RR76: Three years ago, I posted my first story--a craptacular flop called "Past Tense," detailing the history of Spira, 500 years prior to the game. It was an original concept, never done before, but due to my inexperience as a writer and general uninterest, it flopped. This is where I rectify that.
This story details a war--officially, a "border dispute,"-- between the Church of Yevon, and another Spiran power, the Yudora Empire. Armed with military technology far beyond Yevon's, the Empire is in an excellent position to end the war in their favor...yet, inexplicably, they are losing. Several of the islands in their archepelago have been taken, and the port city of Luca, their only fortress in the mainland of Spira, lies under Yevon's sway. With the end of the latest Calm drawing near, it is becoming increasingly clear to the Imperial High Command that if Yevon doesn't kill them, Sin will.
The largest island of Yudora--Bhed--lies across a 50-mile channel that seperates it from Luca, with the many city-state islands that make up the Empire scattered in between. The story begins on the coastal city of Hesperus, a city that spans a quarter of the coastline--a city that the Yudora 3rd Army is clinging to by the skin of their teeth.
War Stories
10:29 PM
9/29/06
"It is well that war is so terrible, or we should get too fond of it."-Robert E. Lee
Rubble.
Ashes.
Ruin.
Forty thousand dead, and counting.
The damnable racket of battle. Deafening.
An explosion sent dust and rubble into the air. Border dispute, my flabby buttocks.
He crawled. It was all he could do. Gripping his weapon in one hand, he inched his way across the battlefield.
A pair of Yudora soldiers, backs hunched, sprinted ahead of him. The familiar whine of a crossbow met his ears.
Thump.
Thump.
Idiots.
It was fight or flight now. And in war, there is no in-between.
Fight or flight. And he chose to fight.
Sticking his head up, he peeked over a rather large block of concrete, taking in the scene before him.
And they think we can win this war?
Bodies, piled on more bodies, piled on even more bodies. And wherever he turned, the bleeding eye, emblem of the Empire, took his gaze and held it.
Far away, he heard the sound of rapid footfalls, and the unmistakable sound of automatic weapons fire. A column of Yudora troops, fifty in number, poured from a ruined structure.
And then came the crossbows. And the catipults. And oh-so-many arrows.
Humiliating.
Within minutes, the column was dead. The opposing force was once again unapposed.
Was he the only one left? Likely.
Nothing left to do. Fight or flight.
He raised his rifle to eye level. Peering down the scope, he centered an officer in his crosshairs, standing proud in the center of a platoon of the victorious bastards, laughing and chugging a stein of something yellowish and frothy.
Fight or flight. His finger tightened on the trigger.
Blood sprayed from the head of the officer. For a split second, he saw his men rush to his fallen corpse.
He lowered the rifle. No time to savor the moment. Flight time.
On his belly. Crawling again. Inching towards survival. Just a few minutes more. Just a few--
"Don't move."
Cold steel pressed against his jugular. Aggrivating.
A moment later, he found himself peering down the barrel of a rifle. Surprising.
"You carry real weapons now?" he asked incredulously. His mouth tasted of ash and grit. Disgusting.
"Piss-poor choice of last words, little man," replied the swordsman.
He was smiling now. "I've actually planned for my last words to be 'Blood-soaked frozen tampon popsicle.'"
The man in front of him lowered his rifle. "What are you, retarded?"
"Actually, I'm counting on you being just that. See, in about fifteen seconds, you are going to look straight up, which will give me the opportunity to send you both to the afterlife of your choosing, fleeing this particular stretch of hellhole to safety."
The rifleman blinked. Speechless.
The swordsman chuckled. "You aren't gonna be around for fifteen seconds, little man."
"Thou sayeth."
A low hum caught their ears. The offenders exchanged confused glances. And then they were bathed in light, as something massive, painted black, illuminated in pale searchlights beaming down on them like heavenly rays, hovered overhead.
"It's...beautiful," the rifleman whispered.
BLAM!
"You sunnova--" BLAM!
He climbed to his feet, looking down at his captors. "Praise be to Yevon, brothers."
A rope ladder descended from the sky. The victorious soldier slid the shoulder-strap on the rifle over his head, wincing at the pain it caused his shoulder. Peeling away a layer of flak jacket, he noticed a sprawling, purplish-blue bruise covering half of his right shoulder. When did that happen?
