Year 13, Month 07, Day 03

Hyperspace

En route to the Assam System, Albion Indou

General Sun Li-jen looked over the summary of the training that taken place over the previous month. A large exercise that had involved several divisions from Albion, America, and Kunia. Yes, it had been difficult for many in 38th Division, but they had performed amazingly, especially with the integrated units that had several aliens within them. Many commanders had showed reservations of working with aliens, but Sun, never wanting to turn down assistance, used them to the best of his ability, and his had come out as of the best commands in the entire training exercise. He placed the reasons for his success on the training that his men had been under, and the aliens who had joined his division. The Twi'leks made amazing scouts, and their skills as snipers were almost scary. He at first had worried about his men trying to take advantage of them, but after a couple of his men ended up in the medical wards after getting into fights with them, they learned to be wary of them unless invited. The Wookiees had become excellent shocktroops. He had a couple platoons of them under his command and they were the ones responsible for him taking so many of his objectives. Their technical knowledge, strength, speed, and sheer size made them a very intimidating force.

During the exercise, he sent a platoon to take a forward position, and it resulted the opposing forces panicking and leaving a large hole in their lines. To say that the Albion commander was upset was more than a little humorous, but it showed that his forces had become good enough to handle themselves in difficult situations. Even the few space ships that he had (an aspect that surprised him when he gained his new command) had proven useful.

It was his abilities in the exercise that resulted in the assignment that he was currently on. General Stillwell had given him the task of providing support to the Albion military as the Katanian Army attempted to move through the Assam System. The system was the cork in the bottle for entering Indou, and if the Katanian Military was successful in taking the system, then they would have a launching point for the conquest of Albion Indou. His memory was hazy on the details, but he did remember that the Japanese had used Indian nationalists to create an army that they hoped would begin an uprising, a very strong possibility considering the way that the Indians were treated by the British Colonial government. He could sympathize with the Indou people, but the Katanian's would simply replace Albion imperialism with their own.

He stood on the bridge of his transport as it traveled through hyperspace, accompanied by a support fleet of Albion ships. Sometimes he would come up here and gaze into hyperspace. Such beauty, he thought as he watched the swirls of hyperspace, trying to ease his mind, but it soon returned to maintaining his division. Corruption had been rampant, just as bad as he remembered, but he made a point to ensure that in his unit, it was dealt with swiftly. Public punishments, and even a few executions were done, but in the end, it showed that he would not tolerate such things under his command. Some of his officers and NCOs hated him for the steps that he had taken, but he had the support of several in his staff and the common soldiers, not to mention the aliens.

"Arrr you alrright, Generral?" a familiar growling voice behind him said.

General Sun smiled slightly. The Wookiee Lofykam had become a close companion, and even with the life debt making it slightly awkward at times, he had come to see him as a friend, and a person willing to lay his life for. "I'm fine Lofie. I'm just worried about this entire operation."

The Wookiee sniffed. "You arrre worried that your men arrren't rrready?"

Sun grimaced a little. He didn't like being read so easily but he accepted that maybe his Wookiee companion could see things that others couldn't. "I will admit that I have my reservations about this, but we need to secure Indou or else the Katanians will gain a large ally." Sun knew that if he had his way, he would continue to train the next group of upcoming officers as a way to counter the influence that the Changs had, and improve the chances of the Kuomintang against the Communists. That was the long term goal for him. The current war with the Katanian Empire was an ensured victory for the Allies, but what he needed to do was improve Kunia's chances of coming out of the war better.

One of the bridge officers snapped him out of his thoughts. "General, we are approaching the planet and will exit hyperspace five minutes."

General Sun thanked the officer and turned toward his companion. "Lofie, you should go down to the hangar and make sure that your soldiers are ready."

"Yes, Generrral," the Wookkiee said with a grunt. "May the Forrrce be with us." He turned and left Sun on the bridge with the crew.

