"Son of a bitch!" Lieutenant Jones spat as another anti-armor shell rocked the hilltop. After using infantry waves didn't work as well as they had hoped, the Coalition began bombardment via their heaviest mech suits, quadrapedal monstrosities with two pilots and a designated gunner, much like a smaller and understaffed version of the refit AT-TEs that the Republic used minus a set of legs and the rear-mounted anti-personnel guns. Needless to say, they were meant more to hunt tanks than to take down fortified positions, but adaptation was key on the battlefield regardless who you were.

As another blast hit a little too close for comfort, Jones gave silent thanks that they were direct fire weapons, and not mortars or anything else with a high-arc trajectory. Despite this, he was still cursing his luck that the Coalition forces would focus most of their forces on taking his hill instead of breaking through around the sides where the rest of Spirit Brigade was holding position. He gave thanks again though that they decided to run right into a meat grinder as he remembered that there was an obstacle course of downed mechs all the way up to the top where his men continued to fight with everything they had.

"Someone get me an update on those reinforcements!"

"General Erianus is sending what he can, but it's not a lot. Everything else is tied up just trying to hold the landing zones before the fleet leaves!"

"Well someone better get me a platoon of Centurions if they want this part of the flank to hold long enough for the boys upstairs to bugger out!" Jones spat as he popped up to fire a few potshots down at the mass of Coalition troops and armor. What he didn't expect to see as his HUD zoomed in on a few key troops, was a black blur smashing into the line. Once it slowed down enough for his onboard systems to get a silhouette of what was tearing into the troops coming towards the hill, all Jones could do was mutter and breathe a sigh of relief.

Silhouette... Confirmed.
Clearance... Approved.
Positive FOF ID: Carlia-B2971 - Republic Order of Knights - Centurion Program


A Republic marine dropped to the deck, his chest plate melting in a dozen spots courtesy of a Coalition tactical shotgun carried by a combat engineer. Marine Captain Jadus replied in kind with the Republic version of the weapon, blasting the head off the offending Coalition soldier and half of his chest. Around the headless man, the rest of the Coalition troops exchanged fire with Eclipse Marines only to be overwhelmed as they found themselves up against Captain Jadus' personal guard. The man who had checked the corner was the only Republic casualty as the marine carved a path through yet another security block on their way to the bridge.

"Sergeant Calvin, secure this hallway, set up turrets and other defensive measures. Tyco Platoon, you're with me and my squad. Lieutenant Williams, I'd be honored if you and your brother would join me on the bridge today."

"Pleasure will be all ours, sir." an EPAS trooper replied. Unlike the usual EPAS sets in the field though, the armor of Garl and Ione Williams was heavily modified with extra armor plating and built in weaponry, much like the Centurion armor but with less bulk and none of the nervous system enhancements. Needless to say, this made the twins live up to their nickname in Krayt Company as the Williams Wreckers.

"Perfect, shall we?" Jadus replied with an unseen grin as he gestured to the lift door. Behind the marine officer, the remaining men of Tyco and Jylan Platoons were prepping for the battle that was to come. Tyco was more than ready to storm a Coalition bridge, and Jylan was ready to stop the coming storm that would try to stop the Republic.


"And you're certain they're almost here?" Captain Valius asked as what few soldiers were left on the bridge took up defensive positions. In the midst of all this, a woman clad in robe that appeared to have random pieces of metal attached to them in an artistic pattern checked up on the makeshift barricades. She was a mage, one of many attached to this ship but according to her mental link, the only one left alive aboard the mole ship that hadn't either gone to ground when the counterattack had started, or had met the Republic boarding party head on and did what damage they could before overwhelming fire put them down.

"I can sense them down the hallway... they'll use an anti-tank rocket to take down the door and then swarm down the hallway like a wave of angry hornets." the mage replied, looking back at Valius with a sadistic grin. "Then they enter the bridge and if I'm lucky, one of them may pose a challenge for me and I can have some fun before using the escape systems."

"You seem a little too enthusiastic that this ship is about to be captured."

"About to be? They already overran the engineering decks and we're locked out of the mainframe. The ship is lost and taking this room among all the others is nothing more than symbolic victory that will lessen the headache of taking control of the situation." the mage told him, looking back at the main door.

"Orders, my lady?" Valius finally relented.

"Hide. They are coming."


"What do you mean they're almost here? That distress signal was given less than 12 hours ago." Nelson inquired.

"You know full well that their jump drives work much faster than ours. They probably had a fleet on patrol nearby and intel never caught wind of it." Revan replied, his hologram walking beside Dawn's as they looked over the tactical data streaming in from long-range sensors.