The ladder ascended. The light grew brighter. The familiar cargo bay of his home greeted him. Discarding the shredded piece of flak, he climbed the remainder of the ladder into the hatch.
The ascent was brief. Within a minute, he was home.
"Colonel, sir!" Six men and four women standing around him saluted. The emblem of their ship--the lion's head over the cross--greeted him on the uniforms of his subordinates wherever he turned.
"At ease." Three of the soldiers had executed the order before he had even gotten it out of his mouth. A break in dicipline? Or just new recruits? Setting aside those thoughts, he returned to the matter at hand. "Report."
"Approximately fifteen hours ago, the Bevelle 5th Army crossed the 'Channel and engaged our men at several points along the--"
"I asked for a battle report, soldier," he snapped, "not five hours of mindless exposition. This isn't classical literature, you know."
Blinking at the irreverence of his superior, the recruit continued his expository speech rather than heed his commander's advice. "Command sent three battalions to reinforce the city, but the enemy's numbers overwhelmed us. We've been forced to fall back to the outskirts and wait for further instruction."
"You can rest easy--further instruction has arrived." He turned away from the rambling recruit and strode briskly down the corrider away from the hatch. "We retreat."
"S-s-sir?"
"Did I st-st-st-stutter, soldier?" A bit of condescension, now and then, at least to the idiot recruits, never did hurt. Amusing. He wasn't planning on waiting for the answer. Recruits hardly gave interesting ones anyway.
"Sir, your--I mean--the order conflicts with--" Squeezing his eyes shut and concentrating, the recruit belted out his rebuttal. "We've recieved orders to go back in."
He stopped in his tracks. What? "Go back in?"
The recruit, still nervous but obviously emboldened, nodded shakily. "The order came in thirty minutes ago. We were to retrieve any remaining soldiers and airlift them to the left flank. We're to hold that position as long as we can until relief comes in."
His eyes closed, slowly. Forty thousand dead, and counting...and they send us back in? "On whose authority?"
"On...on General Baku's, sir."
"Baku." He spat the name like a curse. "Of course. Lord Baku says 'die,' and we say 'yes sir.'" He kept his back on the recruit. "And Lord Sanubia went along with this?"
"The General couldn't be reached for comment, sir."
"Couldn't be reached for comment...bullshit. Baku's gone mad with power."
The recruit seemed unsure. "Sir...respectfully, the general has given his orders. And if you dislike them, then with all due respect, I believe you are in the wrong line of work."
He gave a quick, gruff laugh. "Is that right?" The Colonel turned slowly and held the recruit's gaze. "Son, I've been in the military for nigh on twenty-seven years. I've fought in three wars, six border disputes, nineteen police actions, and forty-six armed insurgencies. I've killed more men myself than there's been killed in this battle, and I've ordered the deaths of more than have been killed in these two years of war. You, on the other hand, are some scrawny little bastard who no doubt ain't even got his pubes yet. So don't go telling me that I'm in the wrong line of work, because from where I'm standing, you don't seem so sure of what to do either."
A few of the recruit's shipmates chuckled at his dressing-down. The Colonel turned around again to face the recruit. "I've heeded orders that I'd rather not have heeded in the past. It's the way of the world. Baku says die, and we die. It's the way of the world." His boots echoed as he strode down the corridor to the 'lift.
Fumbling for a reply, the recruit settled on an obvious and stupid question. "So...what are your orders, sir?"
"The order is for you to grow a pair of testicles," the Colonel called back. "The rest of the crew's got a battle to fight."
The mood was tense. Understandable, considering the fact that about half the people on the bridge were raw, untested, and overall lacking in combat experience. In twenty-four months of war, over half of the Yudora 442nd Legion--the legion that they fought in-- had been lost, with another quarter dead in this battle alone. Command was hard-pressed to keep the war effort from buckling, and the only way to do that was to capitalize on the abundance of youth in the Empire. All able-bodied men and women between the ages of 17 and 40 were to be drafted into military service. Most served a standard six-month tour before returning home.
They were the lucky ones. Standing on the bridge of the Surgical Strike Cruiser Griever, staring out at the nervous, shaky boys and girls, the Colonol had made up his mind about that. Truly the lucky ones.
"Sir."
