The Siege of Capella:
Immediately
Prior to Sterilization by Seraphim
Chapter 1: Convention
"Multiple hostiles, range 500 meters, request command."
Commander Zweiss sat in his cockpit, scanning the glowing screens
around him, while trying to listen to the Titan captain.
"Sir,
I repeat, hostiles, 450 meters and closing."
Zweiss analyzed
the situation quickly. "Captain, move your forward and engage.
Keep the Seraphim at extreme range." The Commander knew that
Titan plasma dissipated at long ranges, but he knew the destructive
power of the Seraphim at close range. He quickly keyed in a sequence
of commands for his own command unit. The honor guard of Titans and
the newer Percivals altered course to keep up with him. A sudden
thought struck him.
What about Clarke? Zweiss knew that
Clarke had the worst fighting, in the midst of the city, at close
quarters. She's too impulsive; I hope she's okay.
He
glanced to the right, noting that the Titan Commander had engaged the
Seraphim. Bolts of blue plasma spat, marring the beautiful and alien
designs that were the Seraphim war machines. A few combusted in
glorious flame, but too few of them. They advanced on the Titan
Legion and began hurling streams of negative energy at the titans.
One after the other fell, collapsing to their knees. At last, only a
few remained, valiantly fighting back. All too soon, only the
yellow-marked command Titan was left, engaging the enemies of
humanity with pure plasma beams. With a flare of light, the behemoth
exploded, it's tiny fusion reactor spraying light across the
battlefield.
Another idiot I have to replace, Zweiss
thought, not really meaning it, as he brought is own ACU in. "Hello,
mate," a sudden transmission filled his ears with a familiar
voice.
"Oswald!" Zweiss almost yelled, knowing that his
friend still lived, "Great to see you! But before we talk, I
could use some help here." With his usual elegant flair, Novice
Commander Oswald stomped into the battle. The squat frame of the
support command unit began glowing as bolts of alien weaponry struck
it, yet Oswald continued on. Using his unusual combat style, Oswald
walked straight up to an enemy bot, with Zweiss looking on with a
mixture of amusement and confusion. Oswald extended the arm of his
war machine into the Seraphim's face, forcefully iimplanting it into
the cockpit. Then, he simply fired. For a moment, nothing happened as
the shot ricocheted around the internal structure. Then, the bot
exploded, scattering shrapnel near and far. Zweiss smiled.
He
never was conventional.
Chapter Two:
Titans Last
March
50 gates stood at the ready. 50 Coalition Commanders
stood in front; the pride of the UEF, the most shrewd of the Cybran,
and the glorious Aeon. Inside each command chamber, each pilot sat in
the midst of a ritual. Many would die on this coming day. Commander
Dostya sat alongside her brothers and sisters in humanity, waiting
for the countdown. Then, it reached zero. Commander Hall came on the
viewscreens of all commanders.
"Today is not a day for the
UEF. Today is not a day for the Cybran. Neither is today a day for
the Aeon. Instead, today is a day for humanity; for the Coalition.
This day, we strike deep into our enemies hearts, and we will push
them back into that hell-spawned warp from which they have come."
As one, the commanders walked to their destiny in the quantum
gates, pushing through space and time. Commander Dostya watched the
quantum fields swirling around her, before hitting earth.
She
began building immediately, with the help of the many other brave
souls with her. They had to build a fortress, a redoubt, which could
not break.
Can it be done?
Dostya didn't know.
---
Commander Zweiss jumped as his scanners screeched, having trouble
with the new data. Staring at it, he noted in awe that 50 commanders
had simultaneously gated in a 10 square mile area. Almost
immediately, he heard a ping. Someone was hailing him.
"Commander
Zweiss, we advise that you retreat the hell to the LZ. The Seraphim
are about to make a push and this will be our redoubt. HQ out."
Zweiss hated the bald man who seemed to be addicted to the word
"hell," but he couldn't argue that it was a good idea. Only
2 kilometers to his south, alien bots were finishing the process of
wrecking his defensive line.
"Roger HQ, on my way. Oswald,
get over here and follow me." Oswald disentangled himself from a
once-shining Seraphim tank that he had been mauling. "Yes sir!"
The 51st commander began heading towards the new Fort Riley, just
as flashes of pure energy began to light up the horizon.
---
The
imposing wall of Triads and Ravishers slowly moved by as Zweiss
entered the newly built Fort Riley. It would have to be impenetrable;
this had to stand against the might of the Seraphim, smack it in the
face a few times, and turn it back. Literally thousands of surface to
air weapons gleamed in the setting sun, while walls upon walls of
artillery and turrets scanned the horizon. Zweiss arrived, after a
lengthy 5 minute trip, at the center of the base. Oswald wasn't far
behind, messing with some other sub-commander.
