Author's Note (September 16, 2021):
My apologies for being gone for so long. Life came at me fast.
Thank you for your understanding.
/
Barious Desert, Principality of Gallia
June 15, 1935 EC
Sgt. Batory Andrzejevski
Squad 1, Gallian Militia 3rd Company
"Granat!" The female Viszevar screamed again as she flailed her way up, a panicked bolt of black and gold lightning contrasted against the indigo horizon of the desert. She seemed desperate to clear out beyond the cliff face before the inevitable explosion caught up to her, her rifle and what seemed to be an older Pickelhaube model of Imperial helmet dancing about her in equally wild fashion. "Spierdalaj!"
The B-Type did not wait any longer, going off with a thunderous clap and throwing blue light, shrapnel, and dust in all directions. The Imperial officer stumbled at the very top of the cliff path with a furious curse and faceplanted onto the crunchy sand of the mesa top. The bright azure fireball that just barely missed destroying her immediately consumed her brothers in arms, their own lavender silhouettes in Batory's vision instantaneously vanishing from his sight.
In any case, there were no more combat effectives before the Crow. Behind him, on the other hand…
5:00 VALKYRIA RANGE 70 EVACUATE
5:00 Valkyria Range 80 Evacuate
Batory's mind only repeated the obvious to him – the noises that were coming from behind told him all that he needed to know. There were two distinct auditory terrors – sounds that surely must never have been heard by anyone mortal or superhuman for centuries, discounting the lunatic scientists in the ISB. The first was a chilling, otherworldly shriek punctuated by ringing noises whose tempo correlated roughly to that of someone lightly jogging. Alongside that was a second, lower-pitched staccato accompanied by faster, hissing impact reports. Even as the Valkyria put more distance between herself and him, the haunting, terrifying dirge of a demigoddess at arms rang harshly in Batory's ears – a cacophony of whistling and shrieking that would not have been out of place under an unending heavy artillery barrage typical of the last great war. It was quite a fitting comparison, if Batory could say so himself; the Valkyria was evidently causing as much physical and moral damage single-handedly as an entire artillery park.
The Valkyria was by this point obviously brute-forcing her way through the Gallian Militia's defensive lines; even if Batory didn't look back, he knew based on his observation of the woman a scant few minutes before that she would be batting her way through anyone wearing Gallian blue, howling lance and azure flames marking her form and her path of devastation. The speed of the Valkyria's advance made it also clear that she was not interested in suppressing every last hardpoint in the Gallian lines, the continued thundering of MP subguns and Kar rifles confirming that her infantry were carrying out the mop-up operations. Nevertheless, the clattering of Mags SMGs and Gallian-3 rifles continued relentlessly, Squads 1 and 3 maintaining a minimum level of cohesion and suppressing fire to delay the Imperials' advance.
A Valkyria virtually gliding past the Gallian mortals before her and paying no personal attention to them, instead letting her human escorts handle them? It was almost as if she were more interested in-
"She's linking up with the Batomys," blurted out the Crow as he shot a glance at O'Hara. The Sniper had just finished re-bolting her GSR-3 and was taking aim at the Imperial still making her way up back on her feet, who was now letting loose a torrent of creative Viszevaric invectives that would have stunned even the most grizzled of drill sergeants. Switching his Archer to his free hand and maintaining a bead on the other Viszevar, Batory slapped O'Hara on the shoulder.
"We have no time," continued Batory. "The thing is gone, but she will have escorts to cut us off."
"You saw that DMR, Batty," hissed O'Hara in a suppressed yet hysterical tone as she twitched backward, aching to retreat. Her eyes shot left and right, rapidly scanning for any additional contacts. "We can't outrun 7.62!"
"I will handle it," shot back the warrant officer, sparing a moment's glance at O'Hara once again and quickly throwing up hand signals to signal to Regard – if he was not already occupied at the far side of the mesa – to shift fire to the Imperials surging through the widening hole in the lines. "Find Regard now and cover the rest."
O'Hara silently sprang back up to a standing position and tapped Batory on his own shoulder to confirm her orders. "Just don't take too long, Cezary won't stay here forever!"
Batory gave a nod and soon detected O'Hara widening the distance between themselves, her crunching footsteps growing rapidly fainter. Keeping his Archer pointed at the Imperial, who by now had at least risen up to a kneeling position, he started to advance at the double.
This is either the best idea I've ever come up with on the spot, muttered the Crow silently to himself, or the worst. Bongseon will never let me forget this if he hears about it.
And I live long enough to have to hear it.
"En Viszevarem (1)," Batory quickly announced as he motioned with his free hand toward himself. He saw the other Viszevar widen her purple eyes and bare her teeth at the realization that she was caught unarmed against a foe who certainly was. She was seemingly roughly his own age, a curious age for someone seemingly normal to make the rank of first lieutenant in the Imperial Army. "Surrender your rifle."
A moment passed, and the other Viszevar didn't make a move. On her face remained that same expression of terror and – was it relief Batory felt? The Kar B(S) remained where it was on the sand, as did the Pickelhaube. Satisfied that the Imperial knew she was utterly outmatched at that moment, Batory took one more step forward.
Catherine, of all the times for your homework to start mattering, Batory hissed to himself as he took yet another step forward, it starts mattering now?
It was then that the warrant officer made out a distinct, red 37 emblazoned on the old Imperial helmet, clearly identified even with the Barious sand creating a nice new camouflage pattern for the piece of kit. It instantly filled him with revulsion, and he started to have second thoughts about letting the Imperial live.
