From: Pablo Sanchez Newsgroups: alt.startrek.vs.starwars Subject: [Fanfic] Le Mort Homme Date: Sun, 26 Oct 2003 21:45:12 -0600 Le Mort Homme Chapter One The Lights Go Out ---- "No, not even ignorance of the threat posed by the Yuzhan Vong can be used as an excuse for the unreadiness of the New Republic to turn and defend itself. The only explanation for the tragedy that befell our galaxy is gross ineptitude; inexcusable incompetence. The New Republic was not too weak to stop the Vong in their first foray, not too feeble to oppose them at each turn. It was merely too unprepared, too disorganized, and too foolishly complacent to take action when action was so badly needed. The New Republic failed us, at great cost in lives and material, and it will fail us again. "The Republic's new goals are the rebuilding of industry and reconstruction of lost worlds. I do not object to these laudable goals. What I object to is the return to unreadiness and military weakness which was so disastrous before. Other senators have said that we cannot afford the expense of rebuilding and increasing the fleet. I say that we cannot afford not to do this. If the Republic will not undertake the task of defending its member worlds, then it is not the assembly which can best serve those who elected me. I therefore report to the Senate the decision of the Outer Rim Alliance Legislature, which voted 259-60 in favor of ending its membership in the New Republic. "It is our intention to appeal to the Galactic Empire for protection. We regret abandoning this noble experiment; however, we cannot overlook our obligation to our people. The Empire proved it's mettle in the fight against the Vong, and it can ever be trusted to place the defense of its citizens first. The promised liberties of the New Republic fade to insignificance when one considers that only those who died as a result of government ineptitude have gained the contracted freedoms. The two governments might be identical, but for the simple fact that the Galactic Empire has both the will and the capacity to shield it's member worlds from harm." Senator Len Alhill of the ORA, address to the Senate 28-5-68 AGR ---- "They did a great thing with Coruscant, Vorst. It's amazing how close it is to what it was," Huy said. "Back when the Imperial Civil War tore it up, it only took them a few years to get it back up to speed," Thei'lar said, "and what's it been since we kicked the Yuuzhan Vong off of Coruscant? Forty years? They always exaggerate how much damage was done, anyway. They just tore up the top levels and laid down some soft peat to stand on, nobody really knows where the ground is on that planet, anyway." Huy shrugged at the Bothan's clarification, "Still. It's really something, I wonder how much it cost." "About as much as it might have cost to build a few dozen battlefleets or so, I'd guess. But I'm not an accountant," Thei'lar replied, "why all this talk about Coruscant, anyway?" The human male absently tossed the datapad he was holding to his friend. It would have missed by a large margin, but the other twitched his finger slightly and the trajectory of the little computer changed to land it directly in his palm. Vorst Thei'lar looked at the flatscreen display. It was some propaganda article about order and progress in the New Republic, using the turnaround of Coruscant as example. "They're trying too hard to keep planets as members. The reason Coruscant recovered isn't just because of the government action, it's because of the name," the Bothan snorted. Huy wasn't as quick, "What name?" Vorst cleared his throat and spoke in hushed tones, almost a hiss, "Coruscant. What does it mean to you?" The man rolled his eyes, "A big ugly ball of duracrete, with far too many people on it. You?" "The same. The corporate mind thinks precisely what we do, the only difference being that he likes the idea. He likes it so much that he nearly achieves climax where he sits." "You're disgusting," the man said with a not unfriendly grimace. The two Jedi were sitting in the anteroom to a meeting room, and had been doing so for about three hours. If they did not fit the classic image of the stoic Jedi, it was because they were young and did not have the benefit of tradition. They were bored, and good enough friends that they didn't much care about keeping up appearances. Humans were naturally social creatures, and Bothans were naturally sarcastic. This mixed in a rather pleasing way for the two. Meawhile, In the meeting room things of great importance were going on, but they concerned the Jedi only peripherially. It was only the fate of the galaxy that was being decided, and the galaxy was so unbelievably big and alive that it couldn't be put into terms that well-adjusted people could understand. It took a special kind of sociopath to become a high ranking diplomat. Knights Danril Huy and Vorst Thei'lar were bodyguards for a special sociopath. It was mainly a gesture by the Academy to demonstrate the continued vitality of the New Republic. Master Durron was making a statement: 'look at these Jedi, Imperials, and quake!' That was his style--it had not been Skywalker's style, of course, but that fellow was long dead and most of his own students had been forced by the Vong invasions and the still-growing tensions with the Empire to admit that Kyp was right. Huy stretched out his consciousness into the next room and listened to the emotion running around. They were cold, as diplomats almost invariably were. The sound clarified into the thoughts of the diplomats and the Jedi eavesdropped. The two views conflicted beyond compromise. It was as if the two ambassadors had decided to set out from perfectly opposite goals with the objective of wrangling in futility. It was the fourth day of these meetings already (ten hours each day, which could try even legendary patience) and the situation had not changed. "Negotiation isn't going to work," Danril murmured as his mind returned to the antechamber. Vorst sighed, "I heard you the past three days, it doesn't need to be said again." "Things might have changed." "In diplomacy like this? Sure. Listen to me, man-creature, Bothans have a natural talent for these things. There's no way this question is going to be solved short of war," Thei'lar said in a grim tone. Huy groaned, "You're always so pessimistic." "What's there to be happy about, here?" "It's all in how you percieve it, and deliver it. Like so," the human replied, and then shifted into an unbearably cheerful tone of voice, "there's no way this question is going to be solved short of a really fantastic war, children." "I didn't get the part where you said 'children,'" Vorst said with a smirk. Huy smiled, "I was visualizing." "I've always disliked you Inner Core types, with your stiff-upper lippedness. What did you say when that troop transport crashed and we had to take out the insurgent camp by ourselves?" the Bothan paused, then continued in an excessive imitation of his comrade's accent, "Was it 'I am sure that every man Jack of them died with gentle confidence in the knowledge that we are here to fulfill the mission with or without them.'" "I don't sound like that!" Huy sulked. Thei'lar continued on in the same grotesque elocution, "Yes you do, you sound positively Imperial. Like recordings of Grand Moff Tarkin or a Coruscant schoolteacher." "And while we're discussing this so amiably there are two men in the next room deciding to send uncountable populations to their screaming deaths." "As I've said before, there's no creature more criminal and soulless than a diplomat. To get a diplomat, you find yourself an accountant or lawyer and give him power of life and death over many, many people," the Bothan said with a sneer. The human chuckled despite himself, "I think you'd also need to cut out the beast's poison glands and de-fang him, but that's ancillary to the point." ---- Lord Jerol Weiss had been a ambassador in the service of the Galactic Empire for fifteen years. From his childhood, he had watched the resurgence of his nation's power and revelled in it. Each year more planets fled the failing grasp of the New Republic to join the more vital Empire. But even as he rejoiced for his government, he remembered the lesson that the last few decades had taught. Simply put, the galaxy was too large to effectively govern; the Old Republic had put up a long fight, but except for the relatively brief golden age in the middle of its reign, it had merely been a state in transition from chaos to control and finally to entropy. The known universe was all too big and too populous to be controlled properly. The Remnant had become strong and able to resist the Vong more capably than the Republic because it was more compact--a smaller structure was sometimes more resilient to damage than a massive one. But now, with the desertion of states from the New Republic, the sizes of the opposing powers was stabilizing in the middle. The current situation would last only until the Senate gathered the courage and strength to draw a line in the sand. They were doing so at this very moment. The sentient across the table from Jerol was a Corellian named Greer Tanas. He was a person much like Weiss, from a wealthy family, well educated, intelligent, highly competent, and singularly amoral. Weiss had dealt with the fellow before, primarily from a position of strength. They had divided up stellar clusters between them, deciding the fate of trillions with a sweep of a light pen upon a datascreen. For two normal men such an experience might have inspired feelings of kinship, but they were effective diplomats and had no feelings at all. Jerol had been debating fruitlessly with this man over the most important territorial issue of all. Sesswanna was the administrative and industrial core of the galaxy, as well as the most prestigious and culturally important sector. Within it's borders it enclosed the droid-run industrial complexes of Helvet Prime, the Yula Cluster, and more importantly the very beating heart of the known universe, Coruscant. Unofficial polls had shown that the people of Sesswanna were becoming better and better disposed to joining the Empire by the day, and it was only a matter of time before this became an open issue. It was the intention of the Empire to preempt such a circumstance, which lead to immediate and devastating war between the two nations, by some sort of compromise. Weiss was authorized to offer a partition of the region, whereby the half containing Coruscant would remain with the Republic and the rest would join the Empire. This would allow the New Republic to maintain some dignity and prestige while the Empire would humbly serve the