There were more out there then Mitchell could count. At least two full divisions, probably more the size of an entire army corps like what had attacked Tokyo. From what he could tell, they were drawn up on a massive line of battle that would be able to flank the smaller force from both the left and the right, with dark shapes circling above the formation.
"Wyverns, great." He muttered to himself.
They hadn't moved yet, and Mitchell got the feeling that they had been camping not long before, likely alerted to the allies' approach from the booming sounds of the approaching tanks. But now, they were racing each other to finish the preparations for battle. The JSDF, forming up the center and left flanks, were already setting up their positions with both vehicles and infantry. The all-important AA SPAGS already had their guns elevated and tracking towards the opposing army, ready for when the flyers would attempt their slaughter from the skies. On the right flank, the Marines had dug in behind the Germans and LAV's that formed the front lines while mortar teams and other weapon emplacements independent of any vehicles set up to the rear.
"Joker, you two find a good position to settle into." Mitchell ordered. "Free to engage targets of opportunity when they attack but watch your ammo count. They'll likely try swarm tactics again."
"We'll leave some for you Captain." The sniper smirked, grabbing Reaper and heading off to find a good "nest".
He watched them go for a moment, then turned his attention back to the rest of the company. The veterans were already old pros at preparing for combat, the green boots following their lead alongside the seniors as they made ready to face the army that looked like they were about to begin their assault.
"Time to go to work, Marines!" He shouted, going prone beside the rest of First Platoon as they formed around the tanks. "Keep your cool and don't waste shots, show these freaks how Devil Dogs wage war!"
"Rah!"
Some of these troopers had never seen combat before, but they had trained hard for this, from basic training to the last few months of hard exercising. They were ready, he could read it in their eyes as a line of safety's switched off and M4's had rounds loaded.
"Archer Actual, this is Titan Actual." An accented voice came to his ear.
"Go ahead Titan."
"We'll be putting rounds downrange soon as we're given the greenlight, tell your men to stand clear and keep their heads down."
"Way ahead of you Titan, we'll stay out of your way to let you raise hell."
"As you wish. Titan out."
The sound of war horns brought Mitchell's attention back to the enemy force, as they started forward with battle cries and the clanging of armored men and beasts as they surged towards the gate. The ground seemed to rumble like a small earthquake as they approached, and Mitchell had to admit that the sight and sound was a bit intimidating. This was going to be a slug fest, no doubt about it.
"Steady boys." He cautioned, finger resting lightly on the trigger as he watched the oncoming enemy. "Wait until they reach the kill box…"
The rumbling and shouting became more intense as the army drew closer and closer, sweat forming on Mitchell's brow as adrenaline kicked into his system. He felt himself starting to get twitchy, and he let out a slow breath to calm his racing heart. He could make out individual soldiers by this point, Calvary armed with lances and swords leading the charge ahead of shield and spear wielding infantry. They were kicking up a massive dust cloud as they surged towards the Japanese and Americans. Closer…closer…
"Showtime to all Callsigns." Command Post transmitted. "Weapons free."
No sooner had the words been spoken that the entire line opened up in a mass of fire. Mitchell aimed for the dead center of the enemy formation ahead of him, firing three quick shots. The recoil digging the rifle butt into his shoulder as he slowly shifted fire from left to right. It was impossible to tell which of his shots were hitting instead of the others around him. But they were hitting, as nearly all the cavalrymen were taken out within a few heartbeats of the order to open fire as dead men were taken out of their saddles and slain horses tumbled to the ground to trip up even more horses behind then. This seemed to take the enemy force completely aback, as they seemed to hesitate for a moment as they tried to understand what had just hit them.
Many didn't get a second chance to figure it out, as the Marines and JSDF didn't give them a chance to breath with LMG's pumping out a continuous stream of lead plowing into their formation. Then the real hell started to rain down upon them.
"Kanonier! Feindliche Infanterie nähert sich im Freien!"