Commander Zweiss
activated his communications channel. "Zweiss reporting, I have
arrived after taking heavy casualties." Almost immediately,
Commander Hall was speaking to him. "Great job, Commander
Zweiss. You were fighting against greater numbers and technology,"
then Hall switched over to broadcast, "Commanders of the
Coalition. You may think we are safe here, behind these defenses.
Yet, do you believe that one fortress, no matter how powerful, will
stop an entire alien race? Make no mistake, many will die here, to
protect Capella, and indeed our entire race. But we will die as
brothers and sisters in arms; together. It matters not what faction
we are of, just that we are human. In light of this, I am prepared to
be one of those in danger, to prove that even I will wage war on the
field of battle. I am preparing to gate down to Fort Riley
immediately. Good hunting. Hall out."
---
After the buzz
of amazement at Hall making planetfall, everyone began bolstering the
defenses yet again. Zweiss stared at the slow blue build lasers
flicking out from his left arm, wishing they would move faster.
Building, alas, is a necessary but not very mentally engaging
task.
He thought back to Clarke, wondering why she had not
returned yet. She should have been back now, she should have been
able to recall. Then, a sudden radio broadcast interrupted his
thoughts.
"Multiple hostiles, 7 kilometers south of our
position. All commanders, prepare to engage."
Zweiss checked
his screens grimly, watching the hundreds of yellow dots coalesce
like bees on the screen. Moving quickly, he signalled his newly built
Legion of Titans to attack. The other commanders were doing the same.
"Strategic Launch Detected," said a cool female voice
in his ears. He smiled, assured that a nuke would finish the Seraphim
off. Contemplating their destruction, he stared off into the deep
blue sky. There, he noticed an anomaly; a bright blue flare.
"Magnify," he ordered to his ACU. Instantly, his vision
cleared. It was an interestingly curvy structure, decidedly pointed
at one end, that seemed to be expelling a constant stream of blue
particles.
That can only be one thing, he thought with
dread.
He keyed all command channels and set them to broadcast.
"NUKE!"
---
He fought to keep calm, knowing
that panic would do him no good. Almost instantly, a reply came back
from HQ. "We've calculated the trajectory of the weapon," a
rather amused voice said in his ear, "And it appears not to be
targeting the base." Sighs of relief traveled instantaneously
around the base. "Instead," the voice continued, "It
is targeting the Titan legions." Zweiss gasped in horror. The
Command Crew of the Titans were going to be immolated! Yet another
impulsive young lieutenant to replace. With no way to avoid it,
he watched the gracefully dropping missile as it fell straight in the
midst of the Coalition forces. The resulting explosion, if you could
even call it that, was more powerful than any Zweiss had ever seen.
It more than rivaled the most powerful Aeon Quantum weapon, and far
outstripped the standard, primitive hydrogen bomb. A shockwave of
pure energy pushed it's way past, slicing through robotic chips and
command chambers alike with equal determination, forcing it's way
towards Fort Riley inexorably.
"God help us," Zweiss
prayed as the pulse broke over the shields, "God help us all."
Chapter 3:
The Quantum Realm
The shields snapped
and groaned as they bore the brunt of the attack. Sparkling ripples
radiated across the hemispheres overhead. In a few places, the
shields winked out altogether, leaving the Coalition base bare. After
a few moments of awed silence, a young commander's voice came on the
channel.
"That was a nuke? Blasted aliens! Now we have one
more thing to worry about."
---
"General Hall, as I
was saying previously, this new weapon has great power! It only needs
a little more time to be tested!"
"With all due respect
Dr. Joseph, time is the one thing we don't have. I need that weapon
operational now!"
The scientist sighed. Don't these
military types ever understand? You can't churn out new technology
like you can Mech Marines! He began once more. "The Aeon,
Cybran, and us have been doing this as a collaborative effort. With
the Cybran AI chips, the Aeon technology, and our manpower, we have
been able to accelerate the process. That, unfortunately, does not
mean that we can have an experimental weapon ready in a week!"
Hall sighed. Don't these scientists know what it is like to be
on a battlefield? How minutes turn to hours? You can't churn out
lives like you can Mech Marines! "We can't hold Capella much
longer. Even with our forces, we can't possibly hold the masses of
Seraphim and the Order back. After that, our only fortress world is
Griffin IV, and I'm fooling no one; we can't hold that much longer
either! It as to be soon, Dr. Joseph."
"I'll get back
to you soon, General. Pleasure speaking with you."
With a
flash, the screen erased the science administrator's face, replacing
it with the multicolored Coalition logo. Hall leaned back in his
flexible commander's chair, feeling every one of his fifty-five
years. What could we do with that weapon? If we had the Quantum
Realm fully under our control? Can we get it soon enough? The
questions flicked through his mind quickly, yet his tired brain
supplied no answers.