wishes of the people--or at least half of them. The New Republic found this totally unacceptable, of course. This was the third time he had offered such a compromise, and for the third time Jerol had been rejected. "Lord Weiss, the New Republic once again categorically refuses any compromise on this issue, because there is no such deal to be made. The right of my government to maintain and rule its own sovereign territory cannot be infringed by any outside power. Any attempt by the Empire to do so is a gross violation of our national rights and dignity and will be interpretted as an act of war," Tanas said. Weiss inclined his head a few degrees towards the fine wood table, shut his eyes wearily for a few moments. The lighting in the well-furnished room had a tasteful and comforting bluish tint, but his eyes burned nonetheless. He raised his head again, after a few moments. "A government exists only as the executor of the will of its people. The people of Sesswanna have decided that the New Republic no longer offers the best hope for safety, stability, and freedom; you can no longer hold onto them," Jerol replied, "the treaty that I have offered is better than the one that your own citizens desire. If you will not accept it, the Empire will have no choice but to act on their behalf." "Then it will be war," Greer concluded neutrally, "this meeting is over." The Republican diplomat exited the room to join his Jedi escorts. He would send his message to Coruscant--or rather it would be bounced from there to the emergency headquarters of the New Republic Military Command, wherever that was. Then ships would come, and soldiers. Many people would die, it was more than likely planets would die as well. Weiss reached up to his neck and undid his collar. At least his predecessor had negotiated the Yaga Minor Accord, the agreement that outlawed the construction of so-called "superweapons" like super-lasers and world-devastators and sun-crushers... and whatever other hyphenated devices military scientists could come up with. That was something, even if the obliteration of a living planet still required only a pocket cruiser and an hour's bombardment. Jerol hit a button on his personal datapad that summoned an assistant. The young man entered the room and awaited instructions, looking for all the world like a stiffly animated gray corpse; in appearence just like every other man who ever entered the Imperial Diplomatic Corps. Weiss yawned, his work finally at an end, "Jacobi, send the message to the Moff Council that our offer has been refused, and get me a brandy." The young man paled, turning a sicklier shade of gray than before, "Is it to be war, then?" "Of course war," Jerol replied, "it has to happen every so often, otherwise people get lazy and weapons rust. The Old Republic learned that lesson. 'The flower of government must from time to time be refreshed by the blood of the citizens,' said Tarkin." ---- Grand Admiral Yuma began the briefing. He and twenty other men were seated at the command table in the War Room on Yaga Minor. Yaga Minor had served as the core of the Imperial Remnant effort during the Vong Wars and had since been the center of military command and control for the expanding and recovering Galactic Empire. The table was very large and well lit from above, while the rest of the room was quite dark. Each man had a console and holoscreen before him, and a single primary holoprojector dominated the center of the table. The other men at the table were members of the Imperial General Staff, Imperial Defense Board, Ubiqtorate, and other branches; Yuma was the highest ranking military officer and thus in charge of the meeting. He tapped at the keys on his console, and a map of the galaxy floated up over the table. A few more keystrokes, and it was divided into Republican Red and Imperial Blue. Then green markers identified major friendly military concentrations, and yellow markers for likely enemy fleets and armies. He then typed in the proper code for the war plan he was to be explaining, and a profusion of thousands of arrows, arcs, lines, and other cryptic symbols appeared. It was almost more than Yuma, even with his decades of military experience and cybernetic brain-enhancing implants, could handle. The word "Archipelago" hovered in white beneath the galactic map. "Archipelago is the galactic level war plan that the General Staff has prepared for the eventuality of a dispute over Sesswanna. In brief, it calls for main thrusts towards Coruscant from our bases in the core, against Corellia from Hellas, and a sweep through the outer rim," Yuma explained. The relevant lines and arcs obligingly flashed white as he spoke of them. He continued, "The plan is to use the superior power, morale, skill of our fleets and armies in offensive maneuvers, to force the enemy to disperse his numerically superior forces and dilute his strength. Our personnel training and technical strength will allow our fleets to make multiple sorties in rapid succession and more than compensate for our inferiority in numbers." One of the other men at the table, an elderly Moff named Wergard, leaned forward in his seat to get a better look at the map, "Do we have an estimate on time?" The Grand Admiral nodded, "If all goes according to plan, we will be forcing a favorable peace settlement by new year's day. Sesswanna, most of the central rim, and general disarmament of the New Republic, as per Victory Plan 'Othello.'" "And if things don't go according to plan?" Wergard asked. "The plan is foolproof," Yuma rejoined with injured pride. "One thing I learned from my participation in the war against the Yuuzhan Vong," the Moff said, "is that you can always count on the enemy to be a bigger fool than your plans could possibly account for. What is our course of action if Archipelago is unsuccessful?" Yuma thought for a long moment before responding. He hated dealing with pompous politicians, especially when they were veterans who thought they still knew everything there was to war. Archipelago was the fruit of the Imperial military experience in the Vong Invasion; barring an unprecedented change in the very nature of hostilities, it would work perfectly. "The Galactic Empire, as you are no doubt aware, is much more ideologically and ethnically homogenous than the Republic, most of us being human instead of a hodge-podge of different species. If the war goes on too much longer than planned, we will be able to employ our resources more effectively, and will be more or less immune to the polarization and disintegration that the heterogenous Republic will undoubtedly suffer," the Grand Admiral finalled replied, "of course, we can't effectively plan for this in advance. The spoiling operations and stop-gap measures that such a phase of war would require can only be summoned on the spot. The basic mobilization structure is there, and that ought to be all that we need." "Very well, Grand Admiral Yuma," the Moff conceded, "we will see how it all turns out in practice." "Mobilization will begin at once," Yuma finished the briefing. ---- "Your training, Atkins, introduced you to military discipline and drill," the company commander said, "and this will certainly not end now that you have begun your career in earnest. However, you will find that the Imperial army is a family, and we take care of our children." Private Peren Tomasz Atkins was only twenty years old, and like many young men he had had little direction in life after finishing secondary school. Unlike many, he elected to enter the Imperial army. Volunteering for service was an important decision, because the military was a career to last not less than five years with a mandatory further fifteen years of commitment to the reserves. If he got a good thing going, he might stay on in active service for the rest of his life. The rest of his life might last less than the requisite five years, of course, but this was the army and they probably understand the difficulty and release him from the obligation. "Sir, yes sir," Atkins replied. "That's one training-yard affectation you can leave at the door, Private. I only need to hear 'sir' once for each sentence," Captain Arpad corrected him with a gentle smile. "Understood, sir." The two soldiers were in the Captain's office, a small windowless box in the divisional base. The 589th Imperial Fusilliers was one of the nearly uncountable active duty rifle divisions in the Empire, and like most it was made up of soldiers from the immediate stellar neighborhood. Atkins's home planet of Leincest was only a few hundred light years away, and it had to be assumed that the officer's place of birth lay a similar distance away. It was not far from the Sesswanna sector, and it was heavily influenced by the culture of Coruscant and surrounding areas. The captain looked down at the holoscreen on his desk. It was invisible to Peren at the angle, but it certainly showed his personnel files. Peren idly wondered what they might say, but he was forbidden to read them, because they contained sensitive information and what were probably hurtful assessments from his former instructors. "It says here that you excelled in marksmanship and unarmed combat drill," Arpad read, "and in fact you placed fiftieth of a field of five hundred in your training camp's throw-boxing tournament." "I did, sir," Atkins answered truthfully. "It's good to have a good athlete join the company, because they often make well motivated soldiers," the Captain said. He hit a button on his desk and the holoprojector hummed off. "Now then, Private Atkins--" Arpad began, but just then a display on his desk flickered and beeped. He keyed it quickly. The projector came back on, again invisible to Atkins, though he could hear the man on the other end. "Major Prote, good to speak to you sir," the Captain answered. The voice on the other end, "Not so good, Captain. The division is being mobilized, your company will embark on the transport at ten-hundred tomorrow." "It's war then?" Arpad asked. The other said, "Could be, could be. Just get your men together and we'll see what's what." The connection terminated, and Captain Arpad looked up at Atkins, "You had better join your group, Private Atkins. It will be R Platoon, the map to your barracks is on your datapad." Peren frowned, "Sir? Will there be time for my one-hour religious break tonight?" The captain raised an eyebrow, and remembered that the private's file had recorded that the young man was a member of some religious sect, and his devotions required him to take an hour each week for prayer and reflection; it was bad luck for the day to have fallen just now. A silly thing, but Arpad knew the army had to be accomodating to the faithful. "I don't suspect that there'll be a lot of time, but you can ask your platoon sergeant and we'll see what. Now, get going, there's work to be done," Arpad said. Le Mort Homme Chapter Two We Have Only to Kick in the Door ---- TO: CINC Coruscant Axis FROM: FLEETINT Station 6 Received message from garrison. Pro-Imperial mutiny in progress. Ubiqtorate reports no involvement by our intelligence elements. 