"Ziel erreicht! Fünfhundert Meter!"
"Feuer!"
The Leopard rocked backwards as its mighty main gun let loose its terrible firepower. The HEAT shell traveled right over the heads of the horrified remaining cavalrymen and plowed right into mass of infantry behind them. It threw up a mass of soil, blood and body parts, sending those around the blast tumbling to the ground and searching for the source of their torment. Across the line, the hostile charge began to faulter under the weight of fire and explosives. But that wasn't the entire force.
In the air, the wyvern riders pressed forward as well, trying to fly left and right to get away from the tracers crowding around them. Most were felled by the AA tanks, but one managed to brave the fire and press on towards the Marine lines. Mitchell raised his weapon, preparing to take a shot as the wyvern looked ready to dive down upon them, but the creature seemed to freeze for a moment, as the rider fell away towards the ground.
"That's number twelve" Joker announced triumphantly. "At what point do I have to start shooting with iron sights to make this more interesting?"
"Cut the chatter, Stalker Two." Mitchell smirked, changing the magazine in his M4. "I'll buy you your beer later."
The charge continued for another five minutes, wave after wave of enemy troops being funneled into the slaughter as no one on their side seemed to realize that this tactic was doing little then stacking bodies in sickening rows. It almost felt like they hoped the allies would give up out of sheer guilt of the mass devastation. If so, the sound of the tanks' continual fire would put pay to that kind of strategy. Just when Mitchell was starting to wonder if they were gunning down the entire population of this insane world, another pair of HEAT shells smashed into the enemy lines, and the survivors finally began to break and flee.
"They're running!"
"Jesus, it took them long enough. What the hell is wrong with these people?"
"Showtime, this is Archer Actual." Mitchell said over the radio. "Hostile assault has been repelled. No casualties on our end, over."
"Showtime copies all, standby Archer."
"Everyone do a quick ammo count!" He ordered. "Grab some more from the Humvees if you're low. This party isn't over yet."
"All Archer and Titan Callsigns, standby for FRAGO."
"Archer standing by."
"Titan is ready to receive."
"Hostile force has called off its assault but is not withdrawing from the area. Advanced one click northeast up that small rise and smash the enemy flank, then dig in and await further instructions."
"Wilco, Oscar mike." Mitchell looked up. "Marines! We're pushing forward! Keep your spacing and your head on a swivel, let's go!"
He stood up, doing a quick check of the surroundings before starting forward with the rest of his squad. The Leopards started forward again, their turrets swiveling to watch the approach from which the enemy had attacked and subsequently withdrawn.
"Hamilton, stay the fuck away from the tanks unless you want to get run over."
"You don't think they'd be willing to give us a ride?"
"Try asking the crazy German woman."
"Hard pass."
"Archer One, this is Stalker Two." Joker's voice reached his ear. "We're going to be repositioning, plan to be without sniper cover for about five mikes."
"Copy, we'll make do." Mitchell answered, waving the rest of the platoon forward.
He was forced to look at the ground when they reached the "kill zone" that the enemy army had charged into, watching his footing as he stepped around the hundreds of bodies. He squeamish looking at corpses, it was something he had been forced to grow used too over a long career of being a warfighter, but stepping on them still felt wrong somehow, never sitting right with him. It was a challenge here, as there was a vast field of them between the allies and their goal. Some of the others made noises of disgust or discomfort as they made their way through it, especially whenever they reached one of the small craters left by the tank shells that left organs and gore sprayed across the grass. It was worse when they came across survivors. Moaning and crying out in agony, many missing arms or legs while others had broken bones from horses collapsing atop them. Mitchell felt kind of bad for them, but there was nothing at the moment he could do.
Reaching the end of the killing field, he paused to make sure the others were all making it through fine. The Marines didn't seem to be having any trouble, but one of the tanks was visibly lagging behind.