Red thirty-seven, he thought. She's not…
To his surprise and almost by complete coincidence, the other Viszevar started to smile, a lazy grin materializing on her face as she grabbed her rifle and tossed it toward Batory. A faint cracking sound emanated as the weapon hit the ground. "Nice house," she croaked sarcastically in surprisingly deep and husky Viszevaric, tinged by a raspy undercurrent that almost certainly came from screaming countless orders (and based on her mastery of the profane, insults) over the radio. Her uniform, black and gilded at the collars and shoulders in the style of a commissioned officer's, certainly added weight to this theory. "You got the gun, dear, and you gotta go, so you don't mind if I just step inside and freshen up?"
She wiped the sweat off of her forehead with the back of a gloved hand, and squeezed her brows with her fingers. "Fuck me," she growled, "I hate the desert, why is this place even this far north?"
Batory maintained eye contact and his aim with his Archer as he swiftly crouched and grasped his adversary's marksman rifle by the sling, taking took a few steps back as the rifle rose from the sand. The Imperial made no move to reach for any other weapon, instead continuing to trace his movements with her purple eyes. "Go ahead," he flatly yet rapidly replied as he tried to avoid making eye contact with the snide Imperial. "It wasn't a very good house."
She snorted in amusement, her smirk growing wider as she slowly made to reach for the helmet by her side. "Well, I get it and a new window all to myself," she chortled. The officer gave a theatrical sigh and threw her head back. "Fiu, I lost my escort and my gun. How in the gods-damn am I supposed to explain this to Bles, anyways?"
Batory knew an opportunity for intel when he saw it; he decided to play along, even if he had one unrelated yet burning question to throw at the Imperial. He already recognized the name Selvaria Bles, commander of the Imperial invasion's central forces, from his many discussions with Uncle but it never hurt to get additional information from what seemed to be one of her staff officers. "Who?"
It's so hard for me to not lose my cool, thought the Crow as he stared at the woman. Between surviving a Valkyria and facing down this woman…
The Imperial shrugged and dusted off her Pickelhaube, the 37 present on the front of the grey fabric cover now totally cleared of sand and making Batory proportionately more secretly irate. "General Selvaria Bles, of course," she scoffed as she checked the strap hinges and staggered upright. "You know, the Valkyria?"
Oh, thought Batory in trepidation once more at the news. A Valkyria as the head of an entire wing of the Imperial invasion force was nothing neither he nor anyone in the attached KISHIN unit at Randgriz had anticipated in the slightest. No, he was actively suppressing a scream of rage and frustration at the very idea.
Gallia was just a sideshow, not worthy of so much firepower. Why was a Valkyria, one of the two that KISHIN had positively identified two years prior, deployed in a country that had a smaller population than the entire Imperial Army in peacetime? If the Empire had the luxury of deploying a Valkyria to this far-flung corner of the continent, how many did they have?
And what did that cursed Temple hold for this Valkyria and her master to make an immediate beeline for it?
The officer glanced up and sideways at Batory. "And it's not like I'm violating a secret anymore, right? Everyone's fucking seen her by now, dear, so what's the point in pretending?" The Imperial Viszevar put her helmet on her head and watched as Batory took several more steps back. "Eh, don't shit your pants," she snickered as she fixed the straps under her chin. "Bles's too concerned about the Batomys for her to double back and erase your ass. I'd watch out for her escorts, though."
She dusted off her sleeves and bent down to do the same to her trousers, all without a visible hint of fear anymore. "Just between you and me, you're doing me a favor killing those other pricks."
Batory took another step back, this time partly in recoil at this disregard for her brothers in arms. Even Junjeong back in Alpha Wing was not this blunt, open, and crass about everything, and she was already as subtle as an Euskadi car bomb (and she could probably replicate said bombs in her sleep) and as uncouth as a pig farmer in rural Valakia. Who was this mortal human to behave with such abandon for her comrades, meatshields or not, and with or without deep national enmities?
Inner voice is also not telling me to shoot her. What do I even subconsciously see in this damned woman?
Make up your damned mind, Batory.
"How so?"
"They're almost all Prutenians and at least one of them was Muscovite, they deserve to be shot," sneered the Viszevar with pure contempt dripping from her words, a hatred for the sons of the Empire Batory only typically witnessed exhibited by Diarchic Viszevars. "Just because I'm in Imperial uniform doesn't mean I have to love any of these jackboot fetishists." Her smirk turned frigid, her purple eyes correspondingly fiery. "I'll work with them, but that doesn't mean I'll miss them when they're gone."
What? The Crow started to piece the evidence together, and this had the expected effect of making the bile rise within him. "And you're telling me this why?"
"Because you're Viszevaric, dear," chortled the Imperial, the smile turning genuine once again with a speed that unnerved the Crow. There was absolutely an undercurrent of fascination from her words. "We both serve the haza, just in different ways. I trust you'd give me the same benefit if we were wearing the opposite pair of combat boots." She gave him a lazy wave to dismiss Batory and staggered toward the door.
We both serve the haza?
It all made sense for Batory now. The fact that she was a Viszevar. Her kit bearing a red 37. Her claims that she too served the Viszevaric homeland. Her insistence that she never loved the Imperial core nationalities to begin with.
The rage could no longer be properly contained.
"As I thought someone like you would say," hissed Batory, letting his indignation out if only a little bit as he fully realized who this may have been. A scion of one of the worst traitorous houses in his homeland's history, a house that stood with the Imperials as they partitioned Viszevary off the face of the planet. All of that this house did, done under the guise of protecting the homeland. "Eszterhazy."
The woman stopped dead in her tracks, blinking as she craned her head to face Batory again. "Well," she shrugged as she stared back. "That's me. Oberleutnant Eszterhazy." She placed her right hand on her curiously flat chest and gave it a pat, her face still bearing no signs of fear. "Arch-traitor to the haza, right? You going to shoot me?"
Hold fire
Batory fought the urge to blink. What did it mean, hold fire? Of all the traitors to kill or could have taken a shot at, he couldn't execute a member of one of Viszevary's most despised bloodlines?
