"Got 'em angry, pulling back to street on our port side. Over."

"Copy that, your port side. We're withdrawing and letting squad 3 cover your starboard. You'll lead 'em into a threeway. Over."

"Here they come.

"Suicider! Suicider!"

"Suicider down."

The General nodded along with the near rythym of the battle coming over the broadcasts. APCs sounded as if they were coordinating according to the plan. The Minutemen had yet to take a hit that a power armor grabbing and a STIM PACK couldn't make acceptable - in the strategic sense of the word.

What did worry her was the sheer number of enemy down. If the super mutants could provide that number of sheer targets, how many were still holding the main gate? How many did Cait miscount? How many were just embedded in the ruins that surrounded Diamond City? The plan required the intersection outside the main gate to Diamond City being absolutely secure. If the anvil could be overrun, then the hammer & anvil would become a dispersed melee. Crossfires would lead to friendly fires. Fog of war would increase exponentially with individual soldiers not being able to communicate to one another.

"They didn't follow. Repeat: enemy did not follow."

"We're thinned out on what's coming out of the police station."

The General called out. "That's our queue! Go, go, go!"

APC doors slammed shut as they peeled out from the street connecting the entrances to Hangman's Alley. The settlement was nearly worthless: attempting to farm or keep an internal water source was nearly impossible. On the other hand, it was located dead smack downtown between Vault 81 & Diamond City. Four blocks of driving separated where the APCs had prepped themselves and the 5 to 10 meters of street they needed to cover.

And now three blocks. Two. One.

"First stall!", the General ordered over the internal radio of an APC. The APCs stopped and their doors opened again. Each squad's power armor ran out the back as fast as it could.

"Move!" The APCs had barely picked their doors off the street as they made their way to the hold point. Each nearly dented the next as they tried to form a solid wall across the intersection. Surprisingly and fortunately, most of the super mutants had their backs turned as they tried to follow the action that was down street from their position.

Now one corporal was realizing that he was in one of those moments where a person will remember it in crystal detail for the rest of their lives. They only last a fraction of a second or so. But he would never forget the look on this particular super mutant's face as he reached over with his left hand and tapped another on the shoulder. The other turned from the street he was peering down to rip into the one that tapped him. The first only pointed right at the corporal. The look on the other's face, in response to a line of APCs, was absolutely priceless.

"We're locked in General.", he called out.

"Get those doors back down!", the General screamed through her personal power armor's speakers. With heavy clangs she scrambled out the back of the military vehicle to take command. "Get out and get up. Have your synths cover our backside and make sure we're not jumped from behind."

With that, Minutemen started scrambling out of APCs, followed by Mark IIs. The people stepped into the waiting hands of privates that used their armor enhanced strength to press them up to the roofs of the APCs. In seconds, a firing line in a raised position had been established. The Minutemen cut a sizeable chunk out of what was supposed to be the most dangerous spot in the line of the siege.

"We're in position!", the General called into the nearest APC. "Tell the others to press back into us. Repeat:Anvil is good!"

"Anvil is go. Repeat: anvil is go." sqwuaked every transmitter in an APC in the area. "Hammer commence."

"That means it's our turn, boys.", the General told the other Minutemen in power armor at the APC line. Power armor started pushing each other on top of APCs only to have them drop down in front of the line with MINIGUNs and GATLING LASERs blazing. After the General had everyone at least on top and ready to drop down, she activated her own jet pack to throw her suit over the line and into the fight.

The space in front of the main gate was cleared out of super mutants within the minute. "You and you: hold this north-south street on the right. All of you: rip into everything from the left."

"Yes, General!"

The General's X-01 Type 6 power armor, now decked out in blue and white with a stylized laser musket and lightning logo, clomped over to the main gate and tapped out 'shave and a haircut'. It's oversized finger pressed the intercom button. "Any body in there order an ass-whuppin'?"

An electronic voice came out of the attached speaker. "That didn't sound like a super mutant."

"It's the General of the Minutemen.", she replied. "Get your lazy asses out here and lend a gun to your own defense. Unless you were intending to have the Minutemen render you absolutely useless."

It was a noticable amount of time, in combat terms, before the gate opened. By the time it did, APCs from the hammer sides of the conflict had come into sight. But every available man the Diamond City Security had came our, armed with every pipe gun and baseball bat they could find.

But even after hopping over bodies of super mutants, they didn't really join the fight in any meaningful way. The super mutant force had been split and exhausted in spent ammuniton and man power.

The General waited until a very, very few were left alive along the eastern side of the stadium. "Surrender to the Minutemen!"

"Super mutant beat human!", came the nearly reflexive response. And then dying response.

Standing among smoldering super mutants, the General offered. "Offer a surrender on the other street. Prioritize medical assistance to our own troops. But offer it all the same."

"Um, General?", another power armor suit next to her raised its hand.

"Yes, private?"

"Medical assistance to who?", the Minutemen asked.

The General assessed the situation. Minutemen were pouring onto the street from the APCs that had pulled super mutants away from their lines and then pressed back. The troops in power armor around her were marred but not irrepairable, let alone injured. The men on top of the wall the vehicles had formed didn't seem to be lacking in rifles shooting down the other street. And the Diamond City Security certainly didn't look like they had been in a fight.

"Huh."