70-80% of local troops appear active in mutiny; remaining 30-20% are presumed undecided and inactive; regular NR divisions confirmed as remaining in control of primary shield generation and C&C apparati. Otherwise situation unknown, possibility of aggressive landing on Coruscant to assist rising and capture planet must be addressed. Will advise as information arrives. ENCRYPT SEND ---- "The thing you've got to remember, Atkins, is that the waiting is actually the hardest part. That, and the heavy lifting, organization, scheduling, busy work, getting shot at, and actually getting shot. Those are also the hardest parts. Oh... and don't forget the floggings," Sergeant Davis pontificated. The 589th was aboard its transport and hurtling through interstellar space. The ship had space for divisional artillery, vehicles, command and control gear, and sixteen-thousand odd men; the furnishings for the men was slightly better than what was provided for the inanimate gear. Atkins was laying in the bottom bunk of a rack of three which reached up very near to the ceiling two and a half meters overhead. The sergeant was across the aisle, and they and the rest of the platoon were waiting for their turn to go into an empty compartment which was supposed to be an exercise yard. In the meantime, they would participate in the old Imperial Army institution of bullshitting the new guy. "But it's better than the navy. See, it's the same institutional concept, except that here you don't have guys trying to fuck eachother in the asshole all the time," Davis continued, "which results in a total paradigm shift." Atkins frowned slightly at the curse word. At the beginning of basic he would have blushed, but he had heard enough bad words often enough that he was no longer embarrassed. He had been raised differently from most members of the army. "How's that?" he asked. "Well, for one, you don't have all this trouble with anaphrodisiacs. You can't actually tell a man that you're going to chemically prevent him from getting horny, it's bad for morale. So you sneak it into their food," Davis elaborated, "but then you've got trouble with them slipping antidotes into their food, or the cooks being in on the game and not putting the stuff in at all. What do you do then? Make an aerosol and pump it through the ventilation system. But then you're getting the officers and not just the crew, and officers can get pussy from their pretty assistants or whatever. So that's a bust. The way they unsex the navy crews is a closely guarded secret. I think they just inject it into them while they sleep. Anyway, I don't see why all there's all this concern about anal sex." Davis finished with a sigh, and considered, "What religion are you, anyway, that you had to pray instead of loading gear for an hour?" Atkins now blushed, "The Universal Church." "Never heard of it," said Davis, "but I've never heard of ninety-nine percent of all religions in the universe. What were you praying about?" "Nothing," Atkins responded quickly. "Nothing? Well, thanks a lot for wasting a man-hour of the army's time. You shouldn't bother anyway, I doubt He's listening. If I were God I'd be too busy getting pussy to worry about someone like you," Davis said. Peren set his jaw and didn't reply. He'd always gotten plenty of shit for being one of the faithful, but it was impossible for him to just get used to it. ---- "How long did it take to go wrong?" Grand Admiral Yuma asked rhetorically, "sixteen hours?" "It is now Kickoff plus seventeen point five hours," his adjutant, Rear Admiral Pirtra corrected. The two were moving down the hall of the great Eclipse Class battleship /Eradicator IV/, which served as Yuma flagship and command center. Its superlaser and thousands of turbolaser batteries went entirely to waste while the only component of the ship to see action was its communications array. Yuma sometimes wondered what the point of so lavishly equipping a command ship was, he could have done just as well with a refitted Imperator. He guessed it just wasn't grandly imperial enough to run things efficiently. Yuma and Pirtra entered the high command deck of the /Eradicator./ The room was bathed in the glow of strategic holoscreens and hummed with activity. The Officer of the Watch stood with a snap and saluted. "Admiral on Deck!" he announced, and the rest of the men rose and saluted as well. Yuma returned the salute without slowing his pace, "As you were." The two made their way to the command table as everyone else seated themselves and went back to work. There were already six men seated at the table: Ubiqtorate Director of Core Operations Lesley Iork, High Marshal Adam Branning, the sinister COMPNOR Inquisitor Lev Meclis, and their assistants. Yuma was sympathetic to Director Iork and High Marshal Branning, since they managed intelligence and ground military operations in the Sesswanna Sector, respectively. The Inquisitor, on the other hand, was just some shadowy civilian fanatic who was mucking about in the military sphere. He had complicated everything. "No need for small talk, gentlemen. Tell me what is happening, Inquisitor Meclis," the Grand Admiral began as he seated himself. Meclis drew himself up proudly, "COMPNOR has instigated a general mutiny of the locally drawn militia garrison of Coruscant." Yuma waited politely, in case the man had something more to say. He sincerely hoped that the Inquisitor had something, anything, more to say. Apparently not. The Grand Admiral sighed, "I already knew that. What I want to know is why you felt that it was unnecessary to inform the Navy, or the Army, or even the Ubiqtorate of your operations." Meclis made a sour face, "We didn't want the credit stolen from us." Director Iork was stone faced, as was Yuma. Branning was an old infantry officer and had once upon a time commanded a rifle company against the Vong. "You goddam apple-polishing sodomite," the High Marshal shouted, "do you have any idea how badly you've fucked things up so you can impress the Moff Council?" The various officers working at consoles within earshot of the table looked up, then back down. It was interested to hear someone starting up a good tirade at the command table, but it was more important to get the work done. Meclis half rose from his seat in shock, "Grand Admiral, I will not stand for this language! Especially in such a serious setting!" Yuma looked sharply at Branning, "That is quite enough, High Marshal. What I think you meant to say is that this new development has significantly altered our timetable." The Marshal's hands twitched as he suppressed his rage, "Yes." Meclis sat back down, "I see no problem. We will simply divert forces to Coruscant." Branning shook his head and looked at the black surface of the table, "It's not that simple. With regards to manpower, the army is very stretched. The operational plan has us advancing and retreating fluidly on as many fronts as my forces can handle, I can only assume that the navy is in the same state. Even worse, only a handful of my subunits are prepared for a thick urban theatre, and all of those are already tapped for other key planets. To sustain an advance on and capture of Coruscant, we're going to need to suck someplace else dry." "What's more, we never planned to actually take Coruscant by force. We were going to envelope it and neutralize it as an enemy base of fleet operations, and we would receive it in the peace treaty without having to fire a single shot on the surface. That was the plan for all of the hive-cities, but now we're stuck," Yuma continued. Meclis hadn't considered the consequences before COMPNOR had acted on the Coruscant plan, and he wasn't inclined to start now, "It can't be too hard. Coruscant is only one planet!" Director Iork finally spoke, "The single most important planet in the galaxy. You can expect the Republic to fight tooth and nail to hold it; it'll be a hell of a meatgrinder. On the other hand, the hearts and minds program will be a bust if we let the mutineers go down. We have to intervene, and right away." Yuma leaned back in his chair, "That decision has already been made. You are dismissed, Inquisitor Meclis. Please refrain from any more operations like this in the future." The Inquisitor opened his mouth, getting ready to say something, but Yuma interrupted, "We have plans to discuss. Military plans." Meclis stood with an ugly glare, "Then I will take my leave. Good day, gentlemen." After he and his assistant left the room, High Marshal Branning sighed and rubbed at his temples, "War is too important to leave up to chance and civilian fools." Yuma brushed a bit of lint from his white sleeve, "High Marshal, I trust you have compiled a list of what you think we'll need." Branning tapped a few keys on his datapad, and the information appeared on a holo above the center of the table. "That's going to use up all our reserves," Yuma said doubtfully as he scanned it. "And then some," the High Marshal replied morosely, "the formations highlighted in red will need to be drawn from other sector groups; my staff has already begun the paperwork." "Can't you trim it at all?" "I already have. This is the bare minimum of what I'll need to take and hold Coruscant. Between the killing machine planet itself, ancillary operations to sieze and hold neighboring planets, and spoiling attacks to prevent enemy reinforcement of their formations, I'll need the lion's share of men and material from the whole Empire," Branning replied. Yuma tapped a few keys on the table, and the data shot through the /Eradicator's/ comm systems to other command posts throughout the galaxy. He also sent a message to his staff. He would have to start the same harvesting program as the army to get enough ships for a decisive strike in Sesswanna. "This old ship might be entering combat herself, soon enough," Yuma said quietly as he glanced around the room, "We can only hope that the New Republic is disorganized as us. Director?" Iork nodded, "All indications suggest that we should be so fortunate. They were trying to react to our own thrusts and maneuvers while mounting offensives of their own, so this thing has them thrown off balance. They've got a bigger manpower pool than us, of course, but they can't move it as fluidly. This may be a blessing in disguise." Branning gave a look of surprise, "How's that?" "The loss of Coruscant would be a tremendous blow to Republic morale and prestige. We could see individual entities like the Corellian Free State and Central Rim Alignment sue for a separate peace. We have only to kick in the door, and the rest of the whole rotten structure will collapse," the Director responded with a tight-lipped smile. ---- TO: Flotilla 54 FROM: CINC Coruscant Axis cease advance towards objective xim 2045 asap STOP new orders attached STOP prepare for operations on coruscant proper FULL STOP ATTACHMENT ENCRYPT SEND ---- "Where are you, Sergeant?" someone shouted from down the aisle, accompanied by the clatter of his boots on durasteel deckplates. Lieutenant Richard Pierce shot down the aisle, straight past Atkins and Davis, then skidded to a halt and turned around. "What is it, sir?" Sergeant Davis asked with a laugh. "Change in plans, big change," Pierce said rapidly, "we're not going to a plains area on the surface of a mixed climate-terrain planet anymore." The sergeant paled slightly, "Where are we going, then?" "Captain Arpad says to prepare for close urban terrain in six hours," Richard answered. Other soldiers began to wise up to the commotion and started chattering. Someone said from above, "The 589th isn't equipped for that!" He was right, of course. 