Hold fire, repeated his subconscious. It began to frustrate him even more than he already was. But his inner voice had never led him astray so far, after all. He'd have to have a good long talk with himself sooner or later, but he acquiesced to it. Batory had a Squad to fall back to and cover.
"No," spat the warrant officer as he put even more distance between himself and Eszterhazy. He still could not suppress his indignation at the sight of her. "Not yet, anyways."
Eszterhazy simply continued the same genuine smile as before. "Thank you for that," she replied with a wink. "Now for fuck's sakes, get going before someone probably changes her mind and doubles back here." With these words and one last quiet chortle, the Imperial officer stumbled into the ruins. She never looked back at Batory as she vanished behind the devastated walls.
Batory had seen enough, and he had stayed in place for far too long. One Valkyria was bad enough for the entire campaign, but now there was an absolutely insane Viszevaric collaborator acting as one of her staff officers who evidently seemed to take an interest in him. As Eszterhazy began swearing loudly from within the shattered structure over the utter annihilation of the radio and the ruined corpse of the dead Militiawoman still inside, Batory sprinted to rejoin his unit and put as much distance between himself and the manic staff officer. The Archer was back in its holster, the captured Kar now replacing it in his hands.
He kept running southwest and spotted O'Hara and Regard standing their ground at the edge of the mesa, covering the Squad's withdrawal with a furious rate of fire. "Catherine, Regard," he loudly called as he slid into a crouch right behind them. "We have to go!"
/
Batory ripped his bayonet out from the base of the neck of the freshly departed Imperial Scout who had tried to brute force his way over the scrap of wall the Crow and a few others had taken shelter behind. As the Imperial started to keel over gurgling, Batory grabbed the dead man's ammunition belt with his free hand and savagely hacked it off of his torso to finally feed his captured Kar B(S). His Archer was finally dry, the pistol and the empty magazines resting a half-meter beside him in the sand – a byproduct of his drawing his bayonet to kill the intruder.
Note to self: pick those up later and clean them, morosely thought the Viszevar as he hurriedly sheathed his bayonet without bothering to clean the blood off of the blade first as he usually made attempts to do. Swiftly unslinging his captured rifle, Batory fished around the dead man's magazine pouches for another reload.
It had been just shy of ten minutes since Squads 1 through 6 were officially ordered to fall back in the face of the Imperial sledgehammer assault, the tired survivors tasked with creating last-ditch defensive lines in the rocky terrain just northeast of the Temple to prevent any more reinforcements from approaching Squad 7. The attack in the Temple area was so fierce that for the first time in its entire combat career, Squad 7 had officially reported KIAs, a certain Engineer Wyatt and Scout Leonard receiving the dubious honor of being Gunther's first battlefield losses. Multiple others were wounded to varying degrees, but Squad 7 was holding.
They were apparently even beginning to breach the Batomys's thick carapace and endangering the accursed Imperial nobleman inside. How else could the increased ferocity of the Valkyria's reinforcements – or what was left of them after they were caught in a crossfire from Squad 1 and the Edelweiss – be explained? The reports of the Batomys's armor starting to crack were by this point the only things keeping the 3rd Company's morale just above water.
Behind Batory past Raymond, the last muffled screams of terror of an Imperial Shocktrooper were snuffed out by the correspondingly harsh cracking sounds of metal and bone, as Calvey repeatedly smashed his empty Lancaar lance into the Imperial's face plate to crush the helmet and the Prutenian's face under it like an egg. As Batory rapidly leveraged the Kar's empty magazine out of its well with a fresh one, he sensed Calvey hurriedly bending over to grab the dead Shocktrooper's MP to continue the fight in any way he could.
"All right, how hard can this be," swore Hector Calvey, his signature blue bandana fluttering defiantly in the desert winds as he checked his magazine and tugged at the bolt. "It's just like back home. Just point an' shoot."
"Hey, did the Imps back then have a tank the size of a barn," shouted Raymond as he emptied his magazine. "Or a woman running around on fire back then?"
"No," loudly retorted Calvey as he rested his gun over the edge of the wall and began to return fire. The MP rattled in bursts of five to seven rounds, each burst making someone on the other side die or find new inspiration to find places to shelter in they would never previously have thought possible. "Would've made it interesting back then for sure."
"Probably," admitted the Shocktrooper as he brought down another Imperial within spitting distance of the wall with his last few rounds. At this close a range, their breastplates didn't matter in the slightest. "Stay down, you little shit," he spat. Raymond immediately began to reload, diving into a crouch behind his portion of the wall.
11:00 Sniper Range 150 Kill
The bolt on the Kar slammed into place as the rifle found itself snapped onto Batory's shoulder. Instantly swinging the rifle to his left and peering through the lightly damaged scope, Batory instantly found the helmet of an Imperial Sniper poking through the ruins of what seemed to be a ruined shed. He started to pull the trigger, but a burst of blood and a sudden flinch of the Imperial's head beat him to the punch. Shooting a quick glance to his right, the warrant officer saw Regard throw the bolt back to eject his spent casing with a satisfied smirk on his face. To the grey-haired Sniper's immediate left was O'Hara, who threw a quick, nervous wave at Batory's direction and returned to spotting now that she had finally run out of ammunition.
Thank you, Regard, he thought to himself as he immediately readjusted targets. Your talent in counter-sniping cannot be denied.
12:00 Enemies 8 Range 30 Kill
Batory immediately shifted his eye to the iron sights and began engaging the Imperials closer to him, pulling the trigger in a steady, disciplined manner and controlling the kick of the Imperial 7.62 mm rifle cartridges with slight effort. The enemy was close, and roughly one squad's worth of them remained to engage Batory's immediate section of the line. Unlike at Vasel, these infantry were actively closing the distance even as it became clear that their numbers were dwindling. It seemed the Imperials collectively understood that it was too late to change the battle – but they would still try.
The shots had to count.