What will become of us?
---
"Test firing in 60! All personnel to your stations!
Stand by for test firing!" Loud alarms rang through the science
station. Everyone intently watched the dull grey soil of the moon
outside. Unearthly-looking Aeon scientists, clad in bright green
silently meditated as the clock ticked. Stiff and upright UEF
technicians stood to attention, seeking solace in pride. And the
glittering and glowing Cybran found comfort in statistics and binary.
10, 9, 8... The red numbers on the wall finally reached zero.
A brilliant blue light flashed outside the base, throwing a mix
of shadows and light everywhere inside. Lightning flashed, and before
the amazed eyes of the research crew, a quantum gate began to form.
Unearthly energies radiated out from it, the light streaming into the
vision of all. Finally, a perfectly circular hole was floating in
midair above the lunar surface, occasionally hurling a bit of energy
away from it.
"Quantum rift stable, preparing for test
firing!" The stiff and almost scared voice of the Cybran
administrator echoed throughout the base. "Firing!" The
entire structure shuddered and groaned as enormous amounts of energy
was shunted through the wires. Dr. Joseph sat nervously, knowing that
the nine nuclear fusion reactors outside were putting their full
output through the cords only meters away. The hairs on the back of
his neck stood up and down in tandem with the energy pulses.
No
one laughed. It might have been funny if it wasn't for the lives
at stake, he thought. Just then, a small, almost unnoticed
projectile came out of the rift. Ever so slowly, it fell towards the
ground. His instincts screaming for him to look at it, Joseph tore
his eyes away and slammed them shut. Moments later, he heard the
cries of the others, and strangely enough, himself. A cascade of
light pierced his eyelids like a sword, instantly blinding him. As
his brain overloaded and shut down, he heard the distant voice of the
Cybran.
"Mission accomplished!"
---
"General
Hall, the test firing was successful. The experimental weapon is now
operational."
Hall smiled. Almost. The war hadn't been won
yet, not even close. "So, I can now fire it once more?"
Dr. Joseph winced. "Well, not quite. The test firing burned
out a power conduit and overloaded a reactor. We're going to have to
wait while the technicians get it back online."
Hall sighed.
"When will that be? We are fighting a war, you know."
This
time, Dr. Joseph actually smiled. "Five hours, no more. I'll
transmit the firing codes at that time." Hall leaned back.
Five
hours. Then we can purge the Seraphim from our galaxy! Five hours.
Chapter 4:
No Regrets
"All Commanders, the
attack begins. Today we purge the Order and alien invaders from our
planet! Charge!" Without hesitation, literally tens of thousands
of mechanical minds were put into action. As an enormous tidal wave,
the instruments of destruction surged forward. Zweiss watched as
comical Mech Marines, shambling Titans, stately Percivals, and
lumbering Fatboys started their engines. Alongside the "UEF"
column, glittering, spiked red designs began moving as well.
Spiderlike Manti, flat Rhinos, ungainly Hoplites, and the occasional
Monkeylord began pulling themselves forwards. A relatively small and
robust Aeon brigade stomped alongside; the Colossi.
Sporting
little in the way of anti-air or support units, these massive bots
made trees rattle as they squashed them underfoot. They seemed to
exude arrogance and confidence, as over two hundred of them formed
up. Fiery trails were ejected overhead as bombers and fighters formed
up. A huge Czar made its way across the sky, the ground underneath
rippling from its antigravity systems. And even higher, soaring
through the depths of space, enormous satellites and their potent
weaponry began targeting.
Zweiss noted the vast legion with a
sense of awe; it had never been done before. Yet, he sensed
something. There was something missing, a piece of a puzzle not yet
in place. However, he did not place this final piece, Zweiss did not
think of the small and seemingly insignificant clock in a remote
scientific station. He did not notice the small numbers, slowly
ticking away. Yet less than a kilometer away, one man was watching
those electronic impulses move with agonizing slowness.
3
Failure, annihilation. The center cannot hold. Option Zero.
Extermination.
2
What if? Is it right? Will it
work?
1
We must do it! For the good of all! We
must survive, struggle if need be. No regrets.
"Fire."
---
"Roger HQ, preparing to open a quantum rift..."
The technician sounded a bit worried over the channel. "...Quantum
rift established! Rift stable, location: Earth. Begin countdown!
Initiating Gamma protocol. What is your projectile of choice, General
Hall?"
General Hall sat back in his chair. What can I hit
those damned aliens with?
"I want you to prepare a Mavor
shell for starters."
"Is that all, General Hall?"
came the technicians incredulous response.
"No. Engrave the
words, 'For Samantha' on it as well."
"Give 'em hell,
Hall out."