'Fusillier' was an archaic term for a man with a light rifle, and a fusillier division was essentially a rifle division that had gotten a little below its fighting weight. It was a good thing to put on the ground in a followup wave, because it could move quickly through varied terrain and hit hard where necessary. But fusilliers lacked the staying power and sustainable weight of fire needed for harsh urban combat. Then again, these were all men from the Galactic Core, raised in a particular tradition. "They'll be none of that, then, lads," the Lieutenant said, "command has to know what they're doing. Otherwise they wouldn't be doing it!" That calmed them down. Deference for authority, good manners, and a stiff upper lip--that was the Core. The lieutenant strode briskly back down the aisle to where the officers had their bunks. Once he was out of sight, the same voice as before moaned slightly, "God. I'll never see Kardhif again." Davis shifted into his NCO mode, it was time to buckle down and hold the meat together. That was what sergeants were for. "I've seen it myself, it's not that damn pretty. Get some balls of durasteel, men, and we'll get through this alright," he said, "as for me, I already got some from the quartermaster. I'll be going back to sleep." Davis laid back in his berth and closed his eyes. Atkins closed his eyes and reached into his pocket. He pulled out a little star on a sort of necklace of beads, and mumbled the prayer he had made earlier, while the others had been helping to load the transport, "Merciful God, give me the strength not to fail my fellows. Protect me from the blows and wiles of my enemies and the vagaries of combat. Grant me the force of will that I may not hesitate in the most necessary moment. Merciful God, let me and my fellows survive this battle and those to come, but if it is not to be, conduct us into Your heavenly grace and love. Let it ever be so." Then he put the first bead between his thumb and forefinger and mumbled, "God protect me and keep me in Your grace, in life or in death." He fed the beads through and repeated himself over and over, as if he was a belt-fed slugthrower shooting out prayers. It was all he had. ---- "Report," Grand Admiral Yuma ordered. Rear Admiral Pirtra replied, "All wings report operational readiness and formation is set. Time is Kickoff plus twenty-two hours." "Slave their navigational controls to the /Eradicator/," Yuma said. The order, rich with ceremony, passed down to the tactical officers. "We have navigational control of the fleet, Grand Admiral," Pirtra reported. Yuma nodded, "Excellent, we will commence operations. Admiral Wells, you have the conn." As a Grand Admiral, Yuma was of course a great tactician and naval officer in general. Unfortunately, he was in the middle of a military operation much too vast for any Thrawn-style heroics; he would spend the battle behind many layers of armor and shields, coordinating the sector. Ideally the /Eradicator/ would have been safely parked far from any actual battle, but Yuma couldn't spare a single vessel, not even one as vital as the flagship of the entire fleet. Admiral Wells would command the battle from the bridge and Grand Admiral Yuma would command the entire offensive from the command deck. He stepped onto the turbolift just as the /Eradicator IV/ and the fleet with her jumped into hyperspace. In about twenty minutes, things were going to get very interesting in the space immediately around Coruscant. Le Mort Homme Chapter Three Landing Procedure ---- "It is not unusual when making a combat landing for the soldiers to become frightened and anxious. In order to maintain order and morale it may be necessary for the morale officer to intercede and offer counsel. Here are a few phrases which may help in your efforts. Remember to use his first name, rather than his rank and surname, in order to create a sense of familiarity and comradeship. 1. 'Calm down, [NAME], we're all in this together.' 2. 'Come on, [NAME], be a good sport. We've got to do this for the glory of the Empire.' 3. 'You're the only one panicking. Be a man, [NAME].' 4. 'Everybody has to die sometime, [NAME].' 5. 'It's time to cowboy up, you pussy.' "Remember that you don't have to stick to these specific phrases. Tailor them to your particular situation. Experiment with different techniques. Above all, remember that it is sometimes necessary to get tough in order to keep the soldiers' heads in the game (see chapter 3: Getting Tough)." --Excerpt from Imperial Morale Officer Handbook, Chapter 6: Entering Combat ---- The fleet exited hyperspace in formation with shields up. Admiral Wells glanced at the status report, which consisted of a list of the flotillas in action, 30 in all. Each showed green and one hundred percent ready now, but as the battle continued the command computer would calculate their vitality and the color would travel down the spectrum until it hit dark red, and then it would go black when the flotilla reached less than ten percent effective strength. This would certainly happen to a few of the leading formations. All in all, Wells had around 34,000 capital warships at his disposal. Most of these were screening ships smaller than Imperators, another component was the ten thousand or so Imperators or equivalents, and then there were the four thousand odd larger vessels. He nodded appreciatively; even with the much more efficient war mobilization of the modern era, he was still in command of a force that compared favorably to any in prior history. Yuma had stripped the rest of the fleet to the bones for this operation. It was, of course, too much for anyone to effectively command. It was broken up to ten admirals below Wells, then to 30 rear admirals below, and further and further down until you hit the ships' captains themselves. The fleet itself was organized in the formation which characterized engagements of this size. In essence, the ships were organized into a sort of cloudbank style which was designed to allow maximum concentration of firepower, with various outremers and screens to probe for weaknesses. If an extended limb was faced with an aggressive enemy movement it would fall back into the larger whole so that firepower could be directed against the incursion. Theoretically, the battle would develop with both sides assuming this posture, and then each would move towards the other like two stormfronts. The outremers would attempt to find advantageous fields of fire against the enemy, and to refuse the efforts of their opposite numbers to do the same. Essentially a slugging match. Ackbar and Thrawn might have prized maneuver, but they were fighting in the pre-Vong era, before mass mobilization of shipbuilding resources had rendered that element of battle (save for occasional flashes of luck) almost obsolete. Guns and shields would decide the battles of this war. 'Or not,' Wells thought as he surveyed the scanning information on the enemy fleet. It looked like the Imperial Naval Academy had packaged this battle up rather nicely. The Republicans had, of course, come to the very same conclusion as the Empire regarding the necessary action. They had assembled their forces with the same rapidity and urgency, and in the much larger numbers their greater size afforded them. But Imperial Officers were better trained at organization than their counterparts in the New Republic, and that made all the difference in assembling a fleet from scratch for this sort of battle. The Republican Fleet was strung out piecemeal all through the system and still arriving bit by bit. By far the largest concentration was around Coruscant itself, but the ships orbitted all around the planet with little semblence of formation. About 10,000 loosely arranged capital vessels were nearly in engagement range for the Imperial Fleet, and there was no way they would be able to concentrate sufficiently in time to make a stand. "That's a hell of waste of some fine ships and men," Admiral Wells said quietly, then he barked out, "All flotillas move to engage, maneuver plan is 'Split 16.'" The Eradicator IV's ion engine's fired up and she accelerated towards the enemy fleet. Thousands of screening vessels lay between her black hull and enemy turbolasers. It would have been safer to have stick the ship somewhere lightyears away, but the light superlaser couldn't be spared. Coruscant was the most heavily shielded planet in existence, and the fleet's torpedo spheres could have taken days or weeks to make sufficient cracks. The fleet reached turbolaser range with the enemy, and lights began to flash between the two vast groups. The main battle formation of the Imperial Fleet slowed while other segments accelerated. The more quickly moving ships formed into a sort of deep three-dimensional cross and plunged through the enemy mass, guns blazing. Casualties among these ships were heavy, and not a few were destroyed. But the end result was one of great benefit to the fleet as a whole. Within about three minutes, the ten thousand enemy ships had been separated into four smaller groups; a further two minutes and they were enclosed in spherical pockets and ravaged by waves of turbolaser fire. Imperial fighter wings, corvettes, and other light craft harried the Republicans to prevent them from