Sun didn't know how to take the "blessing" that the Wookiee had given the mission. He had done some research on them, with what connections to the HoloNet he could gain access to, but his opinions of the Jedi were irrelevant. None of them were coming to assist in his theater of the war, and he had to try and win the battle in front of him.

The Albion fleet that had accompanied them was small, but it was supposedly large enough to handle the force that the Katanians had in orbit over the planet and relieve the Albion forces that were under siege. It was their job to clear the planet from orbit to allow for his forces to land and take several important cities to set up a beachhead. That would allow for Albion and American soldiers move in to reinforce them, but General Sun was not as confident as General Stillwell was. Stillwell had attempted to keep the aliens from joining his forces, stating that their uses would be limited and would only cause problems logistically, but General Sun had argued against it and had managed to win a small victory.

The aliens were joining, and the trainers, whom he had later learned were called Mandalorians, would be accompanying them on this attack, and he hoped that it wouldn't be the only one they would take part in.

General Sun had learned much from researching the Mandalorians, especially since they were training his soldiers. They were a warrior culture, always going where the fighting was thickest and coming out stronger than before. He admired them for that, but their tendency for them to follow where the credits went made them questionable as allies. These, however, were Mandalorians who had come from Kunia or were interested in simply fighting against the Katanian Empire. Sun was surprised to see that some of them were aliens, and not humans as his researched showed from their history. The Mandalorians were not a particular race or species as they were more a culture. They had survived thousands of years of war because of this, and he had no doubts they would continue to survive.

General Sun's inner thoughts were interrupted by the navigation officer. "General Sun, we will be exiting hyperspace in five…four…three…two…one…" The lines of hyperspace vanished and the stars of normalspace appeared. In the distance, the flashes and explosions of battle could already be seen as the Albion fleet moved to destroy the Katanian fleet.

"Status of the Albion fleet?" Sun asked.

"Albion fleet is moving fast toward the target planet," the sensor operator reported. "Katanian communications have been jammed so we can expect them to have little in reinforcements for the next few hours."

That's one small piece of good news, Sun thought. The longer that the Katanian General Staff didn't know what was happening out here, the better. "What's the status of the Katanian forces within the system?"

The sensor operator pressed a few screens before she answered. "Most defenders are trapped between the Albion fleet and the gravity well. Makes the possibility of them escaping unlikely. A few patrols seem to have been on the outer edges of the system, but seems to have been mostly picket ships and fighters that have no hyperspace capabilities. Jammers should keep them from calling for help."

"And their ground forces?"

"Katanian forces have stopped all offensives and are trying to move back to possible landing areas, sir. Some of the areas are already heavily defended, mainly those with spaceports. It seems that those we are tasked with to secure are some of the most heavily defended."

General Sun hid a grimace. This was going to be more difficult for him than he would have liked, but he had a job to do, so he was going to do his best to accomplish it. "Comms, contact the Mandalorians and inform them I have a job for their unique abilities. I will meet them in the loading bay. Operations, you have command of the ship. Inform me of any new developments."

"Yes, General," the both officers replied as the general left.

This would be the first offensive operation for General Sun Li-jen's 38th Division since arriving in Indou, and he just hoped that the training and preparations he had done with his men would be good enough to help in the fight for this planet. If it wasn't, then the war in Kunia would end up just as it had before, with both sides losing millions of people and his country divided.

Year 13, Month 07, Day 04

USS Enterprise

The Solomons, Pacifica Region

Fighters streaked through space, attacking the remaining Kantanian space forces defending the settlement. In orbit around the asteroid, several ships of the Katanian Imperial Navy were nothing more than floating hulks, their hulls covered with scorch marks and fires from exposed plasma. The survivors of the American attack were retreating to other parts of the system, trying to escape from the attack fleet. Admiral Halsey looked out from the bridge of his flagship to see how the battle was going, and he was pleased to see that it was better than he expected.