"Titan One, Archer One. What's the hold up?"
"The amount of bodies and soil wet with blood is making the terrain difficult to traverse, we're looking for a route that won't get us bogged down." Vahlen answered, sounding quite irritated. "Elser, wenn wir irgendwo im Schlamm stecken bleiben, lasse ich dich raus und drängen!"
"Mein Bestes geben Oberleutnant!"
Mitchell scowled. Under normal circumstances, leaving the tanks behind would be a bad tactical move, but there so far hadn't been anything thrown at them that the Marines technically couldn't handle by themselves. If they waited, that may give the enemy more time to rally instead of taking advantage of the confusion they were reeling from.
"Understood, we're going to keep pushing up the hill. Link up with us when you can, out."
They pushed forward, coming over the top of the small hill, and ran right into the stragglers from the assault. The armored soldiers looked surprised, as if they hadn't expected a counterattack this soon. But they found their footing soon enough, one purple caped man pulling a dagger from his belt and charging straight at Mitchell. He was promptly put down by two shots to his chest.
"Push forward!" He shouted, as other Marines added their weapons to the firearm symphony around him.
"Hamilton! Two moving at your nine!"
"Got it, tracking!"
"Mitchell, infantry moving dead ahead of you!"
"All mine." Mitchell pulled the pin off a grenade, tossing it at the group. "Frag out!"
The soldiers looked at the grenade as it rolled up to them, probably curious what this strange stone that had been thrown at them was. They were shredded a moment later as the blast threw the blasted shrapnel to slice through flesh. The entire fight took less then two minutes, as the survivors tossed down their weapons and cried out something in their own language. The marines shouted back at them to put their hands in the air, a few of them even remembering to do it in the right language that had been pieced together from the prisoners captured in Tokyo.
Nodding approvingly, Mitchell looked back towards the direction of the enemy force. He could see about a battalion sized unit of hostiles rallying not too far away, but just far enough to make tossing random shots more of guess work then marksmanship. There were several cavalrymen left, including one who seemed to be giving the orders as he shouted and pointed at the others around him.
"Archer One, this is Stalker Two."
"Go ahead, Stalker."
"We have eyes on a likely enemy HVT, looks like the leader of that little gaggle ahead of you. Want us to do a little gardening with his face?"
"He's all yours."
Mitchell narrowed his eyes, trying to get a better look with his plane vision. He didn't hear the shot over the loud din of battle around them, but he did see the spurt of blood from the man's head as he toppled off his high horse.
"Boop."
"Nice shot." Mitchell complimented him, climbing back into a prone position. "Everyone else get ready, I think we may have just pissed them off."
As he'd guessed, the "gaggle" turned the fury over their fallen leader towards the Marines, charging over open terrain once again to try to get at their tormentors. The results were the same, a pile of mowed down bodies stacked high as the marines gleefully slotted one after another in this target rich environment. Mitchell thought that it would just be another straight slaughter like before, until he felt the ground start shaking again. He had no idea what was happening at first, until the troll came into view.
"Oh fuck!" Hamilton shouted. The massive thing had to be close to twenty feet tall, and it was thundering right towards them. A big fleshy target like that might be just as easy as to take down as a normal human, or it might shrug off bullets like monsters in a horror movie. Either way, Mitchell wasn't willing to take the chance.
"Fall back!" He shouted, picking up his weapon and starting back towards the hillside while covering the other marines. "Titan One, we have a big target coming our way. Where the hell are you?!"
"Right here." The giant gun barrel poked its head over the edge, followed by the large metal beast itself. "Where is this- Oh, I see it."
The tank drove forward, somehow looking like a living creature with the same predator-like instinct that Vahlen's voice had been dripping with.
"Marines stand clear. This one's mine."
It stopped at the same position Mitchell and the others had just retreated from, turning it's turret around to target the rampaging troll. It roared at the Leopard, swinging a large club as it closed the distance between them to less than fifty yards.
