Chapter 62

Captain Henryk Liszka of the Achilles Two-Class Gunboat Pan Tadeusz watched on as his DropShip took its place in Low Orbit over the fortification lines that were to be his target for this bombardment. There was a small frown on his face as he did so, knowing that such a bombardment went against the Ares Conventions. Such a thing had not been ordered since Early in the Second Succession War, and that his Lord had ordered it done here and now didn't sit well with anyone who had made a career for themselves in the service, including himself. He'd spoken with Captain Argyros of the Agamemnon about it, and she had confessed to feelings of unease on the subject as well.

That wasn't to say that it wasn't warranted, mind you. After all, the Von Strangs had utilized nuclear mines in orbit that had severely damaged the first line of ships for First Guards Flotilla, including three of their fellow Achilles-Two Class Ships being destroyed outright. Even as retaliation, it still sat uneasily with him, however, and he expected the same to be true for Captain Argyros. However, as far as targets for orbital bombardment went, the situation could be a lot worse. The outer ring of fortifications cutting through the southern half of the Plain of the Rim Worlds Republic were entirely military, after all, with no civilians around to get caught up in the line of fire as collateral damage.

"Just so long as this remains the sole use of orbital bombardment, I think I can live with it." Muttered Captain Liszka.

"Sir?" Questioned his Executive Officer, Commander Phillip Conlan.

"It's nothing, Phil. Has the Agamemnon gotten into position yet?" Queried Captain Liszka.

"She hasn't signalled so. Should we comm over and get an ETA?" Asked Commander Conlan.

"I think so. There shouldn't be anything but military targets in the line of fire down there, but even so, I want this to be as precise as possible. For that, we need coordination." Ordered Captain Liszka.

"Right, Sir." Nodded Commander Conlan.

"On it, Sirs." Spoke up Lieutenant Helli Koskela, the Comms Officer on the Bridge of the Pan Tadeusz. Immediately, she began sending over a message to the Agamemnon even as Lieutenant Viktor Trenkor, the Weapons Officer, began plotting firing solutions with the help of Sensor Officer Lieutenant Gizela Janečková. For a few moments, there was not a single sound on the bridge save for the clacking of terminal keys as the various professionals of the bridge crew did their work. Then, Lieutenant Koskela received a reply from the Agamemnon.

"Sirs, we have the affirmative from the Agamemnon. They've sent their telemetry and firing solutions." Reported Lieutenant Koskela.

"Plug it into our own firing solutions. I don't want to be double tapping fortifications when we don't need to." Commanded Captain Liszka.

For a few more moments, silence reigned on the bridge, save for more clacking of terminal keys as the Agamemnon's Targeting Data was fed into the Pan Tadesuz's own firing solutions. After a few minutes, however, the pattern of fire was as precise as they could make it from low orbit. Lieutenant Koskela turned to Captain Liszka and reported that the Agamemnon had signalled they were ready to fire as well.

"Very well. Lieutenant Trenkor, you may fire when ready." Intoned Captain Liszka.

"May god have mercy on our souls." Added Commander Conlan.

As soon as the order was given, it was carried out, and hell rained down from orbit. . .

XXXX

Major Karl Greiser frowned as he peered at the screens showing enemy placement out on the plains. It was odd to him, but it seemed like the enemy had finished offloading their divisions and setting up their headquarters, but they hadn't moved a single step from their initial landing zones. He briefly entertained the idea of sending out a small unit of mechs and combat vehicles from one of the hidden hangars to try and poke them into action but discarded the thought. Only the mechs would truly be reliable enough for that. Too many of the combat vehicles in their reserve here were Militia Equipment. Most were little more than trucks mounted with Autocannon Twos crewed by scum that couldn't hack it in the regular army, though they did have a number of Scorpion Light Tanks with Proper Crews.

"Major, what news?" Came the Voice of his Commander, Colonel Arthur Frenzer, over the comms unit.

"Nothing yet, Sir. We have no movement from the enemy landing zones." Reported Major Greiser.

"What in the Sphere are they waiting for, I wonder?" Queried Colonel Frenzer.

"Who knows, Sir? Perhaps they simply don't have the spine?" Asked Major Greiser.

"Unlikely, Major. They would not have come all this way if that was the case." Huffed Colonel Frenzer.