The Katanian task force in the area was only a few frigates and a light cruiser, and most of them were docked with the asteroid settlement, leaving those remaining to try and stop the fleet of ships that were cutting off this region of the Solomons. The Katanian fighters and bombers that had been stationed at the asteroid habitat, an idea that seemed completely foolish to Halsey's way of thinking, had been a larger problem than initially believed. Operation: Magic was not producing as many results as normal, from what he had heard and their presences resulted in more ships being lost or damaged than expected. There were also the defenses that the asteroid had that were keeping the transport ships from commencing the invasion, and so they had to conduct bombardments of the emplacements that they could find. That didn't mean that there would ones that were unknown.

Damn that Yamamoto. Since his survival of the assassination attempt on him, the Imperial Katanian Navy was slowly changing their codes. If I don't end up killing that yellow bastard I'll buy him a drink. Halsey had respect for the Katanian admiral, but he was too good at his job. He was just fortunate that the Army was not showing any innovative ideas. Yamamoto's survival was causing some complications, but nothing that the Allies couldn't handle in the long run. He needed to see how space combat was done, and to see that you needed to command from the front. It was a position that Halsey was used to doing, and his aggressiveness on the battlefield did not cause anyone to wonder why he was leading from the front in the first place.

This continuing battle was help in securing Aurora's supply lines and allowing them to take a large part in operations in the Pacifica region of the Terran Sector. It also provided a testing ground for some of the tactics that Halsey had studied, and see how he could improve upon them. Another point of conducting this battle earlier than expected was that Admiral Nimitz had managed to have several transports that were originally to assist in the Sicily Campaign procured and were instead sent to help with this attack, along with several from Aurora.

While Halsey was thinking on how the invasion was to be conducted, a frigate that was moving in closer to the settlement exploded after several bursts of light came off the asteroid. "What in God's name was that?"

Several seconds went by before there was an answer, but before Halsey to demand an explanation, the sensor operator replied, "Admiral, it appears that it was a hypervelocity gun. We didn't see it because it must have been hidden in the rock of the asteroid."

Halsey grimaced. He was still trying to get used to these new weapons that he was dealing with, and the loss of a frigate would mean that countless lives and a ship would have to be replaced. "Do we have its location?" When he was told that they had he began to issue orders. "Have one of our cruisers move up, and tell them to make sure they have all of their power diverted to shields. I want them to draw that thing out again. Send the location of that gun to our fighters and to move in close those coordinates so when it fires, they can take it out."

"Aye aye, Admiral," the communications officer replied, sending the messages to their recipients.

Halsey watched as a cruiser, named the San Francisco, move up closer toward the wreckage of the frigate, to appear as if it were conducting rescue operations. A few moments later, several shots came from the asteroid and impacted the cruiser's shields, except these managed to hold under the barrage. The gun continued to fire until he saw an explosion on the surface of the asteroid. He smiled slightly, glad to see that he plan had worked. He then noticed someone standing next to him.

"Admiral, I have an urgent message for you from Admiral Nimitz," a lieutenant said to him. In his hand he held a datacard.

"Thank you, Lieutenant," Halsey said calmly. He took the datacard and as the junior officer walked away, he placed the card into his datapad. After reading the content, he left the bridge and walked toward the intelligence department of the ship. Entering the area for the intelligence personnel he approached the lieutenant commander who was in charge who then led him to one of the intelligence officers.

"Admiral," said the lieutenant, getting up from his seat.

"Hello, Lieutenant," Halsey said casually. "I just got this report. Can you tell me more about it?"

The lieutenant nodded as he sat back down at his station and brought up the information. "As you remember, Admiral, the Katanian Navy has been changing their encryption, limiting our ability predict their movements. However, their army and the diplomatic communications are still are still using the same encryption s before."

All of this was information that Halsey knew, but he allowed the junior officer to humor him as he continued briefing.

"We know that the Katanian government has requested assistance from the Separatists, and yesterday Command received word that the Separatists were intending to send a fleet to reinforce the Katanian military, with the intention of pushing along the Hydian Way to assist Getov."

