June Fifteenth, 1935 by the Europan Calender. To those who awoke that morning, the world would be forever changed by the end of the day. In Cambrai, soldiers of the United States of Vinland's Army and Marines boarded their ships at two in the morning, most catching up on the missed sleep on the voyage to mainland Europa. Soon they would descend onto the last vestiges of the Atlantic Federation with the subtlety of a rampaging elephant.
By six, a concert of gunfire began sounding along the northern coast of the continent as Federal batteries traded shells with the Vinnish Battleships. By quarter past, the VAF began their bombing runs.
By quarter to seven, the beachheads looked similar to the lunar surface as seen through a powerful telescope. Most, if not all, of the Federal large guns had gone silent. Then, and only then did the Vinnish Navy deploy the ten thousand landing craft across the ten beaches they had chosen to assault. These crafts would be critical to deploy the fifty thousand troops who would partake in the initial invasion as, with the exception of the ten thousand men of the Fifth Army, there were no harbour facilities and it was certain that the Federal troops would make them pay for every inch of land.
The Fifth Army was due at Vassel to aid the Gallians in retaking their country and, if feasible, link up with Princess Cordelia's group to assist in the liberation of Randgriz.
The first indication that something was up was that the river forts had Gallian Civilians standing on their roofs and waving and cheering to the Vinnish ships. Then there was the fact that the Great Vassel Bridge was draped in the flags of Cordelia's Duchy of Gallia and some brave people had made homemade versions of the Vinnish flag.
The message could not have been clearer: "We are not your enemy." This, coupled with the fact that the bridge rose when their fleet approached, meant that they could dock in the harbour and disembark in an orderly manner. To their surprise, the Princess, Welkin and the mayor of the town before the invasions greeted them, along with throngs of cheering civilians.
Admiral Halland approached the trio. "Your Highness," he said, bowing deeply to her. "I must admit, I did not expect for the battle here to be over already."
Princess Cordelia chuckled. "That is because we didn't have to fight a battle. The Vassel townspeople managed to free themselves without any assistance."
Admiral Halland hummed, noting the… enthusiasm that the locals were greeting his marines and the army with. "Then, with your permission, my fleet and I will begin heading upstream to give von Borg and von Damon the good news."
Cordelia grimaced, knowing that naval bombardment would cause a lot of damage to the city. "Do as you see fit Admiral, but I beg you to watch for collateral damage."
Admiral Halland bowed his head, "By your order, Your Highness." he intoned, already having planned to do so. He gestured to an officer beside him. "This is General Ike, he has command of the Vinnish troops officially."
The General bowed and joined them, "Highness." he greeted before looking over his troops. "I see my troops aren't in any mortal danger, by your order, we will proceed to Randgriz and hopefully end this war today."
Welkin stifled a chuckle at the General's words. The only danger was to the various Inns and Pubs along the road to the capitol, and that was merely the danger of being drained of their stocks after the Vinns and Gallians finished the fighting. Princess Cordelia, being closest to him, heard the strangled noise he made but figured that his thoughts had turned amusing, chose to ignore him. Instead, she turned and led the way for General Ike to the Resistance members who had accompanied them.
By midday, the combined forces of Vinland and Gallia could see the walls of Randgriz. The pillars of smoke-filled everyone with unease as a radio operator made contact with the fleet. "Enterprise, Fifth Army. Princess Cordelia wishes to remind you to limit collateral damage. I wish to inform you: I have edited her message." he said, listening to the reply. "Enterprise, Fifth Army. Send last again?"
Cordelia's blood ran hot and turned the air blue, a rage burning in her soul for the carelessness of the Vinnish Navy. The radio operator's next words dropped the air temperature to below freezing. "Enterprise, Fifth Army. Requesting confirmation: You have not, repeat, have not gotten into position or fired a shell into Randgriz. Confirm."
All eyes turned towards Cordelia as the radio operator paled. "Enterprise. This is Fifth Army. Confirmed last. Naval Bombardment has been aborted. CAS will proceed with limited fire missions. We head over the top."
The whole army was silent as they waited for a reaction, any reaction, from the Princess. When she finally spoke, she did not raise her voice, she did not need to, nor did she believe she could at that moment. "When I left Randgriz under Mister Landzaat's protection after the sacrifice of my Royal Guards, there were over fifty thousand still inhabiting the city. Now… now I fear we may be walking into an empty shell of a city." she began, not really looking at anyone or anything in particular, as if they did not exist. "All that is left for the dead, is for us to exact vengeance. I intend to do just that!" she spat, "No mercy!"