achieving even a modest concentration of firepower, and the battlewagons hammered out a brisk tempo. It took about thirty minutes in total to liquidate the entire force, and Wells's own fleet took minor losses in comparison. All but a handful showed bright and cheery green. "Have you ever hunted pack predators?" Wells asked his aide as the last Republican vessels were silenced. The man, like Wells and most other high naval officers, was an aristocrat, "I have, sir." "We're dealing with the same mentality, here. It took a very fine Naval Staff College and a still finer tradition to get our officers to where they are. The Republicans haven't got either because they won their war by trusting in the Force and following great alpha males like Ackbar. Depending on intangibles like luck and genius is the path to ruin; proper command is knowing how to deal with ill luck and stupidity," Wells said, never taking his eyes from the battle display. The fleet moved closer to Coruscant, and the enemy kept up their futile defense. Wells noticed an unusual concentration of activity on the edge of the sensor blindspot created by the planet's mass. He started to issue an order to investigate it, but a flotilla commander had already taken the initiative on that matter and sent pickets to scan the enemy movement. They were transports, probably evacuating refugees. The Republicans had opened up the shields on the opposite side of Coruscant and were getting as many people out as possible. It was difficult to tell with all the jamming, but it appeared as though they had commandeered everything they could lay hands on. The transports were running full burn for open space, hoping to get out of range of the Imperial Fleet's interdiction in time to flee. A holo representing one of the subcommanders, a Commodore, popped up on the tactical screen and began speaking, "Sir, I request permission to launch raids against the convoys exiting the planet, to force the enemy to devote more ships to their defense." The Admiral shook his head disapprovingly, "Now, Commodore, we are not barbarians. Request denied, continue operations according to the plan. He would let them go unmolested, those civilians weren't a part of this anymore. The fleet could continue this piecemeal engagement until the system was cleansed of enemy presence, then peel back the planetary defenses and call in the troops. That was the civilized way to kill people. ---- The transports sat in empty space a few light years away. Within them was a little over one and a half billion men. Obviously this would be insufficient to sieze the capitol planet of a galactic power. This was but the assault wave of the operation, which would seize the landing zones, expand them enough so that many more troops could be deployed, and destroy whatever defensive batteries came within range. Private Peren Atkins felt tremendously small every time he thought of all that was going on around him, so he tried to move his thoughts to something else. Nothing comforting came to mind, so he considered how he might perform in combat. He had never killed a man, and had always been taught that it was a sin. It was the worst sin of all; worse than thievery, lying, sodomy, and even rape. He wasn't sure he would be able to do it. He had read somewhere that only a small fraction of soldiers in combat actually fired their rifles directly at the enemy, and so accounted for almost all small-arms fatalities. The rest of the troopers in a unit just discharged their weapons at the area immediately around the enemy. Peren's drill instructors had thought this behavior intolerable goldbricking. No honest soldier should depend upon his fellows to do his work for him. Imperial Fusiliers had a reputation for accuracy that had to be maintained, so Peren was supposed to shoot to kill. He looked mournfully at his unloaded blastech A-280 as it lay inert on the bunk next to him. If a bolt from that at the standard setting struck a man in the head, the cranium and its contents would become a red mist. If it struck the chest, it would blow out a fist-sized entry wound and an exit wound the size of a basketball. The A-280 would kill a man if the bolt struck anywhere near a vital area, and even if it struck the limbs of the target it would probably tear them clean away and kill him by shock or blood loss in seconds. Atkins felt sick when he thought of shooting someone with it. Then he thought about possibly hesitating in the moment and being shot with one himself, which also made him sick. Peren didn't know which thought was worse, though his upbringing had always tried to teach him that it was better to be killed than kill. Something in him had always resisted that holy teaching, and it worried him that he doubted. Nature wanted to live and would do anything, but wasn't reason and religion the thing that lifted a person above nature? He rubbed his face. His parents hadn't wanted him to join the army. Perhaps they had been right, but what else could he do? He didn't want to be a leech like his father and brothers were content to be, getting all the benefits of the Imperial rule without any of the costs. Atkins understood that he owed a debt to his country that he could never really repay, but he was going to try nonetheless. The question was whether or not he could kill. He had heard the sermons about righteous retribution and war in the name of God, but he wasn't quite gullible enough to believe that. Peren was smart and had never gone in for the glorification of childlike and unquestioning faith in the will of God. A child had no doubt because children were too stupid and inexperienced to question much of anything. Praising that sort of response in an adult was just wrong, but if the holy book said that God wanted his followers to behave so then it must be right. Atkins was very conflicted. Sergeant Davis broke into his reverie, "What's wrong with you, kid?" "Nothing, sir," Atkins replied politely. "Bullshit. You're running a loop, looking at your rifle, then your bunk, then closing your eyes and shaking your head. We're going into combat any time now, and I haven't the time for macho bullshit nor for keeping secrets. I need my platoon and squad up to speed when we hit dirt, and no breakdowns afterwards. It's about the kill, isn't it?" Davis interrogated, not unkindly. Peren nodded. "Everybody thinks like that, the first time. Probably the rest of the times, too. If it's easy for you then I suppose you've got some bad wiring. I've killed a few people, myself--aliens and humans. After a while it gets to be automatic," the sergeant said. "I-I don't want it to be automatic," Atkins said. "Nor I. But that's the way it is. Just think of it the way I do, alright? Remember that if you don't take the shot and aim for the kill, you're giving the guy you didn't nail a chance to pop one of your friends. Whatever your responsibility to this God person or to yourself, there are people counting on you to watch their back." Atkins thought about it, and it actually did help. "Thank you, Sergeant," he said. Davis shook his head, "You can thank me by doing a good job." Then the klaxons sounded for everyone to buckle down, because the transport was about the make the jump to hyperspace. The skipper came on over the intercom system, "Good luck, Fusiliers: In all things daring." Le Mort Homme Chapter Four Check Your Corners ---- "Begin charging sequence." "Weapon is charging. Optimum capacity in five... four... three... two... optimum capacity reached, weapon is ready to fire." "Targetting point selected, grid reference FR223.5, that is two-two-three point five." "Coordinates recieved and targetted. Say goodbye to Second Army Headquarters." "Cut the chatter." "Awaiting confirmation from the bridge." "Confirmed, final safeties are released, weapon is free." "Firing main weapon." "Sensors report immediate planetary shield failure over grids 220 through 230, secondary effects from elimination of Lapuda Shield Generator Complex have resulted in failure over grids 180 to 300. Second Army Headquarters liquidated. Firing sequence completed, power down the weapon." "Powering down. Oh, and by the way... kaboom." "Cut the chatter, damn it." ---- The entire length of the Eradicator IV shuddered with the firing of the massive axial superlaser. Although the acceleration compensation prevented the crew from feeling the full effects, the superstructure of the vessel still shook gently as the big ship drew a green line to Coruscants shields. The weapon didn't bear comparison to the devices that had been used on the Death Stars, but it was still enough to overwhelm the defenses of any planet in the galaxy. The beam drilled through two layers of planetary shielding and lanced into the twisted city scape with much-diminished but still potent force. Huge amounts of smoke and vapor that had been a military complex flashed up and out, some of it fully escaping the atmosphere, but most settling into the upper atmosphere as a dark cloud lit red by the massive firestorms just beginning to rage. "The zone of shield failure is only about 500,000 square kilometers in extent," Admiral Wells' aide reported. The admiral nodded, "A bit small, but it will have to do. Bring the first wave of transports in, and order our Victories to enter the atmosphere and engage point targets." The vast armada of troop-carrying vessels was only minutes away by hyperspace; the Imperial Fleet's interdiction was timed to their lightspeed jump so that the transports could arrive directly over the planet. As soon as the last elements of the first wave had arrived, the gravity well generators came back online to prevent Republican relief efforts. Meanwhile, waves of Victory Star Destroyers flew through the gap in the planetary defenses. The knockout blow against the shield generator complex had caused power fluctuations throughout half the hemisphere and disabled most of the nearby defensive batteries, so the repulsor-equipped warships went for the ground. The lower their altitude the greater the deflection in the shots taken by the republican batteries, and hence a lower probability of hit. The Victories took scattered but accurate fire from those nearby guns which had gotten their independent generators working, but by ferocity and speedy concentration of firepower the positions were silenced. Nonetheless, a few destroyers took heavy damage. Their repulsors failed and they crashed to earth, tearing great gouges in the cityscape. A handful of those suffered multi-gigaton loss of containment in their ammunition or reactor systems, and great mushroom clouds of vaporized ferrocrete and other debris rose into the upper atmosphere. But the