The assault group trudged steadily toward the outland Frostbite Outpost, a lone Titan production facility on the outer rim of the Antarctic Circle. Our mobile armored siege units, aka Artillery, were slowly sliding and slipping over the iced-over waterways. The everlasting winters caused the water to harden thickly, providing sufficient support for the massive artillery batteries, but every now and then, something would go wrong. A block of thinned ice would slip under the water, and a unit would have to be towed out from the water. Once we even lost an entire unit and its infantry escort when the ice under it buckled and collapsed underneath it. Even after then umerous logistical setbacks such as rations and munitions shortages, we reached our siege coordinates safely (for the most part) and began to set up camp.

Private First Class (PFC) Darryl Bard, a close friend from boot camp and a trusted foot soldier, assisted myself, Lance Corporal (LC) Vance Davis, in raising our mammoth-sized artillery barrel. He supervised its orientation and stability while I manned the vast control panel.

Adjust the yaw! Its spinning out of control and holy shit look out became some of the important phrases we learned when aligning an artillery piece. Equipment this sophisticated can't correct itself? That's a bummer. Either way, we made it, and out unit stood proud among the other units that were preparing themselves for the dusk siege assault. Rumor was that the tactical facility a few miles south of us would be sending in some cavalry reinforcements to defend the artillery brigade from any stragling patrols. When that reinforcement arrived -- the bombardment would begin.

We had camped out in the perfect spot for artillery -- close enough to avoid direct defensive fire from turrets, and far enough away to avoid radar detection. The base had been designed with a weaker right flank since a large, unfrozen lakebed resided nearby. We took advantage of this architectural flaw and guided our artillery pieces through the icy streams and slick outputs of thw flowing lake. When we were ready to strike, a small, yet sizeable Assault Buggy battalion made its way to our position via the iced waterways. With our defensive squads dispatched, and enginners jerry-rigging makeshift SAM sites, we were ready to prepare for the onslaught.

I can't remember if I already mentioned it, but this small, unprotected base was a major producer of GDI Titan and Wolverine walker components. Not the complete units -- those could be completed in more secure regions, but just the essential parts: weapons, propulsion and guidance. The good stuff! If we knocked this base off the map with our Lock-Grumman C-10 canisters -- the GDI resistance in this sector, if not worldwide, would be crippled and slowed by the fallen unit production rates. Mobile bases would be required to build their war machines from the material presented before them, and that would pose a serious logistical threat to GDI thinkers. Yet, they left this important facility with a thorn in its paw, and a bleeding wound to match.

The attack began right at dusk as the base's reveille sounded. We were so close to the facility we could hear it faintly in the distance, but it was soon accompanied by massive explosions. Gunnery engineers had decided that rapid deployment forces such as infantrymen and Wolverines were top priority. Removing those elements would force them to sue slower Titans and Distruptors. By strategically removing fuel bays and weapons dispensaries, we successfully reduced the chances of armed resistance. Satellite reconnaisance reported to us that the Wolverine deployment bays had been abandoned, and pilots rushed to the Titan bays. We really couldn't stop their deployment -- they ran off of pseudonuclear reactors instead of fossil fuel. We managed to slow their advancement by bombing unscaleable trenches in the battlefield -- and the Titans would be forced to file in one direction, being picked off one by one by our eagle-eyed gunnery engineers.

I'm not quite sure if you've ever seen a NOD artillery piece, but just to see them shoot is quite a sight. The power and force ejected from those monstrous barrels requires a brutal amount of support and structure. Ground spikes attached to the pieces must be drilled several feet underground, and the whole unit embed a foot beneath the topsoil. Even fully secured under the best conditions -- these bastards shake, shimmy, and whatnot ever time you press the trigger. The initial detonation within the barrel pushes the unit down and extra foot into the ground each time, only to spring back up again with the recoil. So you could say that they actually bounced. And then there is the inertia. These bastards get kicked back several feet per shot, the ground spikes digging deep gashes into the earth. If we tried to shoot these suckers unsecured -- I'm sure the force of the recoil would crush the unit like a tin can. But they built these bastards like a rock, and unless they take some direct fire, they will last you a lifetime.