Almost as one, the army behind her began cheering her, chanting "Wałċk Gålå" until she raised her arms for attention. "Now! We have a War to win! Forwards for Freedom!"
Vinn and Gallian cheered and began a charge that would go down as the turning point in modern history. Tanks rushed to the front of the swarm and began firing at the defensive positions of the enemy. The forces of Borg and Damon began returning fire but even the most optimistic of them knew that none of them would see another sunrise. However, the thought of surrender never once crossed their minds, for they were the most fanatical of the soldiers of the Kingdom of Gallia and loyal to the death to King Borg and High General Damon.
When the Resistance breached the walls of the city, a tank shell at the main gates proving to be enough, the tanks rolled forwards and began taking fire from several angles. Inside Edelweiss, Isara sent another shell at a hostile position. "So…" she remarked casually, "When's the Wedding?"
Welkin raised an eyebrow at his sister's question but answered while looking for the next position to shell. "Let us get at least one date in before you start prodding us with that question Isara," he remarked before catching sight of something. "345, short."
Isara hummed before sending a high explosive shell to deal with the machine-gun position. "So you two did not get up to anything two weeks after we captured Castle Gassenarl?"
Welkin furrowed his brow. "You probably heard Faldio and or Audrey. Alicia and I were on a scout of the surrounding area. 015, long."
Isara took a few extra seconds to fire the gun, but after she had, she just replied. "I know."
Welkin rolled his eyes at his sister's antics and continued to feed her targets. When the fire eased on them, they advanced to see that a small group of civilians ran towards them. None of them carried weapons and many of them ran with handkerchiefs waving above their heads.
Bullets flew near them, causing them to duck into cover as the Imperial aligned troops opened fire on them. A rush ensued to get the tanks between the enemy and the civilians while Alicia ran to speak with them. "We need to get you out of here! Stay close to me!" she shouted.
One of the women in the group, an older one in her late-forties leaned against a wall, breathing heavily. "Get going kids. I'll be fine."
Susie Evans ran the younger ones back while Alicia tried to get the older one to get moving, but she slumped against the wall. "It's already too late for me kid," she said as she pulled her hand away from her side revealing a bloody mess. "I've been around long enough to know that not even Ragnade would help me," she remarked before coughing violently.
Alicia grimaced, but the woman carried on. "The Castle gates are the most defended part of the Usurper's defence, there he has his soldiers put what citizens are left in the town as a shield and those who die are thrown to become sandbags," she said before gripping Alicia's arm. "There were five thousand, then they started using the women and children for bayonet practice, last anyone one knew, there were four thousand left, but that was several days ago," she whispered, losing her strength and slumping over.
Alicia could hear a faint gasp before the women ceased to breathe. Hurrying, she made her way over to one of the forward radio operators. "Castle gates are where we're going to face the heaviest resistance, they're using human shields and human sandbags."
The operator looked green around the gills and began relaying the information to everyone. Princess Cordelia ran over to them and, after hearing what Alicia discovered, whipped her head around. "There's a Marine entrance to the Castle! And several secret passages!"
The radio operator nodded, "Got it." he said before relaying the information to the fleet. The radio operator summed up everyone's thoughts quite nicely. "The noose is closing around their necks. Let's drop the trapdoor."
Maurits von Borg, King of Gallia and Imperial puppet sat on his throne he usurped from Cordelia. Everything had gone to hell since the chit escaped his custody and, he presumed, joined with the Gunther spawn and his Dark Hair misbegotten chit of a sister.
He snarled at the thought of them. It wasn't natural for a Dark Hair to be even considered to be worthy of being in the same room as a national hero, much less be considered family.
His internal ranting was soon interrupted by the throne room door being thrown open, but not by any of his soldiers. Instead, a mob of a hundred or so citizens of Randgriz, armed with pitchforks, clubs and anything they could get their hands on really, burst into the room. All of his guards had joined the defence of the city and so he was alone and from the sounds of battle closing in, the rebels were closing in too.
The mob halted just before the steps to the throne and, for a moment, he thought that they were too scared to carry out the deed when it came down to it. He couldn't be further from the truth.