The Colonol turned to the tactical console. The recruit--the one that had challenged him earlier (how the hell did he get on his bridge at the most important station on the ship?) was staring at a set of battlefield reports flowing in from around the ruined city.
"A question, son?" the Colonol asked. He leaned forward, squinting at the screen. Damn his eyesight. Must be old age.
"Not so much...judging from these reports, all divisions have been routed. The few that remain are sitting tight in the ruined city hall, waiting for evac." He looked up at his superior, awaiting instruction.
The Colonol smiled--it may have come out as more of a grimace, in retrospect. "Helm, get us to city hall. We've got some asses to save."
Within minutes, Griever had crossed the distance. It hovered complacently over the crumbling city hall building and slowly descended.
Standing in the ventral cargo room, the bay doors wide open, wind rushing through his hair, the Colonel took in the gruesome view beneath him. The entire roof had been blown off--gods only know how, considering the weapons those Yevon dogs used. Catapults, though effective, were horrendously outdated.
The ship descended lower, and the Colonol could discern the survivors for the first time. There were twenty, maybe twenty-five on their feet. The dead and wounded lay around them, piled on top of one another. At least two hundred bodies lay scattered throughout the building. Gore covered the caved-in walls. Limbs lay scattered everywhere.
The stentch was overpowering. The soldier operating the bay doors, a kid no more than 17 years old, turned away and vomited. Poor kid'll get used to it.
The ship maintained a low hover--just enough for the surviving soldiers to struggle inside. One man, clad in a long, brown trenchcoat, gripping a pistol in his right hand, stopped long enough to exchange words with the Colonel. "It's about fucking time we got any air support!"
"Nice to see you too, Sergeant," the Colonal called back to his comrade.
The Sergeant, a well-built man in his late twenties, was grinning. "We held 'em. Six fucking hours we held 'em. Bastards never even had a chance. I took about sixty myself."
"I'm sure you were very heroic," the Colonel drawled in the most condescending tone he could muster. Has he noticed all the dead boys and girls around him? "Now get your brown-coated ass onto my ship. We're pulling out."
"That ain't your ship yet," the Sergeant snapped back. "Not 'til I'm cold and dead. And as long as it's MY ship, I give the orders. We stay."
"Stay?" The Colonel gave his commander an incredulous look. "Sir, with all due respect, minimal as that is, this ship's seen enough action today. I got a boatload of youngsters that wouldn't know the sharp side of a bayonette if it was lodged in their collective spine, a casualty list that gets longer every second we stay in here, and the way it smells in here I doubt lunch'll be staying down much longer, if you catch my drift."
"Baku says stay," the Sergeant replied stiffly. "We stay. End of story."
"The city is lost!" The Colonel was losing patience. "The entire 3rd army is decimated! Forty thousand of the Empire's best up and died today, and I refuse to make it any more!"
Crash. Part of the roof caved in.
"Shit," the Sergeant muttered. "Damned bleedin' heart Yevonites took an artillery battery about three hours after we got holed up in here; been pounding us since."
So that's how that happened. "It's not as if we're abandoning the city, Sarge. Command's orders were to--"
"To what? Piss ourselves? I ain't going nowhere, soldier." The Sergeant stood firmly, even as the ground underneath him shook from the artillery bombadment.
"Your men are dead. This building is in ruins." The Colonel leaned closer to the Sergeant and began to speak quietly. "This scene is going on all along the Channel. If we evactuate these survivors and re-group at the left flank, we can at least make a decent stand."
"I fucking said stay!" the Sergent roared. He pointed to the open cargo bay. "You! All of you men, get your asses down here on the double! You are men of the 442nd, and so help me gods, I will shoot you all down before I watch you turn your backs on me!"
A few of the soldiers exchanged troubled looks...and then, to the Colonel's, chagrin they jumped out of the still-open bay door to join the Sergeant. With twenty-four armed men behind him, the Sergeant grinned. "These boys aren't the yellow-bellied pant-pissers the rest of you seem to be."
And to the Sergeant's shock, the Colonel grinned back. "I'll be a pant-pisser then."
BLAM!
The Sergeant fell dead with a bullet in his skull. His men turned and raised their weapons as squads of Yevon warrior monks, some with crossbows, some with rifles, some with cold hard steel, poured into the ruined building. The remnants of the 442nd Legion quickly took up defensive positions and returned fire, diving behind the carcasses of their comrades for cover.
