Authors: Max Feinstein
“At ease Major,” Colonel Hallsworth said as he smirked slightly and walked by the statuesque figure, “sitrep if you please.”
“Sir, it has been a rather quiet day. No contact reported by any of the outbound teams and all perimeter sensors remain clear of enemy activity. Scouts have reported increased activity around the capital, however,” which Jonathan knew wasn’t anything special. The enemy had chosen to fortify Destona ever since the mass evacuation and the army’s intentional destruction of a good part of the city. His intelligence unit figured that the alien landing force must have suffered heavy losses during the city’s bombing and it was taking time to reinforce the units still active in order to restart operations. Jonathan agreed with the assessment as they had all seen alien ground activity decrease sharply since those first couple of days. Sure there had been scouting parties and minor assaults on the outlying areas of the capital and against Bastion itself, but those had been relatively few and far between. If Jonathan had been the commanding officer he would have dispatched larger units and secured a wider region, that is if he had had the units needed for such operations.
As he moved into the middle of the room and gazed up at the large tactical displays
projected on the walls Prinesa continued with her report. “It seems like they are consolidating their forces and might be planning a bigger operation. There has been no slowdown in the reinforcement of the enemy around the city. Most of our remaining troops in the area have pulled back further to the periphery of Destona. Our resistance units are still operating throughout the city, however, and report multiple successes in disrupting enemy movements.”
The colonel nodded last statement knowing full well how many accomplishments his guerilla units inside the torn city itself had racked up over the past week. While the enemy lines had pushed deeper into the formally UPF held areas, Jonathan had ordered a tactical retreat from these contested zones. During their pull back many of these formations had left small four to six troop units in place, hidden within the rubble,
creating an effective harassment force behind the invaders lines. These units were made up of mostly volunteers and a number of senior experienced noncoms, who then taught the rest about guerilla tactics. Along the way they had even found willing civilians to join them, who were put into a resistance reserve force of sorts that assisted the main army units. Losses for his side were slowly mounting as well, as the enemy had begun to adjust their tactics and operations.
He crossed his arms over his chest and slowly looked over the heads of all the working servicemen and women in the command room, studying the information shown on the various display windows. Each one showed different data. The majority of the images being displayed at the moment were those of
a night shrouded Destona and the areas surrounding it. He could also see that most of these images were only hours old and some were even live feeds. These last ones had been the hardest to get. It had taken his specialized reconnaissance units days to move into those sectors without being detected and exterminated by the enemy. All that work and waiting had paid off, however, as Jonathan looked at the images of an almost completely destroyed spaceport and another staging area on the opposite side of the city. In both places there was a lot of activity with the enemy forces still constructing alien looking structures that were possibly barracks and hanger facilities. Unlike the rest of the darkened city, these areas were lit up by floodlights.
There were also buildings around a set of landing zones that appeared to be storage warehouses.
As Colonel Hallsworth watched on a bulbous transport lifted off from one of these landing pads and accelerated into the air. The other thing he saw was that there seemed to be more weapons emplacements now around both these bases than there had previously been.
While looking over the displays
Jonathan noticed a view he hadn’t seen before. Major Girard, as always, anticipated the colonel’s question. “We just detected this camp yesterday. It appears that the enemy is now rounding up civilians and placing them into these detention facilities. We have counted three such camps around Destona, but don’t have any more information on the matter. I tasked a team from intel to look into the camps further, I hope that’s alright.”
“That’s perfect Major, we need to know what’s happening inside those centers. We should also find out why two of them are heavily guarded, but this one,” he pointed at one of the smaller camps, “only has a few soldiers manning it.”
“I didn’t even notice that, sir,” Prinesa said slowly with a hint of disappointment at herself in her voice.
“
Sometimes it just takes a new perspective, Major.” Jonathan said sincerely without looking away.
“Now that you mention it, Colonel, Camp Two
seemed to be the exact opposite. They built it right next to OB Beta and appears to be heavily defended. Perhaps they have something or more likely someone of high importance in there?”
That actually perked Jonathan’s ears and he scanned over the images to find the one she was talking about. His mind raced with questions. They had to get at least one unit close to the area to try and find out what’s going on in that case. There would be a reason for this choice in location and the increased number of troops in comparison to the other locations. Before he could think of anything else a large countdown timer flashed on the tactical display.
“Two minutes until contact with General Hadim,” informed Specialist Ceasaris, who had been helping to run the TACCOM since they had all arrived at Bastion.
“Run diagnostics once more. Make sure everything is ready. This has to go off without a hitch, understood?” Colonel Hallsworth ordered as he kept standing in the middle of TACCOM while looking at the displays.
One of them changed to show the entire planet with a number of red triangle icons orbiting around it. He remembered there being more of them the last time he checked and actually allowed himself a sign of relief. Each symbol represented a single enemy capital ship in orbit. They were revolving around Frontiera’s latitude to pass over both the Telfor and Westora close to the equatorial plane. He watched as they both slowly floated over Bastion and Destona in kind. At the same time the alien transport craft that had taken off moments before was shown rising through the atmosphere before disappearing into the edge of Frontiera’s atmosphere. Both capital ships slid right past the bunker complex just as the timer ticked past forty seconds.
“Everything is ready to go, C
olonel. All tests in the green. Ready to commence in thirty,” the specialist reported after Bain finished running the diagnostic program on all communications and weapons systems.