A Scout, dressed in the brick red combat uniform of an Imperial unit commander, went down after taking a bullet to the neck. He descended into his death throes in the sand of Barious, his hands vainly wrapped around his neck as the blood began to spill and color-coordinate the sand around him with his attire. Enemy destroyed.
Another pair of sharp cracks and a Lancer was struck in the shoulder. The large man roared and staggered back from the pain and impact force of the Kar round, involuntarily squeezing his hands and firing a Panzerlanze rocket a tad too high above the Gallians' heads. The backblast, however, instantly killed his unarmored Engineer fellow seeking shelter behind him, his tunic starting to smolder at the stomach from the sheer heat. Enemies destroyed.
A quick aim adjustment and yet another trigger pull later, the Lancer joined his brother in arms in Hell via a bullet into his groin, the only unarmored part of the body the rifle could reliably find. Enemy destroyed.
The Mags and the MP to his left continued their chatter, Raymond and Calvey pacing their fire to cover the other while they reloaded. Another pair of Shocktroopers was shredded before they could find cover or close the distance. Yet another was gunned down by Regard, the man crumpling to the ground with blood pouring down his face behind his armored visor. A nearby Imperial Scout was then violently transformed into gory, fleshy confetti courtesy of Selden's Lancaar fire immediately to Batory's right.
"Hah, WEAK!" Selden guffawed as she dove back behind the ruined walls. She began to pull out another rocket from her ammunition bag with a satisfied sneer.
"Tin cans are running, kids!" roared Mayfield with delight in the distance as he scurried among his immediate fireteam to encourage them and to correct their stances behind cover to maximize its value. "Keep shooting those assholes!"
"Selden, Calvey," ordered Batory as he saw the two remaining silhouettes in front of him begin to take shelter behind a particularly tall and thick portion of wall. One particularly burly silhouette, obviously a Lancer based on the way he seemingly leaned on something behind the tall wall he called his refuge, caught his attention. But the Crow was no longer as panicked as before – these humans were easy enough to engage, and the Valkyria by all accounts was somehow being held up if the runners weren't mistaken. "Ammo check."
Still can't shoot them even though I can see them, the Viszevar muttered to himself in slight frustration. It's all so familiar now, this sort of restriction.
"Lancaar's empty," replied Calvey as his MP ran out of ammunition in the current magazine. He too dipped behind the wall, reaching out once more to the man he killed a short time prior to salvage another stick. "Subgun's OK, Raymond seems good."
"One more rocket," quietly confirmed Selden as she shoved in her last HEAT rocket into her Lancaar with contemptuous ease. She glanced over the wall in the direction of the high wall, and then back at the Crow with a knowing smirk.
The Crow wordlessly replied with a ghost of a smile as he peeked out above the edge of the wall and jabbed his rifle toward that same wall he knew the Imperial Lancer and his own Engineer partner were hiding behind. "Radical reconstruction," he ordered. Batory swiveled his head in the other direction toward Raymond and Calvey, this time motioning with his free hand toward right of the fireteam. "Calvey, take Nielsen and assist Mayfield. Raymond, stay put, weapons ready."
"Got it, boss," confirmed Calvey. Looking to his own left, he slapped Nielsen to get his attention. "You OK?"
"Yeah, yeah," monotonously replied Nielsen, looking as utterly bored as he always did. "Good to go."
"Nice," grunted Calvey as he grasped his Lancaar with his left hand. "Follow me, and a rocket for the lady, please."
Calvey ran to the right of the team's position in a half-crouch and with both of his weapons, Nielsen hurriedly scuttling behind him and silently tossing Selden one extra Lancaar rocket as he passed by the bodybuilder Lancer. After staring at the rocket in the sand for a brief moment with what seemed to be an amused and contemptuous look on her face, Selden hefted her lance once more and looked back up at the Crow.
"After you," grinned the tanned woman.
Batory gave her a half-smile as he finished checking his magazine as well. "Raymond, stand by." The Crow immediately heard a determined "Yep" from Raymond and gave a short nod. "High wall, do it."
With an even wider grin, Selden shot up from behind her cover, easily hosting the fully loaded Lancaar and pointing it at the wall that was soon to be nothing but dust and echoes.
"Backblast!" Batory yelled out of reflex as he steadied his aim with his rifle downrange and began firing semi-randomly to suppress the last remaining Imperials in his little plot of Gallia. Gallian Lancaar or Imperial Panzerlanze – it didn't matter the model. Backblast was backblast, even to a Crow.
And suppression was suppression, even for large Imperial men with excessive body armor and overly bulky weapons fit more for a medieval fair.
"You see these muscles!?" Selden bellowed, her grip tightening around the trigger mechanism. "How about now!?"
/
Half an hour later, it was all over.
The Imperials broke first, their entire task force beating a headlong retreat westward with the Imperial prince seemingly safely evacuated and the Valkyria doing nothing but covering the rear with a curious attention for her superior. So sporadic and wild was their return fire that Squad 7, even when rushing headlong to run down any stragglers, suffered no additional casualties. The smoldering wreckage of the Batomys tank lay in the shadow of the Temple, ejecting columns of smoke into the twilight sky as blue Ragnite flames began to dance and create eerie patterns of light and shadow in the surrounding desert landscape. The entire area was littered with ammo casings, rubble, splotches of blood, and the occasional body part not yet recovered and processed by the graves details.
As the last scrapes and clatters of entrenching tools echoed in the Temple grounds as the last of the Imperial dead were thrown into hasty mass graves and the last of the Gallian dead identified and bundled into body bags, Batory surveyed his bloodied Squad. The men and women of Squad 1 assembled a stone's toss away from the crustacean-like roof of the ancient building, exhausted and traumatized. Landzaat and all of the NCOs were present, as well as all of the "old breed" – a term bandied around the Militia and the wider armed forces in reference to those who had survived the first war.