The Colonel stepped backward and signaled the operater to shut the doors. With minimal hesitation, he complied.
He punched a panel on the side of the wall. "Bridge, this is the Colonel."
Static, then a response. "Go ahead sir."
"Get us the hell out of here. Regroup with the 203rd on the other end of the Channel." The sound of bullets richocheting off of the hull grated on the Colonel's mind. "The city's lost. The least we can do is try to hold them at another point in the channel."
What about the 442nd?
The Colonel chewed his lip--a common nervous reaction. Sergeant Malrei had commanded the 442nd, and Griever, since before he had been assigned to the ship. "Dead. There are no survivors."
More static. What sounded like sniffles in the background. Then a definate Aye sir. The ship lurched and sailed into the air as the Colonel once again made his way to the bridge.
"We're coming up on our destination now sir."
The Colonel rose from his chair and strode down the aisle, staring out of the massive bubble canopy, eyes blazing with intensity. "Any word from the survivors?"
After a pause, the man at the communications station--a seasoned veteran soldier, unlike the raw recruits the Colonel had surrounded himself with--nodded. "We're recieving word that they've massed inside a gorge about seventy meters from their last known position."
"How many?" Doubt it's enough for a counter-attack.
"Four hundred."
Four hundred? "Casualties?"
"Minimal."
"Sir!" The Colonel's attention flew to the tactical station, where the young whippersnapper who had challenged him earlier was frantically typing away at his console. "Scouts report a fresh column of enemy troops charging the 203rd, estimated time to arrival...two minutes."
"How many?" snapped the Colonel impatiently. This day just couldn't get any worse, could it?
"1,700. Sir..." The recruit swiveled his chair around and faced the Colonel, his face deathly pale. "It's the Children."
I stand corrected. "The Children of Advent?"
"Aye...the best of the best."
He chewed his lip nervously. "The soonest we could intercept and destroy?"
The recruit gazed at the screen for a moment, then sighed. "Four minutes."
"Sir, the 203rd survivors have sent a distress beacon," the officer at the comm station reported. "They request immediate evac."
The Colonel weighed the odds. They could attempt an airlift, but the ship's maximum capacety was 200, and with 159 men and women alreayd crammed on board...
He quickly came to a decision. "Soldier, bring the missile launchers online. Ready a full spread of missiles, and fire on my command."
"Aye sir." The recruit's tone was optimistic as he punched in the commands. "Shall I target the advancing column?"
"Nay. Lock the missiles onto the 203rd's position, and await my command."
Heads snapped in his direction so fast that their owners must have gotten whiplash.
"Sir?" The recruit's face was pale, and his jaw hung in shock. "Did you just order me to open fire on 400 of our comrades?"
"That I did. Now do it."
The recruit's finger hovered over the button that would send 400 men and women to their graves. Hesitently, he tried to reason with his superior. "Sir..."
"Son, state your name and rank." the Colonel ordered stiffly.
The recruit blinked. "P-private first class Cadmus Mordecai, sir."
"Private Cadmus," the Colonel said slowly, "Let me say this just this once: When I give an order, I expect it to be obeyed. If you have a hard time hearing what I have to say, then I will be more than willing to clarify. If you have a problem with what I have to say, then keep it to yourself. This is my ship now. What I say goes. Are we clear?"
Sweat gathered on Cadmus' brow. "I..."
"Sir, the 203rd has sent another message," the comm officer called. "They have engaged the enemy and require immediate evacuation."
"Are we clear, Private?" The Colonel was leaning close, uncomfortably so, and stared Cadmus down, his pale grey eyes boring into his skull.
Finally, he turned back to his console. "Aye..."
"Are those missiles prepped, Private?"
"...Yes sir."
"Open fire."
The command deck of S.S.C. Griever raised itself, revealing sixteen missile launchers, eight on each side. Almost rhythmically, all eight fired, one after another, sending flying death straight towards the surviving men and women of the Imperial 203rd Legion.
In the canyon below, a few of the soldiers had turned their heads to the massive black shape looming in the sky. They had hoped, prayed, that the ship was to be their savior, that it would rescue them from certain doom, that the 203rd Legion would survive to fight another day.