“Very well, initiate contact with the General as scheduled,” Jonathan responded, looking over another display that depicted
the dispersed resistance units throughout the devastated city that Destona had become within the last ten days. The surrounding areas were shown on neighboring windows allowing him to see the two main enemy spaceports and military bases, which were actually combined together for increased protection. Each of these bases were represented into great detail through the advanced night vision of his units with multiple red ‘targeted’ reticles scatted throughout at specific sites. There was also a trio of Jayhawks now gliding high over the areas as spotters and comm relays.
Finally the countdown reached zero and the RAI Bain initiated the plan already put in place. These same actions had happened two p
revious times before over the past four days, making the methods employed tried and tested. From one of the missile launch tubes cut into the mountains a single modified missile body ejected and quickly accelerated up towards the predawn sky. At a preset altitude the nose cone burst open and instead of a warhead revealed an autonomous aerial vehicle which then separated and rocketed out further to a position over the Velio Ocean. It took up station in this middle ground between the two planetary continents before instantly establishing laser data link contact with both Bastion and Fort Vostovas, the central command center for General Hadim and TACCOM of the entire Federation military force on Westera.
No sooner than the connection was confirmed and stabilized
, General Hadim’s deep voice broke through Bastion TACCOM’s overhead speakers and his video image appeared on the central display board, “Colonel, it is good to hear from you and see that you are well. There has been much uncertainty these days with the ever changing environment we live in.”
The accompanying data packet gave Jonathan every indication of what the General was
referring to. Over the past two days the alien forces occupying the better part of Westera had seemingly launched an all-out offensive against the General’s forces in a bid to completely quell the combat effectiveness of those defending troops. He instantly saw that the new data indicated that many units were now below fifty percent in strength and number. There had also been a great amount of territory lost in the tactical retreats due to the relenting attacks of the enemy ground and space forces. General Hadim was trying hard to preserve as many units as possible for the day when a counterattack would be warranted. To Jonathan it seemed like the enemy was trying to focus most of its current efforts on defeating the smaller army garrison on the other continent before turning their attention back on Telfor.
Now it was Colonel Hallsworth who grew ridged at seeing this new horrifying intelligence, “sir, I think it’s time, then, that we showed whoever these beings are that while we might be down we are not
at all out of this fight. It’s time we show them we still have some teeth left and bloody their nose instead, for a change.”
Jonathan thought he noticed a minimal smirk from the elder commander after his comment, “Well said Colonel. We will all fight on as long as we can. Is everything ready on your end?”
“Yes sir,” Jon replied and looked over at Ahron Ceasaris who nodded in confirmation, “all in the green and ready
to synchronize on your command.”
“Very good, we’re initializing the link up now,” before the general even finished a new program window opened on the screen and Ahron instantly confirmed the transmission
, allowing it partially take over some commands within Bastion’s TACCOM. In response a new timer popped up and began to count down.
“Looks like we are out of time Colonel,” Major Girard stated at that moment from beside him and pointed to the sensor display on one of the other walls. “We have a number of Alphas closing on the drone’s position.”
“Seems like we will have to cut this short, sir,” Jonathan said while looking up at the General’s image being projected on the display. Behind him a few of his staff officers could be seen huddling around a TID table.
“Alright Colonel, give the bastards hell. Good luck,” General Hadim added and gave Jon a slight nod.
“Thank you sir, to you as well,” he was able to wish back just as the image vanished and the communications drone disappeared from the sensor display.
“They got her sir,” the major confirmed and stiffened more, her eyes glancing up at the clock counting down the remainder of time before the attack.
In acknowledgement Jon simply nodded and looked around the command center. Everyone was at their designated station concentrating on the task at hand. By the time he turned back towards the screens the counter finished its march. Without delay Bain initiated the attack and distributed orders among the multiple combat units already in place to carry them out. The first phase was conducted by four spread out and hidden artillery batteries. These units each launched three different salvos of missiles at various targets before switching fire to enemy patrols and formations closer to the mountain range. The secondary barrages were done with HE and plasma shells to devastating effect against the alien ground troops. Jonathan watched a number of enemy patrol squads vaporize under the impact of superheated plasma and high explosive fire as they tried to recon a number of mountain passes. Other units were at first more fortunate, protected somewhat by the rocky surrounding as well as their transport carriers. These same units, however, were then attacked by Federation armor vehicles. Both Chimera tanks and Centaur IFVs broke cover around these formations and managed to surprise the enemy further. The Colonel watched a number of these large troop transports detonate in midair and fall to earth as their surviving comrades retreated. Not leaving anything to chance his armored units continued to pour destructive fire into each of these crashed alien craft, killing any Teddies that tried to crawl their way out of the burning wreckage. Their tough armor wasn’t enough to protect them from the intense firepower of the vehicle mounted particle cannons.
Through the data relay feeds Jonathan was able to watch live as the tanks and fighting vehicles approached the enemy crash sites. Blue particle beams discharged every so often as these combat vehicles detected motion among the wreckage. On the main display he could see a lone figure emerge from the flames and stumble
towards a nearby bolder for cover. That large stone instantly exploded a second later as one of the Chimera’s fired upon it. The now exposed enemy soldier was then targeted by nearby Centaurs, its body almost entirely vaporized under the assault of their main guns.
“Ten seconds to impact,” Bain warned and switched the main central display to show the missile barrages approaching their targets.