"It's plain and simple, Admiral. If we don't leave in the next hour, we'll be facing another fleet, and another supercapital." Dawn sighed. "We barely managed to disable the first one and get it hidden at the edge of the system. No valuable intel inside other than weapons scans, she'd be more useful as a giant bomb than anything else."

"Too much damage?" Nelson asked, cursing his luck as they once again lost their chance to gain an asset.

"For immediate redeployment, yes... other options are still viable if we hold the system though."

"Which is a probability that has drastically decreased since my last calculations." Revan added.

"We're out of options then... other than falling back and regrouping with reinforcements." Nelson told the AIs, his tone somewhat grim as he brought up the land battle. "Our boys on the ground won't stand a chance without cover from orbit..."

"They still have the Ghost and her squadrons, we also have a few corvettes taking up defensive positions around her and that mole ship that Mendez is trying to capture, but that's about all for now."

"Designate ten of our capital ships to head to ground. Whether they hover or actually land is up to their captains as long as they stay cloaked at all times. Signal the fleet to break and fall back to the edge of the system so we can make the jump back to friendly lines... and prepare a drop pod before the Spirit jumped away." Nelson ordered, looking over the readouts one last time before giving a hint of a grin.

"Dawn, Revan, make sure that Admiral Duylio knows what to do in order to get the another fleet to back us up. I don't care which one it is."

"Aye aye, Admiral. What about you?"

"XO Protocol is in effect, Captain, you have the bridge."


"Repeat, we have a company of enemy troops two clicks from your position preparing to mount an attack. They have mech support and lots of it just waiting to tear into your lines, General." Chris reported as Harv continued to bring up Coalition tactical reports onto his HUD. Courtesy of the mech they downed and communications equipment they had captured, over the past few hours the Centurion had been feeding data to every available Republic officer he could come in contact with while he and a few marines continued through the forest fighting as guerrillas.

"Thanks for the heads up, Centurion. Oruko, out."

"And another disaster averted, sir." Harv quipped as Chris and his small escort slide down a washout and into a creekbed. As quietly as they could, they ran across in pairs as to not draw attention from the men escorting a line of ten artillery walkers heading towards a pair of hills that Spirit Brigade was holding. While formidable when used properly, like any artillery piece they weren't meant to be engaged up close by infantry.

Especially when that infantry was a Centurion.

"Sir, I think they're closer than we thought." one of the marines said as he noticed small ripples in the water around their feet getting bigger with greater frequency.

"How close?"

"Proximity alert!" Harv chimed.

"Using the creekbed as a pathway."

"Scatter!"


The line of artillery mechs came to a halt, the men walking alongside slowing their stride only long enough to give a quizzical look at the lead machine before the officer in charge of the convoy spoke up.

"Why are you stopping, no one ordered a halt."

"Sensors picked up movement up ahead in the creek bed. Request you send your men to investigate."

"Request denied, I'm picking up the movement as well and it's less than a squad if there are even any enemies out there. Probably just some spooked wildlife. Press on, no excuses."

"Very well, Lieutenant..." the lead mech pilot replied, his eyes nervously glued to the holographic displays all around him. Republic strike teams had been hitting their more isolated units all over the continent in precisely timed counterattacks that could only mean a breach in communications security that had yet to happen in this war.

"Why are we pressing on?" the co-pilot and primary targeting operator asked.

"They believe the risk is minimal and that they can handle anything that would be in this area."

"They do realize we have no anti-personnel weaponry at our disposal, correct? We're for use behind the lines, not on them."

"Grunt bravado, brother. Grunt brava-" the pilot began before he was cut off by the cockpit caving in as a giant armored arm burst through the front of the cockpit. Attached to said arm was a rather large cannon that was already charging up an overpowered shot that burst through, melting the pilot to his chair and sending shrapnel at the gunner behind him. Outside of the artillery walker, a Centurion was latched onto the front of it as a quartet of marine laid down cover fire with rifles and freshly stolen grenades from the corpses of the first mech's infantry escort.

"Harv, get in and turn this gun around!" Chris barked.

"Already sifting through the systems, give me a moment and keep them from taking out the guns!" the AI replied with equal ferocity as he mined through the simple targeting systems and began overriding the safety and security protocols.

"Sometime today would be nice, old friend." Chris muttered as more and more plasma started to glance off his shields.

"Almost got it and... there! Cracked the system! Would you like to give the word, sir?" Harv asked, his avatar grinning with feral delight as it popped up in the corner of Chris' HUD. As the AI smiled, the main turret and missile pods turned to bear down on the rest of the convoy, the familiar sound of warheads priming and chambers closing filling the air and mixing with the din of rifle fire and grenades going off.