An aged gentleman slowly made his way to the front, cane slowly tapping on the polished floor. When he reached the front, he scanned Borg with his eyes before speaking. His raspy voice commanding all to obey. "Maurtis von Borg. You are guilty of High Treason. The judgement for this is clear. Death by Hanging, Drawing and Quartering."
A rope was presented to the aged gentleman and, in one deft motion, he looped it around a hook that normally hung a chandelier. Borg hadn't moved, he was in shock. Shock that his world was coming crashing down around him, shock that commoners presumed to be able to pass judgement on him, and shock that General Roald Kankkunen, a war hero from the last war, was going to be the one to personally execute him.
If Borg thought he got the worse execution, High General Georg von Damon would disagree. He had been overseeing the defence of the gate when Vinnish soldiers overran them from the rear. They didn't even bother asking for his surrender. Five soldiers, each stoic in demeanour, simply pointed their rifles at him and unloaded their thirty shot clips into him. Only stopping once they had run out of ammunition.
By One-Thirty in the afternoon, no further gunfire was heard as every soldier of the "Kingdom of Gallia" was dead, as were Maurtis von Borg and Georg von Damon. Welkin, General Ike and the retired General Kankkunen stood overlooking the carnage in the main street. Members of the resistance and Vinnish army had begun the lengthy process of bringing the dead together for ease of burial and the whole boulevard was lined with corpses. Most of the enemy had been burned, though General Damon's body was still burning and, if the resident coroner was to be believed, could well burn for a very long time. Borg's quarters were sent to Ghirlandaio, Fouzen, Mulberry and his head was placed on a pike in front of the main gates. "How are we going to handle all of this?" Welkin asked in disbelief.
Kankkunen grimaced, over a thousand civilians had perished in the last forty-eight hours and needed burial. "The local Cemetery should have enough room for our dead," he said before he looked to General Ike. "What about your boys?"
General Ike sighed. "We're lucky we didn't endure many losses, but to prevent plague and disease, we need to bury the bodies," he said, not hearing anything around him. Not even the footsteps behind him. "As much as I am loath to suggest it. A Mass Grave may be the only way…"
"EXCUSE ME?" A shrill voice cried out from behind them. All three men jumped and spun around to see Princess Cordelia, blood on her clothing, looking pissed. "If you finish that sentence General, you can forget about any agreements between my government and yours! The fallen shall be given individual burials and rites accordingly. The War is over. We will bury our dead with respect." she growled. And with that, she stormed off in the direction of the cemetery to see to the matter personally.
Kankkunen stared in the direction of the Princess. "She's grown since she escaped Randgriz. Borg used to ride roughshod over her administration without so much as a peep."
Welkin grimaced, "I need to head after her, if she had her way, she'd dig the graves all by herself and she's near the breaking point as is." he replied before hurriedly departing from the Generals.
General Kankkunen chuckled as he watched the son of his old friend hurry off to try and catch up to the Princess.
Several dozen miles to the southwest, outside the Castle of Wessel, Faldio looked through his binoculars at the imposing structure. Baldren and Gilbert Gassenarl had decided to abandon the town, according to the townspeople, they were of the opinion that the Resistance would herd the civilians to the castle gates and gun them down. He was of the opinion that they either believed their own propaganda or had gone mad. Audrey was of the latter opinion herself and many who had defected from the Federation aligned state agreed with her.
Audrey drew up alongside him and gazed towards the castle with her good and her fake eye. "If the civilians were accurate, we're looking at about two hundred in there."
Faldio grimaced, "I've counted about a hundred peering from the defences. Possibly more inside."
Audrey sighed, "I wish we had artillery." she murmured.
Faldio grimaced, the historical significance of the castle causing the historian in him to baulk at the destruction, but there was a war on. "I know." he quietly replied before looking to the Lancers. "Get me a hole!"
The Lancers nodded and the battle began. With the riflemen and one heavy machine-gun suppressing the enemy troops on the inside, the Lancers quickly made several holes in the wall and gate, leading to a rush of the Resistance to get in the castle before the enemy could plug the holes.
Faldio and Audrey made it inside in the first wave and rushed to what had been the Great Hall of the castle, figuring that was going to be where they found Baldren and Gilbert.
To their surprise, they were right. Baldren and Gilbert Gassenarl stood on the far end of the Great Hall. Audrey and Faldio looked at each other in concern for a brief second before advancing slowly. "Welcome. To your doom." the raspy voice of Gilbert Gassenarl called to them when they had crossed half of the floor.
