly found the gravity reversed and began to lift off the ground as though suddenly experiencing the neko-genes flight. Many clung to debris on the ground, buildings, or whatever they could; Some unlucky few flailed and fell into the sky for the brief couple seconds the lance burned being just long enough as the weapons battery; Unable to traverse enough to hit the actual distant coalition battle lines but doing devestating damage none the less just by firing over it, cut off just as quickly as it started and right on time for a half douzen men of taskforce-3 to fall from twenty-meters in the air back down to the ground.
They hit the corners of buildings and landed in jagged piles of debris. Some simply landed flat back on the pavement and shattered most of their lower bodies or broke their backs or even necks. It wasnt enough to kill. But it was enough to cripple two of the Reds, three of the Duskerians, and a member of the Moholi.
Distant as they were from the lance the damage to the coalition battle line that it fired right over was likely unimagineable.
"We don't have time." Slayers bell like tinny voice called over the command frequency. Her next words were underlined with meaning and implication while lacking in sympathy for sounding so young.
"We move on." She declared, walking right past a Fujiko Red surrounded by his fellows as he thrashed and screamed at the near 45-degree angle that his lower body was currently fashioned in compared to the normal straightness of his spine.
The night was slightly brighter now as blacklight stars hung in the air, slowly dissipating like a luminous mist spreading out and falling down harmlessly to the ground where they winked out again. One such particle landed on the spine of the warmask of a nightmare as she watched at a distance as two of the Moholi held down their injured comrade, her ears picking up his distant screams of abject pain and horror even as one of them tried to muffle his mouth as a second drove a blade through a gap in the injured mans body armor and silenced him ruthlessly. She faded into the dark silently as where she had been her cohort did the same.
At this time of night, the low hum of the inertialess drives of the Duskerian vehicles were all that could be heard of them, the remaining infantry riding atop the two fighting vehicles and using them as makeshift hover-transports, though they were not built for sustained hover flight in their lower profile vehicle configuration.
However, burning out the drive units had been deemed acceptable in exchange for avoiding making noise with the treads on the vehicles. Only the two tank pilots and three of the infantrymen were left of those commited to the suicidal venture.
The Duskerians hadn't spared too much time for mourning after the deaths, the men who had gone down thrashing for only a moment before growing still unnaturally quickly, followed by one of the Duskerians seeming to make a call on long-range comms before giving a thumbs-up to the CO.
It seemed like their "synch" had worked, whatever that meant.
- OOC Notes
- The end of the Osman Campaign