"Feuer!"
The main gun boomed once again, and the troll went completely silent as Mitchell's view was obscured by smoke. When it faded away, only the lower half of the creature was left, the torso blown away to bloody chunks. The Marines whooped and hollered over the display, several whistling and trying to say things in broken German.
"Archer One, you are clear."
"Thanks Titan." Mitchell said, unable to stop a little smile himself. He looked further to the north, seeing where the rest of his company was advancing. "Archer Two, SITREP."
"Just about clear, sir." The Lieutenant responded. "Got one last stubborn group of enemies, but they're about to be cleared out now."
Mitchell dug into his belt and pulled out a pair of binoculars. He could see second platoon hanging back and waving for something out of view. Ahead of them, another battalion of enemies were marching towards them, but this wasn't a loose collection of survivors of the first charge. These soldiers had formed themselves into a shield wall as they pushed towards the Marines. That shouldn't have been any problem, after all it had been more then apparent during the battle of Tokyo that those shields couldn't stop a 5.56 round, and Mitchell wondered why the platoon was holding position.
He got his answer a moment later as one of the Marine LAV's crested the small hill and rolled forward to face the incoming hostiles. They stopped, clearly unsure what to do about this new threat, when the LAW's Bushmaster cannon lit them up. He could hear the explosions as each round slammed into the shields and completely obliterated the formation as it fired from right to left. The ones at the end seemed to get wise as to what was happening and tried to run, but they were all cut down as the chain gun finished its murderous rotation.
"Badger One, Target suppressed."
"Copy that. Archer One, Archer Two has secured the position, over."
It would have been funny in a way, if it wasn't resulting in so much death. After all, who in their right minds would have tried that kind of tactic against an armored vehicle back on earth? Even the Taliban had been smarter than that. Mitchell didn't know how he should feel about any of this.
"Nice work, Two." He said, deciding to leave that kind of internal debate for later. "Showtime, all Archer Callsigns have secured designated positions. We'll hold hear until we hear otherwise, out."
~oOo~
The enemy's center was the last to break. That was both to be expected and a bit impressive, since they managed to maintain discipline until surrounded by JSDF on the left and US Marines on the right, all pouring down fire upon them that they couldn't answer. But they HAD broken in the end, their leadership taken out by sharpshooters and carefully established formations shattered by firepower. They had stood and fought as best they could, but that wasn't saying much.
Jackson estimated that only about a fraction of the total enemy force was left alive to run away as fast as their legs would carry them, less then five thousand of a force that had probably been in the high tens of thousands. A casualty rate that was unacceptable no matter what nation you hailed from.
"We've broken their back." He said aloud, watching down at the mop up operation from his position near the command post. "Fighting should wrap up soon."
"I think we've done a little more then that." General Hazama, the commander of the JSDF and overall leader of the expedition, snorted. "I'm not sure whether we should be cheering or crying after that kind of a battle."
"I'd say neither, a battlefield isn't a place to feel emotional one way or the other."
"Always the professional I see." Hazama nodded. "For now, I must agree. We still have much to do. The dead will need to be cleared away, and I'm certain there will be a lot of wounded that will need to be tended too."
"Did we bring enough medical supplies for this?"
"Probably not, but if we run low, we can always send a message back to Japan for more."
"Oh right, nearly forgot about that." Jackson said, glancing back at the gate. "It's still strange."
"What? The fact that we just had a major battle with Tokyo a short drive away? Or the fact that we had to make said drive through a magical portal to get here?"
"Take your pick."
"Yes, well hopefully the scientists can make sense of it sometime soon." Hazama said, putting a pair of binoculars back to his eyes. "I think the fighting is more or less done. I'll have my troops start gathering up the casualties, if you would be so kind as to have your marines form a perimeter while the Engineers start setting up the base. We'll likely be here for a while."
Jackson smiled cynically.
"Home sweet home."