But there were still obvious no-shows in the assembly. Far too many of them.
Vermell and Carmine are dead, solemnly thought the Crow as he reflected on the retreat from the mesa. Vermell could never have recovered from that shattered neck and back, and perhaps it was best that he died as quickly as he did. Maybe, hopefully, he never felt it. And Carmine never should have died so horribly. The woman's blood and brain matter still stained the Scout gloves that Batory finally retrieved from his marching pack and forced onto his hands, just for the purpose of handling the human remains.
The bodies remained in the villa ruins curiously unlooted, not even a pouch showing signs of tampering on either corpse. Perhaps Eszterhazy knew certain things about showing due diligence to the dead.
Vermell, Carmine, Rosenkranz, and a few others are dead or crippled. None of them had survived more than a month in the field, continued Batory in his own head. Even Carmine, who was rumored to have been a deserter from Latium's notorious Tenth Legion superheavy infantry unit and roamed the continent as a guard for hire, survived. Not even the alleged legionary survived a head-on assault involving a Valkyria.
Batory suppressed a sigh as Landzaat began to speak to his Militiamen, a weary and strangely beaten tone emanating from his mouth. Perhaps Landzaat felt the loss of his men and women as keenly as other Squad commanders did; Squad 4's Lt. Baelz had reportedly come close to snapping after enduring the Batomys's crushing charge. Perhaps Landzaat had had a dark epiphany regarding the Valkyria, if his tone when speaking to the warrant officer before the battle commenced was any indication.
Perhaps both, grimly concluded the warrant officer.
"All right, ladies and gentlemen," spoke Landzaat in that deflated tone. "We've made it. And we should all be proud of what we've done." He forced a smile onto his lips. "Cpt. Varrot's just let me know that the tank we just helped take down here was the same one that ran down Ghirlandaio back in March."
The lieutenant quietly chuckled. "Apparently the Army guy who had to tell her that over the radio sounded very upset that we got it."
The amassed Squad let out a suppressed, collective laugh, filled with contemptuous vindication and relief. Finally, there was something the Militia accomplished that the Army couldn't discount, especially not when an entire 240-tonne vehicular carcass remained as a trophy on the battlefield. Perhaps having Ellet attached to the company and continuously reporting on their accomplishments (while also quietly downplaying their defeats and setbacks) wasn't all that bad.
Of course, the Army sent us here in the first place without proper information, noted the Crow to himself, finding himself to share a small part of that contemptuous glee. Given that Uncle had oftentimes shown him during his trips back to the embassy Gallian Army intercepts showing that Amatriain oftentimes denied critical, need-to-know information when sending many Militia units beyond the 3rd Company out to battle, the Crow stopped giving the Gallian GHQ as much benefit of the doubt as before. So they can remain silent as we rub it in.
In a sense, perhaps this too was something he should have anticipated, knowing full well that armies simply could not be expected to tell their men everything for security purposes. Not even KISHIN could be reliably expected to tell outbound Crows everything, given the agency's inherent paranoia. But he still could not help but share in his Squad's derision for the regular Army. It was in-group osmosis.
"That being said," continued Landzaat as his smile vanished and his tone became lower, "We've lost some good people today. It's always too many, no matter what anyone outside says."
Batory saw from the corner of his eye the lieutenant turn his head from left to right, taking in the whole Squad arrayed before him. The collective Squad too began to briefly deflate in mood as they remembered once again the missing comrades that were still alive a scant few hours prior. "But we're still in the war," the lieutenant continued, "And there're still Imps to kill. I need you all good to go, and so does Gallia."
Landzaat gave a slow nod as he slowly inhaled and let it out. "We got screwed today," he snarled louder. "But I'm still with you. Are you still with me?"
The Squad collectively let out a roar in the affirmative. "Yes, sir!" Old, young, men, women – they all were still united in their resolve to fight and die for Gallia, and their hopes to drag some Imperials kicking and shrieking to Hell with them in the case it didn't turn out so well.
One Batomys and one Valkyria did not change the fact that Gallia still needed them until the end. And Batory understood that whether it knew it or not, Gallia still needed him and everyone else.
How quickly his motivations had mutated. He didn't resist it. Manju or Barious, it was still fighting the Empire – but now, it was no longer just about killing the Imperial elsewhere before he punched too far into Kokuria again.
It was also about defending Gallia and her people now.
/
"Gods, look at this shit," muttered Valt as he rapped the track armor of the dead Batomys with his gloved knuckles. The flames had been extinguished around the Batomys a short time prior, the Army reportedly sending over a salvage team to go over the hull and wrench out any useful things still left intact before dynamiting the remains. "Are the Imps compensating for something? Who the Hell decides this sort of tank is fine?"
"Someone very sad that the Feddies are making better tanks, probably," chortled Inglebard as he gave the Batomys a kick, the boot making a satisfying, metallic echo on the dented, scorched steel. "What'd they call 'em? Minutes, I think."
"I mean, these things were around from like a year back at least, babe," gently retorted Aika Thompson, her pigtailed red hair marking her out from the rest of the group. "Saw those at the Morganston D.E. parade, remember? Who knows what the Feddies were making before that to spook the Imps."
She turned toward Raymond, who was staring up at the main gun of the Batomys with contempt etched on his face. "Heard you had it hard out there, Alex," she probed cautiously. "Got a goddess running around and all, right? How're you all doing?"
Raymond shrugged and glanced back at Thompson with an expression displaying a mixture of frustration and satisfaction. "We're OK," he answered. "I'm not sure many of the greenies are still around, though. Lot of 'em are dead or being sent home."
"Speaking of 'all dead,'" interjected Valt as he swiveled his head back to Batory with an inquisitive look. "Hardins in Squad 4 told me that you told 'em to start knocking out those escort tanks. Said you sounded like you already knew the drill."