With the GDI forces scattering to find into and inside our range radius, we were destroying their structures and units left and right. A Wolverine would detonate into a ball of flames, then a nearby Barracks would explode, then maybe a charging infantry squad. In the end, hey were all vanquished by our unrelentless volley of artillery fire. The engineers had conducted their bombardment with such precision that a shell was hitting the base at any given point. Boom! Boom! Boom! The cheers emanated from the artillery ever time the spy satellite or the patrol binocs showed a GDI position being detonated and destroyed. Slowly the GDI numbers dwindled. The enlightened base commanders had their units building around a rough circumference of our shot radius inside the base. A wide arc of Wolverines, infantrymen, Titans and Distruptors was visible by radar and satellite. They were waiting for a breach in the radius to occur -- so that one unit could invade our range and slowly pick away at our forces. It wasnt going to happen that way. Eventually, we ceased fire to save munitions while more were being trucked in, but the GDI forces were hesitant to advance. Everytime a unit inched forward into our range, it would explode in a bright orange fireball. Everything was running according to plan -- at least until the Orca's came.

A routine air survey patrol was returning home when its squadron leader had discovered half of the airfield was destroyed. Quickly landing his squadron and refueling and rearming, they made a beeline for our position. The makeshift SAMs our enginners produced through a rod into the squadron leaders plans momentarily, but they compensated and avoided the missile batteries. Within our final perimeter was one Orca bomber and three Orca fighter, primed and ready to fight. I quickly did the calculations in my head. With four missile packs in each fighter, we would lose roughtly two or three artillery, that left us with nine. But the bomber mixed in a few problems. As closely knit our units were, each bomb could take four orfive artillery with us, that leaves of with a worst case scenario of three artillery pieces remaining. There would be no way to complete to objective with only three units left. A few of the units shot off shells in an attempt to knock the annoying flies out of the sky, only managing to detonate a few missile packs. Still, they managed to raise the odds of survival higher, leaving us with roughly seven or eight artillery units remaining. The situation was secure enough to complete to mission, but just barely. Gunner quickly restarted bombardment while the infantrymen shot randomly and frantically into the air, hoping to put a bullet in just the right place to take down a fighter -- or if they were lucky -- the bomber.

The remainder of the squadron created a barrier around the bomber, and shots impacted against the hardend armor of the GDI air units. At about 100 yards back, the bomber let loose its payload. With the interia it created with the forward motion -- they would be propelled far enough to impact with our battle group. We decided to keep the artillery going until the end. Dismantling them would waste valuble time that they could use to finish off the base. It didn't matter anyway -- the Orca's were significantly faster than an artillery piece, so it was easy to say that we should just stand here and die -- but some of the soldiers couldn't do it. Inside the reinforced armor hull of an artillery piece, you could survive a bomb blast or a missile impact. What did the artillery in was the loss of its barrel. If it lost that, it was noting but a slow APC. But the bare infantry on the battlefield would be incinerated, with nothing left to pick up. As the high explosives flew toward our position, a line of gunfire spread across their path, one by one the payload detonating in mid air. The stream of plasma bulets riddled the bombs with energy, sending their remains plummeting to the ground. From within a cloud of dust, a platoon of Tiberium Cyborgs stormed onto the battlefield, followed closely behind by a squadron of fully loaded Harpies. The Harpies flew through the dusty cloud, chainguns running on full power. Their depleted uranium bullets made confetti of the Orca bomber and fighter armors, sending them aflame to the ground, an unrecoverable hulk of twisted metal. The Harpies, now depleted of munitions, began to make their way to home to the base, when three exploded mysteriously in midair. Blue streaks filled the sky, impacting with the escaping Harpy force, decimating it completely, leaving no survivors. The blue streaks originiated from withing the crumbling walls of the GDI base. Engineers had just begun to dismantle and prep for departure the artillery pieces when more bursts of blue light emanated from the base. They struck the numerous artillery pieces that were defenseless against assault. All hell broke loose when the all too familiar earth shaking, thundering impacts of hydromechanical legs. The proverbian Mammoth Mark III prototype had made itself known, its rapid-fire railrifles running like Vulcan Cannons. The EMP cannon on is back charged and prepped for destruction. The blue-green orb of energy was propelled from its chassis, impacting smack in the middle of the escaping artillery. Instantly paralyzed by the impact, they became the most vulnerable target on the battlefield. The Mammoth stormed the forsaken artillery, crushing the burning, disabled hulks under its massive bulk. Underbelly Vulcan Cannons ripped through the remnants and any survivors mercilessly. It truely was a mammoth. It sported the single EMP cannon on its dorsal hull assembly, the two Vulcan Gauss Cannons on its anterior hull asssembly, supported by an arrangement of ventral Vulcan Cannons and dorsal Starfire missile packs. When the Mammoth stood tall against the burning wreckages, we were fortuneate enough to have recieve subterranean APC support, and most of the upper half of the chain of command had been saved. The rest of the grunts -- they burned with their comrades on forsaken soil.