great majority managed to get to their firing positions and begin to undermine Coruscant's defensive systems from within the shields. The network of turbolaser batteries and shield generators gradually fell. Within a few minutes, enough guns had been knocked out to allow the transports to begin landing. They would hit ground like a rising storm; first would be the smaller ships, transporting individual companies and regiments. As they secured the landing zones with fire support from the Victory-class destroyers and the more distant orbiting fleet. Then divisions would begin landing and expand the strongpoint, so that larger and larger formations could land and increase the volume and tempo of the symphony in progress. Finally, the landing zones would spread out until they consumed the entire planet, liquidating enemy resistance and taking Coruscant. So the plan went. ---- "Clear the fucking ramps!" a naval non-commissioned officer to Peren's left screamed. The soldier scrambled down the unloading ramp onto a ferrocrete plain and followed his platoon in a quick sprint to their rallying point. The navy files were very anxious that the disembarking areas be totally cleared of traffic. Normally this would have been done to allow the division's vehicles and artillery to be quickly offloaded, but Atkins didn't see the point. The vehicles and artillery would be useless in the urban rat's nest that was Coruscant, so they would just be left in the hold anyway. The higher-ups were apparently just being by-the-book. As the platoon reached its rallying point, the various soldiers plopped to the hard ground for a breather. Atkins was in better shape than most, so he wasn't too winded, despite the thirty-odd kilos of equipment he was carrying. He tossed his helmet carefully onto the ferrocrete and sat on it. "Bunch of... assholes..." Private Corning gasped, "I'll catch them on a dark night, I will." Peren looked over at his squadmates, who were already setting up a bullshit session only minutes after landing. They were going off to secure some buildings very soon, and would potentially die. It was therefore vital that they get straight to work on talking shit about the chain of command. Private Morys, who was from the much-looked down upon Kardhif area and a natural whiner, was in his element. "What the fuck's wrong with 'em, really? Making us sprint about and waste our lungs in this smoky concrete shithouse, it don't make mil't'ry sense," he said. Sergeant Davis was not breathing hard at all. "Well, shit, Bryan, why don't you send them a letter informing them of your opinion on this 'miltry' matter." There was an insufferably bright flash a few kilometers to the north. Atkins was facing south and escaped harm. A few people who had been looking in the direction of the blast exclaimed in surprise and pain as the center of their vision was consumed by a bright purple blob. Something big had blown up, and after a few seconds the crack and roar of the explosion washed over the landing zone. Off in the distance, a mushroom cloud made up of particles from former buildings and former people rose up into the atmosphere. It joined the enormous darkness spreading across the horizon where something truly big had struck very hard, possibly even the Eradicator IV's big gun--though the soldiers didn't know for sure. Atkins sighed and sniffed at the air. It reeked of smoke and ozone, despite the stiff wind that blew across the rooftops. All those big blasts were taking their toll on air quality, and the winds precipitated by the many firestorms could only spread the stink around. Atkins hoped that this would be the worst smell he would have to encounter in wartime, but he knew he would soon be encountering very unpleasant scents. It wasn't a good train of thought, so he got back to the bull session. "What the fuck are they doing over there?" Corning asked. Atkins turned around to face back at the transports. The divisional vehicles and artillery were being unloaded from the transport. They were all clustered together and being recklessly driven over the huge ferrocrete expanse of the landing pad, and they would have made a perfect target for enemy artillery and air support if such a thing had actually existed. The horde of repulsor vehicles, walkers, and wheeled and tracked ground vehicles roared across hundreds of meters of flat and sturdy rooftop, right up to the edge of abyss between buildings, where they stopped. "What the fuck?" Morys asked no one in particular, "Why are they leaving those here, they're useless in this sprawl." "Making room?" Atkins guessed. "Room for what?" Morys said angrily. His answer came quickly. A solid wave of people emerged from all the buildings near the landing zone and converged on the transport. Tens of thousands of refugees poured towards the vessel, covered by soldiers of the division. They came from every direction, carrying bundles of their belongings. It seemingly took forever for them to board, and for the whole duration, the platoon sat silently and watched the stream of dispossessed moving by. Finally, the transport was filled beyond capacity and the loading doors were shut. Those thousands still stuck on the tarmac cried out, and Atkins heard the officers with loudspeakers trying to calm them down. The transport wobbled into the air on it's repulsorlifts, loaded with far more people than it was meant to accomodate. It gained altitude and slowly shrank into the distance while those left behind wept and moaned. Then a bright red point of light whipped out from someplace close to the horizon and intersected the transport's hull, turning it into a puff of smoke. Hysteria overtook the remaining refugees as their friends, family, and neighbors lazily tumbled back to Coruscant--at least those who hadn't been vaporized. Atkins wasn't angry or sad, because it was at that moment impossible for him to understand what had just happened. Perspective was denied him, because of the enormity of the occurence. His mind chopped it down to a level he could understand: he had seen a female twi'lek with three children go to board the transport, and they had almost certainly been on it when the trip ended. His eyes teared up. "Jesus," Sergeant Davis said quietly, then he jerked to alertness as a transmission came over his radio, "the company is moving out, beat your feet, boys!" "Which way?" Corning asked. The sergeant looked back at his squad as he put his helmet on, "Just follow the grumbling." Atkins put his own helmet on and got his outfit assembled. The input/output cord came out of his rifle's butt and linked into the jack on the arm of his combat suit. His combat suit featured plasteel plates integrated into the camouflage fabric--the mottled brown camouflage fabric, which was a joke on Coruscant. The division was supposed to be on a planet of grassy plains and rolling hills, but such was life in the business of death. His helmet had a visor that linked with the rifle's scope and helped him aid. The suit was effectively a cheap knock-off of stormtrooper armor, which Atkins would have killed for. 'Stormie' armor had full climate adjustment and would have filtered out the reek of ozone and smoke. The company hoofed down the wide boulevards which were common around landing pads. Every building had the same dangerous look to it, as their fusillier's training revealed a potential machinegun position in every window. Thankfully each building they passed featured prominent charring and was in some state of damage, indicating that it had been cleaned out, or at least the levels of it which had lines of fire onto the street were clear. Occasionally an echo of blaster fire would suddenly make an appearance from a blasted-open doorway, or it would climb up from the abyssal and infinitely deep airshafts that laid next to the road like mouths leading into the depths of hell. A few of these poured out flame and smoke from fires down below, where men were still fighting. The company was lucky not to be down there, roasting in their body armor and forced to wear their gasmasks constantly for fear of smoke and fumes. Gradually the sound of fighting became more constant and loud. They were entering the war, now. A few hundred yards down the street, they could see men behind cover, throwing up walls of red light at windows and doors, trying to suppress the enemy, so they could assault across the open street and enter the doors. Then they would clear room to room. Atkins prayed that he wouldn't have to do that. The company halted there on the street, and Atkins took his prayer necklave out. Morys sat down on the street and looked at Peren disdainfully, "Don't waste your breath. Whatever God there might have been was on that transport when it exploded." Peren stopped praying briefly, "I can't stop believing just because some people died." "Then you got a problem, brother. My old man couldn't stop drinking. I think you got the same problem as him, just a different poison," Morys said, not unsympathetically. ---- Captain Arpad crouched down and radioed his CO, Major Prote. In the terrain, the battalion had been split up into several elements; the headquarters was separated from him by a city block full of tall buildings, but it was still close enough for the command radio (conventiently located on his assistant's back) to punch through the concrete, metal, and jamming. "Reservoir, this is Aqueduct Three, over," he said. Reservoir was battalion headquarters, Aqueduct 3 was himself. Codenames were important, if only for maintaining the illusion of order in this shithouse. "Aqueduct Three, I recieve you, what is your status, over?" returned Major Prote's gravelly voice. Arpad cleared his throat, "We have arrived at rallying point Tau with... two casualties, a broken ankle and one case of heat exhaustion, requesting orders, over." "Aqueduct, there should be another captain from the eleven-hundred and third infantry division in your area, he'll tell you what you need to do, over." "Affirmative." Arpad wrangled with the frequencies for a while, eventually getting the man on the line. After receiving a quick summary of the situation, he divided up his platoons and issued objectives. They would fade into the buildings and go completely beyond his capacity to command. This planet was going to require a war of squads and fire teams. ---- Sergeant Davis and his squad moved through a street-level doorway and into the office building. The lights were still functioning, so it was easy to navigate. They were supposed to deal with the threatening Republican infantry formations that were lingering in the levels below, threatening to break up to the surface and advance on the