"… I may have, yes," admitted the Crow unfazed. "… I had a friend in the 10th Armored who saw something similar and took notes."
Raymond gave an appreciative nod. "That's good," he remarked as he too gave a swift kick to the Batomys to vent his rage. "If the Sevens had to deal with other tanks at the same time, we'd been screwed. Tell your friend I said thanks when you get back home, I don't even care if he's 10th Armored."
The Shocktrooper gave a small smile. "Also," he quipped, "I kinda liked how you spoke faster for once. Keep doing that, would you?"
"… Of course," replied the Viszevar with some amusement. Bongseon would have a field day being complimented by mortals. He'd probably never let anyone in Alpha hear the end of it. "… My friend likes the attention."
He hesitated a little before continuing, "And I will try to speak faster, yes."
"So this isn't the first of this thing that the Imps lost," sneered Valt in satisfaction as he side-eyed the superheavy. "Probably the first to get owned by militia, though."
"So how'd your friend do it," asked Inglebard, his eyes glittering at the opportunity to talk about anyplace else. "How'd he fight a superheavy?"
"We kept shooting it until it died," admitted Batory as he turned his attention to the Arcadian. This time, he actively put in effort to make the Standard Europan flow more naturally as opposed to his prior, overly measured manner of speaking. "Manju is too flat to really hide vehicles, so you all did it better here."
Inglebard beamed at the compliment. "Well, we do our best," he grinned. "To be honest, I think the Imperial prince guy helped a lot, driving his ride into a canyon like this. What a moron."
"Yeah, and only like one squad to screen his royal rear," commented Valt. "Maybe two. That's what Is- the other Gunther told me. Only one or two freaking squads made it to you all. How embarrassing."
"Squads 1 and 4 send their respects," scoffed Raymond as he raised his hands and imitated shooting a gun. "Breastplates don't stop 7.92, who'd have thought."
"But I heard," continued Thompson as she turned to the Crow, also sharing her fellow Arcadian's glimmer at the prospect of talking about the outside world, "That you guys got even closer, right? Got right up to the tank before firing?"
"Pyeon-gon rocket fire, apparently danger close range," nodded the Crow in respect. "The Batomys never had a chance by that point."
"Hey, can we get some of those, then?" Raymond smirked as Inglebard and Thompson wordlessly showed their amazement. "It'd save us a lot of time in the future."
"Embassy is open from 9:00 to 6:00, Raymond," shrugged Batory. It was so unusual still, speaking so quickly and casually. Most of the Crows had no difficulties in this regard, but the Viszevar for a long time had never had a need to speak so fast.
But he started to like it somehow.
"Make it a day trip," he continued, "And I have heard rumors the Diarchy has already sold some weapons, anyways."
Probably just some old 16TD tanks or even some 20TDs, but they'd still be better than the Gallian models. KISHIN doesn't really deal in trade negotiations.
And let's just ignore the part where most of the rocketeers died in the return fire, continued Batory to himself. But they made it count.
As did many of us here.
"Oh, you bet I will," blurted out Inglebard as he mimicked a rocket with his hand. "I'll just walk in there and ask for some, they probably won't mind." His smile suddenly wilted as he glanced back at the Batomys. "You know, I… I wish Dallas and Montley were still around to see this damned thing smoking. Maybe see those rockets you mentioned."
"Hey," interjected Raymond as he reached out and gave a soft push on Inglebard's shoulder. "They didn't die for nothing, you told me that earlier. If it weren't for them, you wouldn't have been able to get killshots on it."
"We still got a long war, babe," quietly spoke Thompson with a hint of sadness as she too gave Inglebard a comforting hand on his back. "We can get back at the Imps for Dallas and Montley, right?"
Batory watched silently as Raymond and Thompson assured Inglebard. Whatever he was going to say, the two had arguably already had said. Crows were never trained to be a moral pillar of support, other than killing enough people and high-value targets to boost combat morale. And yet…
"… Wyatt and Leonard made it count, Inglebard," quietly answered Batory, keeping the same distance from the Arcadian as before. He momentarily returned to his slower habits of speaking; he did not wish to rush. "… But it is up to us to make sure we win the war and that they truly did not die in vain."
He looked up at the Batomys as well for a scant moment, remembering what Bongseon had told him about the end results of the ammo cookoff in the Eisener Hand, and the reports of the Haesamwi Massacre he had received in the following days. War was brutal, and oftentimes could not allow for mercy to be shown. Kokurians and Yamataians knew this better than almost anyone, having wrestled with the Empire and its relatively newfound Tatar lackeys for decades and reclaiming land, resources, and honor with blood and steel. Viszevars shared a same level of contempt and rage toward the sons of Schwartzgrad, if not an even deeper hatred.
Diarchists showed scant mercy toward Imperials, and expected none in return – a decision that was vindicated seemingly every war based on reports on Imperial activities in occupied lands and even against prisoners of war. It was ugly and it was starting to wear down the national identity, to reduce Diarchists into a people perpetually under siege mentality. He of all people could thus probably not be asked to give good advice for a pair of Arcadians not even of legal age to drink under regular circumstances.
But he could soften the advice, to help steel them. He couldn't ask them ever to be Diarchists, that was not the way of western Europans and their descendants. But he could still help.
Batory looked back down at the Militiamen. "… Keep fighting, keep killing, and win the war, and the dead here will become heroes… That is what we must do for them now that they have sacrificed themselves for us."
Inglebard looked back at the Crow, processing these words; Thompson and Raymond also glanced back and seemingly pondered this piece of hopefully cogent advice. After a long, uncomfortable pause, Inglebard smiled once again.
"I've always been good at finishing things," he whispered as he returned the favor and gave both Raymond and Thompson pats on the shoulder in appreciation. "I can't exactly stop now, can I?"