"It would be my pleasure... fire at will!"


The bridge doors aboard the Coalition mole ship burst from their frame, but not due to explosives as expected. Instead, two EPAS troopers were standing where the door was with fists ready and built-in wrist-mounted blasters already firing on anything that wasn't behind some sort of cover yet. Captain Jadus and the rest of his marines filtered in beside them in seconds, adding their fire to the mix as the Coalition bridge crew began firing back before Jadus went flying back.

"The hell!?"

"Mage! Everyone stand clear!" one of the Williams twins shouted as they both charged the robed woman. As they fired at her, the plates of metal that adorned her robes shifted, taking each hit and not showing a single burn or scratch despite it. She had no weapons out yet and for the most part was unphased by the two suits of powered armor closing in on her like wild animals charging something in their territory. When the three collided, the Williams Wreckers' fists met only armored plating that had morphed to meet the impact.

"What the..." Garl began to say before his brother started firing point blank in an attempt to get past the curtain of metal. His try was unsuccessful and only managed to get the mage to take a step back before both twins composed themselves and renewed their assaults. Despite what reports always said about Knights and Mages, fighting one for the first time always seemed to cause some initial uncertainty in Republic or Coalition troops as powers beyond their own were used against them by beings that by all means, shouldn't actually exist.

The only thing that saved most men and women who fought a Mage face to face was training kicking in and resolve working its way back into their mind. In this case, it was only a split-second hesitation by Garl as Ione kept blasting and Garl kept punching. Before long though, the mage started to look annoyed.

"Enough." she whispered, her soft voice barely being picked up by the auditory sensors in the helmets of those close enough before she sent a shockwave through the bridge that knocked almost everyone, friend or foe, straight to the ground. The only two standing were the Twins, and they were in a modified crouch ready to pounce as they tried to come up with a solution to their new problem. That problem only got more complicated as the bits and pieces of her metallic shroud started moving from the plates orbiting her straight into her hands, forming two blades that both EPAS troopers believed without a doubt could cut right through their shields, armor, and straight into their flesh.

"This just hit the fan." Ione muttered into his comm transceiver.

"Only if we let her get the blade down into us. It'll be just like sparring a Knight, glancing blows only and we'll outlast her." Garl replied, nodding to his brother as they both charged in again.

"I tire of your games, soldiers!" she spat at them, swinging her blades at the two men but barely missing as they weaved around her blades to try and strike, only to meet metal plate once more.

"We're not soldiers, ma'am!" Garl replied, not relenting in his strikes against the metal plates.

"We're Wreckers!" Ione chimed in, ducking and weaving around her blades and throwing in his own blows, this time only missing because she dodged his fists. In kind, the three traded unsuccessful blows as the Eclipse Marines started the engagement again, firing on the Coalition bridge crew and forcing those who were watching the duel around the Captain's chair down back into cover.

"Semantics, gentlemen, semantics!" she quipped, a smile forming on her face as they both got closer to hitting her as the fight dragged on. "But I'm here to prove the power of actions, not words!" she added, her swings becoming more wild and grand, yet more calculated than before.

"Sith!" Ione exclaimed as her blade cut through his shields and the armor around his gut, cutting in and grazing his abs and making him swear again before he swung wildly and managed to land a punch to the woman's shoulder that sent her back a few feet. She growled in reply, leaping into the air with the twin blades forming into one large sword as she swung down overhead straight at the still-shocked EPAS trooper. Training kicked in as she brought her blade down and he reached out with both hands to try and intercept the blade.

Ione Williams 'clapped' and managed to trap the blade between his hands, stopping it and the mage wielding it harmlessly.

"... holy..." Captain Jadus whispered, a sentiment shared by the Twins but not with as much subtly.

"I caught the damn thing?! I caught the damn thing!" Ione kept shouting in disbelief. His brother on the other hand, put his shock aside and planted his fist squarely on her jaw with enough force to send her flying back into and out of the main viewport with her weapon still sandwiched between his brothers hands.

"Captain!?"

"Here, Lieutenant. I'm here." Jadus replied.

"Bridge is secure."


"Colonel, we have reinforcements inbound to help on top of the hill." a comm officer stated, ducking down as more tracers blared by overhead.

"More? What could the fleet be sending? We've already landed most of the invasion force." Colonel Torpa asked.

"The message from Dawn said the 'XO Protocol is now in effect.' but nothing in my databanks has a confirmation code or an explanation."

"I know what it means, and it means the Coalition is in for a nasty surprise. Send a message to everyone on the planet, short and simple. Ready?"

"Aye sir."

"Admiral on deck. Repeat. Admiral on deck."