Halsey knew that this was going to cause a problem for him if the Separatists managed to reinforce Yamamoto. The reason why the Katanian Navy was on the ropes was because they had lost most of their experienced personnel. He had studied the capabilities of the Confederacy's military, and he was impressed, especially with their droid armies. An almost limitless number of soldiers and fighters that were easy to build and maintain. Damn, this could cause all sort of problems. "Do we have any indications where these reinforcements will be arriving, or what we can expect them to be sending?"

"There's good news in that," the officer said, pride in his voice. "The Separatists sent a listing of what they were going to send." He brought up the associated information on his screen, motioning for Halsey to take a look.

Halsey looked over the information and was surprised at just what they were sending. Providence-class carriers/destroyers, Recusant-class destroyers, and several droid control ships that would be more than enough for them to retake the initiative in the region. "God damn," he muttered.

The intelligence officer nodded in in agreement. "I did some math, and those ships the Katanians would be able to completely replenish their lost fighters, and leave enough for spare parts and replacements. However, we do know where they are going to arrive with these vessels." He gets up from his station and walks over to the hologram that shows the Pacifica Region, and then brings up the Solomons, and zooms in on Guadalcanal. "That is where they are going to hit us."

Halsey grimaced. "They undo all of the progress that we've made here if they are able to do that." He rubbed his chin thinking. "Show me what vessels we have in the area." The display changed to show the order of battle for American ships.

"A few escort carriers, two light cruisers, and some escort vessels are within the surrounding systems," the intel officer said.

Halsey knew that despite the vessels that he had, they wouldn't be able to stop a fleet of both Katanian and Separatists vessels, but he was also sure that the Katanians and Separatists knew that. That meant they would assume that it would be an easy victory. That made them arrogant. An idea soon came to his head and a predatory smile started to form on his face. Time to take a page from Getov's book, and if this war is similar to how thing went on Earth, then they should have the same flaws. "Thank you, Lieutenant, for informing me of this development."

"You're welcome, Admiral," The officer said, standing from his station.

Halsey soon left the room and made his way toward his quarters. There, he worked on the plan that had come to mind, leaving the operations to those subordinate to him. He began to draft orders for the raider commanders that were under his command. They were similar to the submarine commanders that he worked with, having no time for bull and always going straight to the point. He knew that some of them would be upset at being taken off going after Katanian ships, but he had a feeling they would forgive him for the next assignment he would give him.

Year 13, Month 07, Day 07

Pskov Oblast

Getov-occupied Rarus Federation

Field Marshal Walther Model looked over the hologram depicting the forces of the sector he was in command of. Around him, his staff was sending the required orders to the proper units in preparation for the inevitable offensive that the communists would send to try and relieve the siege that was around Leningrad. Model had become used to having the rank of Field Marshal in the Wehrmacht. It had come must sooner than on Earth, and the reason why it had happened was because of his "exemplary command of forces", at least according to the promotion certificate. Model knew that something else was behind his promotion, but he wasn't going to complain.

When he had most of his forces fall back along the Dnieper, he had begun preparations for when the Rarus military would strike after clearing the obstructions that had been placed in the systems and routes that led to the Dnieper. However, when he received word that he was to be relieved of command, he believed that the Fuhrer had somehow lost faith in him and was sending him back to be a staff officer back on Getov Prime (a waste of talent in his opinion). He was surprised to learn that he was instead being given command of the Upper Military Group along the vast Rarus Front, to prepare for the upcoming attack to relieve the Siege of Leningrad.

The siege hadn't been that of a city but more of an entire planet that had the name Leningrad, and while there was a city with that same name, the planet was the key point. It had been under siege for years, with fighting all across the system and planet, but even when there was no possible route for reinforcements or relief, the residents of the planet continued to fight on, making every advance a slow and costly one. Even with encirclement, the Rarus Federation managed to find ways to send supplies and even some relief to the planet. There was a hyperspace route to the system that was used that led them through an asteroid field, and while it was dangerous and patrolled by Getov forces, enough made it through to where it was used as a way to send in supplies and pull out wounded.

