Chapter 190: (The War) (1/2)
HEAVY METAL INCOMING! rang off of every flat surface, roared from every speaker.
Every Lanaktallan on the planet jerked in shock, some dropping paddy or cud, others urinating in surprise.
The surprise only lasted till the roar was repeated four times more. A Lanaktallan in the Most High Command Complex hit the planetary alert button as it roared out again. The signal went out to the entire planet's defenders.
Red Alert.
Mo'orbys heard the klaxon wailing and galloped for the armory. More and more Lanaktallan surrounded him, all of them galloping for the same complex where the weapons, armor, and equipment was stored. By the time he reached it and found his place in lines thousands of Lanaktallan were waiting to get their equipment. The Company and Battalion Most Highs moved up and down the ranks, making sure everyone was in their positions and handing out stimpacks. Tabbing the stim calmed Mo'orbys down from the anxiety he had felt each time that the Terran battlecry sounded out.
HEAVY METAL INCOMING! CLEAR THE WAY! roared out twice while he was in line.
At one point his datalink pinged and he checked it.
Once he drew his armor and weapons he was to report to the airfield. An armored hovercraft personnel carrier would take him to the perimeter of a lithium salt field extraction point where he was to dig in and help Sixtieth Infantry Division hold the extraction site.
He quivered slightly in excitement. There would be eight thousand Lanaktallan with him.
To face the Terrans.
Finally, a chance to show the Terrans that they were little more than jumped up lemur primates who got lucky a few times.
The entire system was devoted to resource extraction, refining, and manufacturing. The shipyards themselves had hundreds of thousands of
HEAVY METAL INCOMING! CLEAR THE WAY!
ships that Mo'orbys knew were being cleared for action even as he waited patiently to get his equipment. There were literally millions of troops to protect every important location. The cities would be evacuating to the hardened shelters, meaning the Terrans couldn't threaten the civilian populace. Tanks would be rolling out to scatter into company sized elements to prevent an orbital strike from wiping out an entire brigade or regiment.
Mo'orbys was part of the infantry. Part of the unending tide of Lanaktallan martial might.
He took comfort knowing that should he fall there was ten thousand to take his place.
All the Terrans had faced so far was neo-sapient and Near-Civilized military forces.
Now they would face the durasteel shod hooves of the Lanaktallan military might.
He got his armor and quickly donned it, years of practice making it almost automatic. He checked his drone launchers, his environmental systems, his battery charge level, and every other part of his fully environmental personal protective system.
There was no surprise to him that it was at 100% across the board.
At the equipment point he got his packs, draping them over his abdomen and checking the seals then the inventory sheet. Everything was there. Munitions for his drone launcher, extra food,
HEAVY METAL INCOMING! CLEAR THE WAY!
a personal shelter, an automatic fighting position mechanism, everything he needed for extensive operations. He received his power assist system, which went on his back to supplement his arm strength, allowing him to continue on much further than someone could without it. He was outfitted for long term combat.
Even operations that lasted an entire week.
He smiled to himself as he was handed his weapons. No neural weapons here to show mercy to the Terrans. He was gunner, meaning not only did he receive his rifle, he also was entrusted with a belt-fed plasma cartridge machinegun capable of fifteen hundred rounds a minute at maximum fire. He put the bag with the extra parts on his lower back, adjusting it and making sure it was fixed properly to his armor.
Fully geared up he trotted out to the hoverfield. Passing several windows he smiled behind his helmet's visor. He was imposing, fierce looking, the armored hoof of the Lanaktallan might. Mo'orbys found himself looking forward to combating the Terrans.
He had fought to put down more than a few rebellions. Never against neo-sapients or Near-Civilized, they could not put up a fight against the true warriors of the Lanaktallan. He had fought against rebelling Most Highs, against Corporates who had gotten too full of themselves, against those who possessed true martial might.
He had nearly eight months of
HEAVY METAL INCOMING! CLEAR THE WAY!
combat experience, eight marks on his armor to distinguish the grueling campaigns.
The Terrans will make an excellent ninth sigil on my armor, Mo'orbys thought to himself as he climbed onto the hovercraft. All three gunnery positions were manned, six-barrel laser rotary cannons able to shred plasteel with ease. They could shoot down a starship with a twelve second sustained burst at up to five kilometers.
Mo'orbys knew that the rotary laser cannons would sweep any attacking Terran aerospace craft from the sky like so much debris before the hurricane.