Faldio frowned, it was clear to him that the elder Gassenarl had lost his senses. "It's over Gilbert. Your troops are being taken care of while we are surrounding this hall. Surrender. And you will receive a fair trial." he said.
The male Gassenarls began laughing manically, it took some time before they drew swords and advanced. Baldren towards Faldio and Gilbert towards Audrey.
Audrey readied her sword and took a quick scan of her former father while she assumed a standard fencing pose. In the eyes of a man who had once loved her, at least in theory, she saw eyes more suited to a feral beast, trying to find prey to kill to eat. Or to kill for the rush of it. Faldio did the same but where Audrey saw a feral beast in her opponent, he noticed an unbalanced appearance in Baldren and began figuring out ways to throw him ever further off-kilter.
Baldren and Gilbert attacked fast and furiously, Baldren pushing Faldio to one side to keep him away from Audrey while Gilbert kept his former daughter more or less in the centre of the room. Audrey's fight lasted about thirty seconds before she noticed that Gilbert was using a pattern. Attack high, parry, attack left, stab, parry. With this in mind, she began to plot how to defeat Gilbert. However, before she could disarm him, attempting to follow Cordelia's request for prisoners, Gilbert spoke in a snarling manner. "You cannot hope to beat me, No-Name. I will look forward to your punishment."
Audrey snarled on his next high attack and grabbed his sword wrist, holding it high above her head. "My name is Audrey Landzaat," she growled, her voice as cold as the blade piercing Gilbert's stomach.
As the life left Gilbert's eyes, Audrey looked over to where Faldio had run Baldren through. "He got sloppy after I mentioned we were sharing a bed," Faldio remarked as a way of an explanation.
Audrey shrugged it off and they were soon joined by their troops. "Send word to the Princess. The War is over."
In Randgriz, Princess Cordelia wiped her brow. She and other members of the Resistance had been digging for hours and, though it didn't feel like it to any of them, they had managed to get through a sizeable chunk of all of the digging that they would need to do, only needing to dig about a further three hundred graves before they had enough to bury everyone who had perished before they could liberate Randgriz. Cordelia heard a commotion coming from behind her but paid it no mind, in her mind, her present work was more important than whatever the Vinns were getting worked up about.
Covered in dirt and blood splattered and stained, the change in Cordelia could not have been more pronounced than in that moment. Even her Valkyrian form paled in comparison in the eyes of her people. To them, their Princess personally getting involved meant more to them than any number of super soldiers.
A clearing throat behind her drew her attention. Spinning around, she was confused, who would wear an immaculate three-piece suit in a time like this? And be surrounded by several in a similar dress? "Are you looking for someone in particular?" she asked.
The man at the centre of the group smiled a small bit, "You, actually." he replied. At Cordelia's unimpressed look, he hastened to add. "President John Roos, United States of Vinland."
Princess Cordelia raised an eyebrow, "Mr President, things are rather hectic at the moment, so I'm afraid you either need to grab a shovel and start helping us dig these graves or shove off. I must see to my people."
With that, Cordelia turned around and moved off to the next plot to begin digging. President Roos heard muttered behind him: "Gallians." and was unimpressed. "She's rebuilding her country after those who were older and should have known better tried their damnest to completely destroy the very notion of what it was to be a Gallian." he snapped. "If I hear that sort of talk again, you all are heading back to the States while I continue working here." he finished before clasping the shoulder of the youngest member of the group. "Come on son, let's get to work."
And off the President and his son went, finding a shovel in short order and joining in with the efforts. By candlelight, the first funerals began that evening and, come the following morning, all of the dead would be laid to their eternal rest. Princess Cordelia attended each one, giving her condolences to every family there. But for some, only Princess Cordelia, Welkin Gunther, Isara Gunther, Alicia Melchiott, President Roos and his son attended, often because that person's entire family was already dead. These affected the young Princess deeply, often she would be seen leaning against someone for support. But, by dawn's early light, the final casket had been buried under the soil of Gallia and then, and only then, did the Princess, escorted by Welkin and Alicia to keep her upright, enter Castle Randgriz and entered a fitful sleep. But for the first time in months, she slept without worrying about invasions, resistances or war.
Because Gallia rose to the occasion and that morning, she slept in a free Gallia.