"No, you can't," agreed Thompson. "I don't think you've ever really understood the concept of 'impossible.'"
"That's what people say to feel good about themselves when they quit," retorted Inglebard in better humor. He nodded. "Empire's big, but our body count matches. We'll win this."
Batory returned a small nod in appreciation. "That is all Gallia needs right now," he agreed, his tone steadily returning to its regular volume and the requested speed. "It needs leaders and warriors like you."
Valt swung at the Batomys again, the resulting crack this time becoming harsher as if to accentuate Inglebard's boast. "They couldn't break 250 men with a superheavy and a goddess," he smirked. "They better bring more shit if they wanna win."
Oh, Valt, thought Batory in a brief moment of bitterness. You have no idea. The Imperials aren't necessarily even trying their best here.
Bastard children of the dynasty don't get many benefits as legitimate ones. Make the most of it.
"Oh, good," laughed Inglebard again as he rubbed his hands in anticipation, his spirits fully restored now. "I got that ration, Bat's got the gun, we could probably go for something bigger, then."
"You said that the biscuit tasted like death, Vyse," sighed Thompson in an exaggerated manner, a smile coming back to her own face. "You wanna die again?"
Raymond let out a snort. "Wait, Vyse can die? Since when? Bat's already started to speak faster, what else am I gonna learn?"
As the two Arcadians and Raymond started to bicker over the frugality and quality of Imperial field rations and Valt began to muscle his way into the conversation with his retorts on eastern Europan cuisine, Batory could not help but smile ever so slightly. Valt was right, and so was Inglebard. The Empire had been utterly humiliated on the field yet again despite its overwhelming advantages. Even if Imperial forces in country were intentionally handicapped due to politics and the wider Europan theater, fighting the Empire was more than possible even for a country utterly dwarfed by its neighbors.
Winning was not impossible. To vindicate the deaths here was more than feasible.
/
Barious Desert Outskirts, Principality of Gallia
June 16, 1935 EC
First Lieutenant [REDACTED] Eszterhazy
General Staff, Army Corps Center, Gallian Invasion Front
"So," drawled the quartermaster in Prutenic as he hefted up a new Kar B(S) in front of him. He stared tiredly at the staff officer standing in front of him with a cold smile fixed on her face, who showed not a hint of fatigue. "How'd you lose this one?"
The woman reached out with both hands and grasped the marksman rifle, prying it out of the wizened QM's hands. Closing her eyes and gently tossing the rifle in her hands to get a feel for the weight, she looked for the words to answer.
"I got fucked by a grenade," shrugged Eszterhazy as she opened her eyes, also taking care to reply in the Empire's command language. Technically, it wasn't a lie. It was also better than having to explain to the Prutenian that she was held up by a fellow Viszevar and decided to roll the die. "The lenses were ground to dust."
The QM gave an exasperated hmmph. "To dust, you say?"
"OK, I was exaggerating," she admitted with a roll of her eyes. "But I heard something crack on my way down."
The other Imperial in turn shrugged as well, his waxed moustache drooping as if to show his rapidly faltering patience with such a second-class subject of His Imperial Majesty and the Victor's Throne. "Must have been your pride," he muttered.
"Oh, really?" The staff officer shot back in a low voice, half-seriously. These pissant Prutenians and their preoccupation with prestige made her miserable. "How much do I have left then, sir?"
"Too much and too little, Viszevar," sighed the supply officer as he rolled his eyes and waved his hand toward the tent flap. He looked down at the requisition form on his desk, freshly annotated for the lieutenant's replacement arms. "This isn't the first time you've lost a gun, but please make it your last. Now raus (2)."
The Viszevar glared for a long second at the QM's forehead and obeyed his instructions to vacate his tent, turning on her heels with a silent sneer and an undercurrent of fury in her steps on her way out. She had paperwork of her own to fill out regarding her status as sole survivor of her immediate ad hoc assault squad and how she had lost her weapon, and the QM was being the Prutenian boot shiner as was most of Army Corps Center. But at least she wasn't in the center of that damned desert anymore and the early dawn was making the ambient temperature reach anywhere acceptable levels.
Too bad about there being no showers, sighed the lieutenant in resignation as she made her way through the mass of Imperial troops, weapons, and vehicles that were starting to organize themselves in the new FOB. It was without question far less populated than last morning. The lines would be shorter now. Thank fuck.
Eszterhazy reached the expansive central tent, the one that housed His Grace Maximilian and his immediate staff. While normally, she would have been assigned along with Bles to a separate tent right next to this large cornerstone construction as a staff officer for the Valkyria, her general was in that overpoweringly enormous shelter at the same time and was apparently refusing to leave or even see most other people at all. It had been like this ever since the Batomys had to be forcibly evacuated under Gallian fire the previous evening.
It was all very enlightening to see both Maximilian's and Bles's expressions and behaviors as they staggered back to base camp. Bles appeared genuinely worried for His Grace while remaining livid over what seemed to be her defeat. Selvaria Bles always was like that, for as long as Eszterhazy had known her – while she was genuinely concerned with the welfare of the men and occasional women under her command, she was above everything else hopelessly devoted to her prince in almost-literal shining armor. To have to evacuate the man she loved under fire after being demolished by militia was a humiliation for her.
Maximilian on the other hand seemingly never broke his cool, regal demeanor, right down to using royal we's on the battlefield like he was a true son of the von Reginraves. In victory, sure, he gloated, but he never truly broke character in defeat as far as Eszterhazy had the pleasure (or displeasure?) of knowing the man. After all, he said, they were only temporary setbacks. Even if he showed a small level of frustration with the recent defeat at Barious…
He seemed more upset over losing the tank, she recalled as she began to make out a familiar figure a mere ten meters before her. He didn't even address Bles's own concerns at all, I think. Who knows with that man.