division's landing zone. Of course, it was difficult to say where the enemy was, and in what strength, but it wasn't Davis's job to think about that. He was supposed to kill the Republicans and ensure that a minimum number of his soldiers died in the process. They moved through rooms covered in blast holes and scorch marks from previous combat; Davis led the way to the emergency stairwell, and then down. Three flights down, there began to appear corpses in Republican uniform. There were the first combat casualties that Atkins had ever seen, though he had supposedly been trained to deal with such things, as with all soldiers of the regular army. But now that he was actually faced with the reality of the situation, he felt as if it had been entirely useless. The soldiers had been clustered around a landing, trying to defend the stairs when they had been quite literally blown to pieces. He found himself staring intensely at the wound characteristics... blaster bolts cauterized and blew apart whatever flesh they struck. There was even burned meat stuck to the walls. He felt the sickly sweet fluid rising up in the back of his throat. But all the time his feet kept moving on their own and presently he had marched past the bodies and down the stairs. That was probably the intent of the training--to make him an automaton. Just as they hit the next landing, there was a muffled thump that shook the floor under their feet, and the lights failed. Atkins flipped the light amplification on his helmet visor, and the scene reappeared in green. "What the fuck was that?" Morys asked. Sergeant Davis shook his head, "I dunno. Probably an orbital bombardment." Corning grinned in the darkness, "Do you like the feeling? If some fuckass navy file forgets to carry the one on his trajectory calculations, he might drop two-hundred megatons of green light in your lap, and you'd disappear into a cloud of water vapor so fast that you wouldn't even realize that you were dead." Atkins reflexively ran his hand over the pocket on his armored vest that contained his prayer necklace. Nothing in his training could save him from a mistargeted turbolaser blast, so he had to put his faith in God. After another few minutes of descending the stairwell, Davis led them out onto the floor of rooms itself. This area of the building had once been an office complex, but it had also been the scene of heavy close quarters combat. The cubicles were torn apart and blasted to tiny pieces... not so much out of tactical necessity as from the traditional dislike of the soldier for the very concept of lemming-like corporatism. The smoke was still thick here and the reek of ozone was heavy. There were more Imperial soldiers here, who had already seen some combat. They had only been there for a few hours, but they were already beginning to acquire the look of crusty veterans. Their shoulder patches identified them as members of the 1103 infantry. "Hey, you're finally here," one of them called, waving them over. The squad moved closer, and Davis saw that the man was only a corporal. The sergeant barked, "Who's in command here?" The corporal smiled wanly, "Me. The chain of command's a little fucked up." "What happened to your squad sergeant?" Davis asked. "Squad Sergeant?" the other NCO laughed, "why not ask me about the Lieutenant, the platoon sergeant, the rest of the squad sergeants... or any of the other dead sons-of-bitches?" "Jesus..." Morys shook his head. "You mean you're in command of your platoon, Corporal?" Davis demanded gently. "Platoon? I guess. We're at about quarter strength, ten guys don't make a very good platoon. I better get a field commission out of this anyway, though," the man said. Davis nodded. "Alright. We've been ordered to move onward. Which way is the enemy on this floor?" The corporal pointed to a door. "Down that corridor. I've got a couple of men with a T-21 covering it, make sure you don't disturb them." The sergeant started to lead his squad away, but the corporal grabbed desperately at Davis's shoulder. "Hey! Damn... when's our relief going to get down here? I been in this hole too long." Davis looked at him curiously, "You've only been here two hours at most, soldier. You've got a while longer to wait." "What?" the corporal's eyes took on a wild look, "Only two hours? That's impossible. I can't stay down here or I'll die. Shit... you'll die, too. All of you!" Davis slapped him across the face, and the corporal dropped to the floor without another word. He stared vacantly at the squad as the twelve men moved into the corridor. Atkins looked into the man's eyes and touched his breast pocket again, and then he was in the corridor and moving towards probable death. Le Mort Homme Chapter Five A Hint of Nausea The squad filed past the two soldiers guarding the hallway. The men laid prone just past the doorway and said nothing, they merely picked up their gun and went back into the other room, where the rest of their 'platoon' was waiting. One of them stopped in the doorway. "How many grenades do you have, each?" he asked passively. Atkins was the closest, so it fell to him to answer, "Ah, four or five. Why?" The soldier shook his head and stepped through the doorway. Looking the other way, he explained, "You'll need more than that. Don't be afraid to take them from the dead." Atkins shrugged and followed Private Morys down the corridor. He was part of that little fire team of four men, which was the standard number for room clearing. One man would burn down the door with his rifle on maximum, then the next would charge through, covering the two far corners. Another man immediately behind would sweep right, and the last would clear the left. The idea was to burst through with all possible speed in a flurry of firepower to intimidate and silence anyone waiting inside before they could shoot. The teams advanced down the hall, picking doorways in turn. Three four-man teams stopped on the way, and the final team, which was Morys's, crouched just past that third door, covering the rooms yet to be cleared to prevent enemies from rushing out. Atkins breathed evenly and held the rifle to his shoulder. He aimed at nothing in particular. There were short bursts of blaster fire behind him, and the three teams reported the offices as cleared. The squad moved back into the hall and Atkins advanced to the next door. The squad stopped and allowed the others to leapfrog past. They waited until everyone was halted and ready. Peren took the breaching position and clicked the safety off. His A-280 was dialed to maximum power, and the little ammunition indicator on the side of his visor's holographic display read full charge. Morys nodded. Atkins pulled the trigger and the weapon jerked back against his shoulder. The door ahead of him came apart in a shower of plasteel fragments that would probably cause significant harm to anyone on the other side of it. Morys was in first, followed by Corning and then Private Heller, whom Atkins had only just met. "Clear!" Morys called from inside. It seemed fairly easy so far, they hadn't even encountered any enemies yet. They continued down the corridor like this for several cycles of the fire team, until finally Morys turned up the hallway to complain. "Sergeant... there isn't anybody here. What the fuck are we doing?" he called. Davis stuck his head out of another empty room, "Where were you during training? This is standard room clearing practice. If you want to play games and skip every other door and then get shot in the back, get your own squad. Get your own army, for that matter." "Someday I will, Sarge. Someday," Morys rejoined with mock wistfulness. Then it was back to blowing up doors and charging full-bore into empty offices. The squad grew increasingly loose as time went on, but they weren't entirely lax quite yet. They were just bored. "What the hell was that dumbass corporal in the other room talking about? There ain't shit down here," Morys said, sitting down just long enough to eat a ration bar and get a sip of water. "And I suppose his platoon just tied their bootlaces together and fell down the stairs? Somebody shot them, and somebody must still be here, Bryan," Corning replied. "You've just got all the answers, don't you, Adan. And don't use my first name, familiarity breeds contempt," Morys ordered sternly. "As if you need help with that," Corning replied with a wink to Atkins. "Alright, I've got point on the next fucking door instead of you, I'll show you how it's done," the corporal said, wiping the crumbs away from his mouth. He stood and moved to the next door. The fireteam covering the hallway was scarcely at attention, holding their weapons loosely and glancing back and forth. Corning took up the position that Morys should have filled on this turn, aiming his rifle at the door. Atkins would be the second through. Adan waited until everyone was ready, and then he blew open the door. Morys went right through the haze of smoke and into the room, with Peren right behind him. Suddenly there was a very loud and high-pitched sort of sneeze, and half of Atkin's vision went dark behind a veil, red-tinged at the edges. Dimly he saw the corporal tumble to the ground in front of him, and a human shape in the office beyond moved to aim a rifle at him. Peren couldn't see well enough to aim precisely and he thought he felt blood running down his face. It was possible that he had been struck in the head--or even the eye, since he couldn't see anything out of his right. He clicked the A-280 to full-auto and cut loose, not because he was panicking, but because he didn't have time to actually aim. The rifle spat out ten rounds per second and sent little fingers of energy slamming into the walls. The man on the other side of the room took at least two in the center of mass, and Atkins turned to the corner on his left. There was another enemy there, and he went down as well. Then Heller was in the room and liquidated someone in the right-hand corner. Peren stood for a moment, then Corning barrelled into the office and knocked him aside. Atkins turned and looked out the door, red bolts were going down the hall in both directions, and he dimly realized that there was a lot of blaster fire going on. He looked at Corning. "Shit," the other private said, staring at Peren. "Am I hit?" "No... you're covered in bits and pieces of Morys," he answered, having to shout over the din, "half your visor is shut out and the whole right side of your face is covered in his blood. Get a bandage or something to wipe it off." Peren dug into one of the pockets on his webbing and pulled out a field bandage. As he wiped it off, Corning moved back to the door and stuck his