When he arrived on Pskov Oblast, he began making preparations. He remembered where some of the targets would be, and a rough idea of where some of the routes the communists would take, but space combat was a concept that he had very little experience in. It was like trying to command ships that could also perform the abilities of aircraft. He took a hands on approach on the measures he was taking, and while he knew that it would cause many of his subordinates to despise him, he knew that he was the only one who would know how things were going to go, and they would follow him as soon as there were results.

"Field Marshall." Up to him came a colonel with a datapad in his hand. "I have the latest reports from our supply lines."

Model grimaced at the mention of his supply lines. He thought that ships with the ability to travel at speeds faster than light, supply problems would be a thing of the past, but he learned that all of the problems that he dealt with were just as much a headache as before. "Give me that damn report. That navy commander had better have found a way to secure our supply lines."

The colonel flinched at the language, but gave the datapad to him and braced himself for the outburst at the bad news.

It wasn't long after he started reading that Model's face began to turn red and anger became far more prominent. After he finished reading the report, he tossed the datapad onto the holotable. "Are you telling me that fucking partisans in the Baltic Region has managed to destroy an entire supply convoy and the escorts that were supposed to be protecting them?" he demanded.

The colonel's face lost some of its color. He had heard how Model was not a typical Getov commander, but this was completely unexpected. Generals, much less Field Marshals were supposed to have an air of professionalism about them, but this was unprecedented. "It would appear so," he managed to say. He took a few breaths before he continued. "It is not uncommon for them to attack us, but this was an unexpected, and bold attack on their part."

Model simply fumed at his supply situation. "If we keep experiencing these sorts of problems, there is no possible way for us to continue the siege of Leningrad, much less repel an attack when the Rarus swine attack."

The colonel simply swallowed, trying to say something but his throat was too dry to and could do nothing but stand there, which seemed to worsen Model's mood.

"Colonel, I want you to get me that damn commander who is in charge of securing our supply lines," Model ordered. "Get him on our communications right now so he can explain to me why he can't do his job, and after that, I want you to get me a line with the Fuhrer."

At the mentioning of the Fuhrer, the colonel was almost astonished at what Model was planning on doing. "Field Marshal, with all due respect, isn't that breaking the chain of command?"

"Do you think I give a damn about the fucking chain of command at this moment?" Model almost roared. Everyone else in the room stopped what they were doing to watch the exchange. "All I care about is making sure my men are ready for when the fighting starts, and if others can't do their job properly, then I will make sure that there is someone who can do it. Do you understand, Colonel?" The last word filled with venom.

"Yes, Field Marshal," the colonel answered, barely able to speak, but managing to do so. "I shall see to it personally."

"That is good to hear, Colonel," Model said, calmly, which seemed to make everyone else feel uneasy. "And if you can't do that properly, I will find someone else who can do that. Do I make myself clear?"

"Yes, Field Marshal." The colonel saluted Model, which was promptly returned, and he quickly left.

Model looked around and the other officers and few enlisted who turned back toward their previous tasks, trying to avoid making eye contact with him. He didn't care what they thought about him. What he care about were results, and if he offended a couple of officers, well, they couldn't do anything about it, especially when you were one of the Fuhrer's favorites. Sometimes you had to take direct control of the situation, even if it upset some people, but as long as it got results, there was no reason for anyone to get upset.

He turned back to the hologram showing his sector of the front, trying to see how this latest setback will affect his plans for the future. Along several hyperspace lanes, red indicators were showing where partisans had attacked his convoys, and that didn't included the various resistance groups throughout the Baltic Region and Getov-occupied Rarus territory.

"Damn it all," he muttered. He knew that he had over a month to prepare of the upcoming attack to retake Leningrad, but if these supply problems didn't stop, he may have to postpone any offensive operations in the area. That commander had better be able to do his job, or else it's going to be his last assignment if I'll have anything to say about it.