The lieutenant was stopped from entering by her general's other major adjutant, dressed in his red Ace combat uniform and bearing the accouterments of a Scout sans the crested helmet. He glanced at her apologetically through his messy brown hair.
"Sorry, Eszterhazy," spoke Second Lieutenant Johann Eisen as he rose from a small wooden chair a short distance before the entrance to the central tent. His Kar B rifle remained on the ground propped up against several nearby crates, surrounded by a crass menagerie of combat equipment. Also present was a half-devoured pack of combat rations, paired up with a small pyramid of shreds of cardboard. Naturally, the biscuit tins remained mostly unopened as the Viszevar came to expect. "The general's still not taking visitors."
"That bad?" grumbled Eszterhazy, the frustration continuing to boil despite her like for the man in front of her. What did Bles see in that bastard child of the von Reginraves, anyways? She did know that Bles was former ISB and that Maximilian had something to do with that transition, but that alone probably wasn't justification for fawning that hard over that man. Hell, the lieutenant herself had a good reason to support Maximilian given his lip service toward elevating Viszevary to a full Core Domain of the Empire and his history of getting shit done, and even she had reservations.
At least Eisen was honest and direct, and capable of thinking for himself when tough decisions had to be made. He also didn't participate in any wanton killings of civvies or Darscens like most of the other scum in the invasion force. So she made an exception for her contempt for Imperials when it came to the Scout.
Eisen nodded in concern as he plopped back down onto the chair. "She's livid right now," he warned quietly as he began to chew on a cold pea sausage. The Scout Ace stole occasional concerned glances back at the tent flap, almost as if someone was going to storm out and rip his arms off to beat him to death with his own liberated appendages, food items and all. "She's very upset over what happened to His Grace yesterday. I heard he took some ricochets and concussions."
Understandable, thought Eszterhazy as she saw Eisen gingerly swallow the mouthful of food in his mouth. Given the amount of AT ordnance the Gallians had to break a Batomys, I'm surprised that was all he took on the way out.
Good. I still need him for the sake of the haza.
"You'd understand why no one's too eager to enter," finished the other aide, bringing the sausage for another bite and then hesitantly lowering his hand. He cocked his head as he continued to stare at the Viszevar. "I want to go in and see how she is, but-"
"She did tell you off at least politely, right?" Eszterhazy smirked coyly. Oh, how predictable his motivations were. "I know she likes you well enough."
Eisen gave a nervous chuckle as he rubbed the back of his head with his standard-issue fingerless gloves. "Yeah, and you'd probably get the same treatment if you tried for the same reasons," he answered as he returned the lieutenant's smile. "You're her favorite comms officer, I think, so just take a number and we'll wait for now. It's not important, is it?"
The Viszevar shook her head with her smirk intact. "No, so I'll just be on my way to get a chair like the one propping up the general's favorite former Engineer." She tilted her head and raised her eyebrows as she looked at the small tripod Eisen rested on. "Bitch, where did you even get it to start?"
"Otto made it," smiled the Ace. "He said it helps him concentrate, being a carpenter and all."
Eszterhazy snorted in amusement. "Your boy knows how to work with his hands, huh?" She stopped for a moment, her smirk remaining on her face and her finger hovering next to her pallid face as if to demand silence. "Actually, time to pay him a visit. How much for the chair?"
"His tent's the third one down the southeast lane," replied Eisen with a jab of his finger. "Let him know I sent you, and he'll make you something for cheap. Friend of a friend, right?"
"Oh ho, that's real kind of you both," replied the Viszevar with a wide, toothy grin and a wink. Eszterhazy pivoted on her boots to embark on her quest for seating, but was soon stopped. "Hey, Eszterhazy," hissed Eisen.
She spun again on her heels to face the Scout Ace, the Gallian dirt crunching underneath her boots. She cocked her head in slight frustration, the grin wiped out. "What?"
"Are you sure you don't want to talk about what happened to you at-"
Eszterhazy sighed and closed her eyes. "No, Eisen, Gods damn it," she griped. "At lea- at least not yet."
The Imperial raised his hands apologetically. "Hey, sorry," he answered. "But it's been a while already, right? You've already told the general?"
"… Yeah," she whispered as she opened her eyes once more. "She's known for a while. Look, I'll tell you eventually, all right? I trust you to not run away with it."
Eisen smiled once more at the lieutenant. "I'm not trying to rush you," he assured her, and she knew it was genuine. He always was honest, just like that; no wonder Bles kept him around as one of her closest aides. Eisen always did bring out the best in the Valkyria – and maybe the Viszevar herself. "But wouldn't it be better to just let it out soon before it rears its ugly head?"
Eszterhazy could only shrug non-committedly. "Maybe," she admitted as she stared forlornly at the young man. "I don't know. I'll be back."
Eisen patted one of his pouches on his dull crimson chestplate, the worn leather of the container marked with the familiar white and red symbol of first aid. It was a carryover from his old Engineer webbing, something he always carried even with his class transfer; not even his Iron Star hitched a ride on the cuirass as often as those pouches did. "Well, are you at least good on Ragnaid?"
"Yeah, Eisen, I am," smiled the Viszevar. "I only got scratches, and they're dealt with. You've always been paranoid about that stuff since Ghirlandaio."
"Antitoxins, Ragnaid," he shook his head with some anger at the memories of Ghirlandio Fortress, "They're both going in my pouches. Who knows what'll happen after that." After a moment, Eisen forced himself to relax and smile again. "Anyways," he sighed. "I'll stay here and hold down the fort."
"Thanks, dear."
Eszterhazy winked back and made a final pivot on her heels to weave her way through the sea of steel and muscle and Ragnite works. Eisen quietly watched her go. "Yeah," he quietly sighed as he raised the sausage up to take another bite. "You'll be back, and she'll still be here."
/
(1) Viszevaric for I am a Viszevar
(2) Prutenic for out