rifle out. He was looking down the corridor with the camera sights, and every once in a while he squeezed off a shot. There were a few muffled thumps of grenades going off, but all in the direction of the enemy. It was probable that they had already run out of grenades. Peren had to use a little bit of water from his canteen to clean off the last streaks of blood on his visor. His vision had been restored and his face was clean, though he had a significant amount of gore on his right shoulder. "Is Morys alright?" he asked Heller, who was attending to the corporal. "He's dead," Heller shouted back, "but ya killed the fuck out of those other guys." Atkins examined the scene. Morys was definitely dead. The man that had shot him had been crouching on the other side of the room, and the bolt had passed through his right shoulder and over Atkin's head at an angle, probably just missing the private but showering him in blood. In turn, that enemy had been cut almost in two at the waist, and the other one Atkins had bagged was scarcely recognizable as a humanoid. With all that, Peren considered, he didn't feel as sick as he expected. Just as he completed that thought, he had a fleeting hint of nausea, but it passed quickly. Corning was still at the door, firing intermittently down the hall at enemies that Atkins couldn't see. He turned back into the room. Adan said, "The bastards showed up just now, they're right next door!" "What happened to the--" Heller started to ask. "The guys who were covering the hall are dead," Corning interrupted. Peren thought about the implications of the enemy being in the office next door. Suddenly he realized that when he had gone cyclic, he had dealt a lot of damage to the walls. The rooms were really just prefabricated boxes and the walls were less than a foot of plastic and insulation. His bolts had punched ragged holes the size of his head clean into the next room. He was amazed that the republicans hadn't noticed yet. He pulled a grenade off of his vest and walked up to the wall, then yanked the pin free and tossed it through on of the holes. The thump on the other end was follwed by a few screams. The walls were thick enough to turn fragments aside, but not nearly thick enough to resist blaster fire. He stuck the muzzle of his rifle through the crater and examined the view from the gun camera. The armor of the enemy soldiers was made of strong plasteel and had apparently allowed all but one of them to escape serious injury, though they were concussed and confused. The fourth one was laying unconscious on the floor and shooting blood in great spurts from his thigh. His femoral artery had probably been laid open, Peren thought cooly. His rifle was still set to automatic, and he fired a few bursts at the disoriented men in the adjoining room. He cut the three down in moments. Heller got the idea and moved to the wall himself. "Good shit, man," the other private said with a grin, then he turned back to Corning, still at the door, "I'm using a breaching charge, we're changing rooms." "Do it," Corning replied. Heller dug a breaching kit out of his pack, because the walls were too delicate to use a blaster--the bolt only went straight through. It was several thin sheets of high explosive with adhesive backing, and he used his vibroblade to slice it into strips of the correct dimensions. He then applied these to the wall as if drawing the outline of a door, each strip in contact with the next. Then he stuck the end of a detonator cord into on of the sheets and retreated to the other end of the room. Atkins followed. Heller clicked the trigger on his detonator and the charges exploded. Atkin's helmet deadened the noise but his ears still rang, and a door-sized section of wall collapsed. He and Heller moved through, checking for any enemy survivors and finding none. Corning followed after a moment. The lights in the room had been shattered by the grenade and were flickering intermittently. "Atkins, on me," Corning said. He turned to the door, priming a grenade. He threw it into the office across the hall, also occupied by enemies. Atkins tripped his own grenade and tossed it a second later. The staccato explosions ripped the other room apart. At the same time, Heller dropped to one knee and fired a long full-auto burst through the wall into the next room down the hall. After thoroughly perforating the barrier, he let his A-280 hang by the strap while he pulled a grenade from his vest. Peren was just turning to him when a shot ripped through the divider and snapped Heller's head back farther than the neck was probably designed to flex. Shot through the right eye, Heller fell limp. Atkins heard a metallic snap and his blood ran cold. Heller had just pulled the pin from his grenade, and now the trigger had come off. Peren dove across the floor as well as he could in full combat kit and grabbed the bomb. He rolled onto his side and whipped it sidearm through one of the many apertures in the wall. It exploded while still in the air, and Atkins quickly got to his feet and stuck his rifle through again. This time it appeared that everyone in the room had died, unluckily for them. Corning was still at the door, and he turned back in, "I think they're running scared." He fired a few shots down the hall, but the volume of fire had fallen significantly. "Shouldn't we chase them?" Peren asked quickly. "Take it easy... you killed a lot of people today," Corning pointed out, "and anyway we're very likely down half the squad. We'll take a breather unless Davis says otherwise." Atkins looked around. Heller was dead, so was Morys; according to church doctrine Morys was burning in the fires of damnation and chances were that Heller had joined him. But as briefly as he had known them, they had been his friends, so he might as well throw them a few prayers and hope they could transition as high up as limbo. The concept of eternal damnation for earthly mistakes had always been distressing. Corning leaned against the doorjamb and spared a glance for Atkins. He looked quite a sight: a gore-covered soldier kneeling on the floor, mumbling to himself, and fiddling with a string of beads. It was no wonder that religious types got so much crap in the modern age. They were asking for it. Corning was smarter, because he knew that the universe was utterly without meaning--only the action of people could fill that void. Atkins might as well be trying to divine the future in the entrails of farm animals. "Shit," he said, "you know I enlisted just to get out from under my old man? I figured it'd be safe enough, how the fuck was I supposed to know they were going to fight a war?" "That's what armies do," Atkins said helpfully. Adan shook his head, "How nice that you feel comfortable saying spurious crap like that. I wonder if Heller felt the same way." Atkins stood, "Take it easy." ---- Davis felt relieved, not just because the combat had taken a break, but also because his men were holding together better than could be expected. After a quick roll call he found that of the dozen men he had started with, he was down to six, two of them wounded. Well... one of them was wounded, anyway. The other, Corporal Harden was unable to stop weeping. He was doing it in a quiet way and it was evident that he was ashamed of himself, but all of Davis's admonitions to soldier up and stop crying were useless. The sergeant supposed that some people just reacted that way to mortal combat. Other than that and Private Guye who had a small fragment lodged in his knuckles, his squad was intact. Still, unlike Atkins, he had known all of the dead men very well, had lived with them like brothers for months or even years. The regular army was like that. It wasn't time yet to think about what he could have done differently, but it would probably be impossible not to think about it eventually. At any rate it would be impossible to continue moving forward with the squad at less than half strength. They would have to sit down and wait to be relieved. They had managed to secure one corridor in an office building that probably had thousands of them. It was a hell of a war to fight. ---- Grand Admiral Yuma frowned at the hologram, and the one-fourth scale projection of High Marshal Branning scowled back. "Casualties at the end of the first day are severe. This damned sprawl is perfect for the defence, our spearheads get tangled and chewed up in a matter of hours. There's no maneuver, it's just a door-to-door slugging match," the general complained. "I want solutions, not excuses," Yuma cut him off, "we've a schedule to keep." Branning barked a clipped burst of military-man laughter, "Solutions? Get me every man you can spare. It takes a division to take a single block of apartments down here, what with the damnable vertical cross-connected buildings, with ten thousand levels each." Yuma, "That's been done." "Then get me some you can't spare. If you want to take Coruscant, you can either give me every warm body in the Imperial Army or you can turn the planet into a smooth ferrocrete parking lot," Branning said acidly, "you can preach at me all you want from up there, but down here the stories is different." "Blasting isn't even an option to joke about, High Marshal, but we shall see what can be done to resolve the manpower situation," the admiral replied, then continued a little lamely, "Governor Timosniko has been saying something about raising Penal Divisions." Branning snorted, "Hell, I can use some extra ammunition, but I need soldiers more... what about a draft?" "A what?" "You know, a draft of random able bodied males into the army. We did 'em in the Vong wars," Branning explained. Emergency levies of recruits had been carried out during emergencies in the war against the Vong, usually to quickly mobilize a given sector. "I know what you're referring to. I don't see how it would help, we're already getting a lot of volunteers." "I'm talking about an all out draft, through the whole Empire. Volunteers aren't going to cut it this time," the High Marhshal replied. "That's never been done before. I don't think there would be sufficient popular support, people only put up with it when it was isolated to individual sectors and the danger was truly great," Yuma pointed out. "Maybe, but this is a big war and we'll need a lot of men. And if we don't do it first, the Republicans will." Yuma's face hardened, "I'll bring it up at my next conference with Overcommand, but I think they'll still be hoping for the war we thought we were fighting on the first of the month. You know, the one that was going to be over very soon? Moff Wergard will be quite smug." "Well, we know better. Ground control out."