Their faces fell as the missiles streaked toward them. A few wept, throwing their weapons to the ground and falling to their knees, letting the invading army slaughter them where they fell. But the rest, the valient men and women of the Yudora Empire, hoisted their weapons and fought with a renewed vigor, without concern for their own lives--hell, they were going to die anyway. Better to die bravely than to die like dogs.
And finally, the Yevon warrior monks and infantry raised their heads to the bright, roaring missiles streaking ever-closer to them. And they realized the end was upon them.
And just like that, it was over.
"Direct hit." Private Cadmus' voice was devoid of emotion, completely numb. "All targets eliminated."
What have I done? "Can you confirm that the Children were destroyed?"
"The entire valley was leveled, Colonel." Cadmus' voice was hoarse, barely above a whisper. "Nothing could have survived that."
He swallowed hard, forcing his next sentence from his mouth has he chocked down the bitter bile of defeat. "Excellent...then we've ensured that we fight another day." He examined the readout on the tactical screen, then noticed the Private's face--the first time he had really regarded him since he had been airlifted out of his precarious position. He had gone completely pale, brown hair sharply contrasting with his colorless skin. To the Colonel, it seemed that he was about to cry--his dark blue eyes were clouded with what were either tears, or premature cataracts.
He refrained from dressing down Cadmus any more, and clapped a comforting hand on his shoulder. "It's never been easy, Private. Never. And it doesn't get easier." Without awaiting a response, the Colonel turned and swifly left the bridge, ignoring the shouts of his subordinates for him to return.
I doubt this could get any more depressing.
"Sir, Lord Baku has just called in. He demands an update.
Speak of the devil.
"Then the Channel has been taken?"
"Yes, milord. All remaining Yudora infantry have retreated back to the outlying cities. We have eight infantry divisions awaiting the order to charge."
Grand Maester Akbar of Yevon took a moment to mull this information over. "Inform Lord Kabeer to have his men entrench themselves. Lord Sanubia will not take this defeat lightly. They'll send out a counterattack, and I want to be ready."
"Yes milord." His advisor bowed low, but remained in the room.
Akbar noticed his continued presence. Very unsettling. "Is there anything else?"
"Just..." the advisor cleared his throat. Akbar took note of this--clearly, whatever he was about to say, he didn't look forward to saying. "The elite troops we sent--the Children of Advent--sustained heavy casualties in the assault."
A muscle in Akbar's eye twitched. "Define 'heavy.'"
"Well, maester...the initial casualty reports list as many as 1,700 dead, with another 122 wounded."
"1,700?" Akbar struggled to keep his cool. That was his own personal elite guard--completely irreplacable.
"Yes milord...and seeing as how the division's commander was killed in the battle...all remaining troops have been placed under the direct command of Lord Kabeer."
Ouch. "Is that all?"
"Y-yes, milord."
"Then get out."
"Yes milord." The advisor shuffled out of Akbar's study, shutting the door behind him.
Akbar collapsed in his chair, sighing heavily. 1,700...almost too convenient.
He had sent his elite guard as a means to keep an eye on his brother, Lord Kabeer, knowing that he has had designs on Akbar's position for a long time. With their commander dead and their ranks depleted, and the remaining troops placed under Kabeer's direct command...
And the people...the people were not stupid. The war had gone badly for Yevon in the first few years--the invasions of Luca and the botched first invasion of the main islands of the Empire had cast his leadership skills in a negative light. It was only after Kabeer took over as the supreme commander of the Yevon warrior monks, transforming them from a dedicated group of religious fanatics into a well-structured army, that they began to turn the tide in their favor.
He closed his eyes. The capture of Luca. The razing of Kilika. And now, the taking of the Yudora Channel. The fifty miles of ocean that seperated the mainland of Spira and the islands of Yudora belonged to his brother.
This day could not possibly get any worse.
Loud footsteps sounded in the hall, and the door to his study was flung open, the advisor from five minutes ago standing, red-faced, out of breath. "Milord, come...come quick."
"What?" Akbar was on his feet now. "What is it?"
"It's..." Taking a deep breath, the advisor finished. "It's your wife, sir."
I stand corrected.
RR76: The Yudora Empire and all characters contained within this story are my property. They are of my invention and are not in any way connected to the official story of the original game.
If anybody is confused, fear naught...I'll have info on the story put up in my bio by Tuesday.
I implore you to keep reading.
-RR76
October 29th
11:01 PM