Nearly two thousand hovercraft lifted off and Mo'orbys felt thrilled to look out the open side and see the perfect formations of crafts. A vertical V, allowing all five of the ranks to fire without interfering with each other.
Sixtieth Infantry Division shall be the rock the primates break their little lemur teeth upon, Mo'orbys thought to himself as the hovercraft screamed across the sky at nearly a hundred miles an hour. We will dig in and become impossible to dislodge. We shall be the anvil
HEAVY METAL IS HERE!
the hammer of our armored divisions break the Terrans
HEAVY METAL IS HERE!
upon, he sneered.
The roar kept coming. Curious Mo'orbys started to keep count.
Fifteen. Fifteen times the roar of HEAVY METAL IS HERE! sounded out from the flat surfaces. Mo'orbys knew it was because the Technical Corps had managed to cut the Terran signal out of the circuit.
Still, he tabbed up another stim and felt his anxiety release.
The lithium salt flats came into view just as his datalink pinged an update.
He'd be at the northwest edge, helping protect a heavy support position. He had experience with point defense and anti-aerospace systems, heavy rotary weapons, and infantry rifle support. Mo'orbys was a little disappointment that his field rank didn't change, but that was fine.
Lanaktallan rank structure was flexible, to be determined in the field to ensure that the most capable being was put in charge of the situation. Your pay was determined by the amount of time you had in service and the amount of time in combat.
Unlike the unwashed and ignorant masses, a Lanaktallan didn't need to be held in debt to ensure they fought. They fought for the good of the Lanaktallan people.
The hovercraft dropped down and landed. Mo'orbys jumped out at the height of almost a meter, feeling his legs taking the shock and gritting his teeth to ignore the pain in his knees and hips. He galloped toward the marker his datalink was putting up on his retinas. Around him his fire team dismounted the hovercraft at a safer height, galloping after him.
Within two hours they had the fighting position set up. Point defense, air superiority systems, electronic warfare systems, even dug in fighting positions where the duracrete was steaming as it quick-set.
Mo'orbys himself was behind a six-barreled heavy plasma rotary autocannon, the belt of plasma cartridges gleaming in the harsh light of the bluish-white sun.
Now we wait, Mo'orbys thought to himself, staring off into the distance. With my luck the Navy will keep the Terrans at bay and I'll never be able to force these primates to admit to the superiority of the Lanaktallan people.
-------------
INCOMING METAL! rang from every surface, making Mo'orbys jerk awake. He had fallen asleep in his gunner's cradle, his implant set to wake him if there was any changes. The rest of the six Lanaktallan fire team were all moving their helmets to give their cameras the best view.
His datalink clicked a few times, then made a few odd metallic pings.
Then he heard it.
Music. Harsh, screaming, heavy percussion. Coming in over his datalink.
Six by twelve we make our stand
Armored might we take this land
”Go to local datalink only,” Mo'orbys called out, reaching up and switching his datalink off.
The scope's display suddenly blanked, then came back up shot full of static, then flickered a few times before it went black again.
The speaker next to the weapon, used for warnings and the like, suddenly crackled to life as a digital face appeared on the scope.
”Six of you, huh? One for each barrel on this piece of shit plasma-gun,” the voice said, it's tone condescending and mocking. ”Stay right there, you've got some incoming presents.”
Mo'orbys yanked the power lead off of the computer assisted scope, pulling the rest of the cables, leaving only the power leads for the power chassis and the gun itself.
”What was that?” Lo'otbul asked, his comlink sounding tinny without the processing power of the local node.
”Terran electronic warfare. Pay it no attention,” Mo'orbys stated.
”What did it mean by 'incoming presents' do you think?” Yumo'op asked.
”Probably just trying to scare us,” Mo'orbys snorted. ”As if we have to worry.”
Before any of them could say anything else the point defense and air defense positions started firing, the lasers and plasma ripping into the night sky. Mo'orbys opened his mouth to ask if any of his team could see anything when the impossible happened.
The point and air defense suddenly shut off.
And the missiles and artillery rounds started slamming home.
The battlescreens failed in the first second and a half. The power generators exploded on the third second. The fifth second the armored self-propelled artillery and the missile launchers all took direct hits and exploded. The seventh second, all still part of the same rippling, rolling, all consuming barracks, the ammunition bunkers were hammered until something gave and they blew up on the ninth second. In the first ten seconds all of the hovercraft were destroyed, transformed into twisted burning wreckage.