Just then, however, his scopes let out a beeping noise, drawing Major Greiser's attention to the sensors. It seemed that the aerial bombardment from the Enemy's Vulcans had stopped, and the enemy Aerospace Fighters were pulling back out of the engagement zone. That was odd. Why would they do that, he wondered. It didn't matter, though. With those fighters out of the engagement zone, even the Militia Scum that had been forced into service would have a clear shot at the enemy landing zone.

"Colonel, the enemy fighters are pulling out of the engagement area. Permission to sortie Combat Vehicles?" Reported Major Greiser.

"Granted, but send a lance of the Jenners to back them up. I don't want any of the Militia Scum that Grassy has under his command bungling the attack. See if you can't get the enemy to counterattack into range of the fortress guns." Ordered Colonel Frenzer.

"Of course, Sir." Agreed Major Greiser. After all, both of them knew that Ferenc Grassy and his Militia were barely worthy of the name. Best to send in Fritz Koch and his Jenner Lance to stiffen their spine. Unfortunately for all involved, no sooner had the attack begun and the Combat Vehicles and Jenners left their hidden hangars than the reason for the lull in the fighting revealed itself.

And no Militia or Regular Soldier sent out would survive, nor would Major Greiser. . .

XXXX

I watched the line from the cockpit of my Highlander, mouth set into a grim line as I did so. I probably didn't need to do this, but I had ordered the orbital bombardment. I should be here to see it through. As I watched, I saw parts of the fortifications open up and issue forth a series of Combat Vehicles and Light Mechs. Most of the Combat Vehicles were military trucks with some forty-millimeter Autocannon Twos mounted on them, but some were Scorpion Light Tanks. The insignia on the trucks was different from the ones on the Scorpions. They were Green, White, and Red instead of Black, White, and Red. The Scorpions' insignia matched the ones on the Jenners, though.

It looked like a mixed batch of militia and regular army units if I had to make a guess as to the origin of the two different kinds of attackers. After all, I doubted that even Otto Von Strang would equip his regular army forces with ramshackle gun trucks that looked like they were put together on the cheap in a machine shop somewhere. I figured the fact that the militia was so poorly armed was likely a way to keep them in line. The Baron and his Wardens wouldn't want the peasants getting any ideas just because they had some guns, after all. Better to give them pop guns that might still kill enemy infantry and APCs, but wouldn't do shit to a tank, light mech, or anything heavier.

Of course, no sooner had the enemy's forces exited their hidden hangars than my Comms Unit beeped, and I looked up to the sky in time to see two new suns blossom into being. Orbital bombardment from two of the Gunships was a thing of terror and awe, as batteries of Large ER Lasers, Explosive and Armor-Piercing Ultra-Autocannon Rounds, Streak LRM Missiles, and Gauss Rifle Slugs rained literal hell down on the enemy.

By itself, an Achilles Two-Class Gunboat had fewer weapons than a Normal Achilles-Class. It was the quality of those weapons that made all the difference, however. That showed now, as the pair of Gunships in Low Orbit rained down on the fortifications and the enemy forces that had just exited them. There was a massive flash, and I felt the explosions in my stomach, even though the attack was happening on the horizon instead of anywhere close to my position. The thundering of guns and the blaze of flames lit up the horizon like some sort of second and third sun.

For fifteen minutes, I was witness to the single deadliest concentration of firepower I had ever seen. When it was finished, two gigantic sections of the fortifications were simply gone, not built to withstand the sort of continual bombardment from orbit that we had just subjected them to, that I had just subjected them to. To either side of those breaches sat crumbled rubble, as parts of the fortifications had been blasted to either side by shots going just a bit wide. The ground covering those breaches had likewise been turned to glass, dirt fused into a crystalline pane, extending for hundreds of yards to either side of the breaches.

There could be no question about it. Had this bombardment taken place on the third or even second line of fortifications, it would have caused civilian casualties. Even from a mile away at our camp, I could tell that much. It looked like the glass floor we had turned part of the Plain of the Rim Worlds Republic into extended a bit over half the distance from the fortifications on either side. I definitely couldn't order this again, the bile rose in my throat just thinking about potential collateral damage for that. However, there was little time to worry about that now. I had to press the attack while the enemy was still reeling.

"Come on, let's hit them while the iron's still hot!" I commanded.

My Highlander lurched into action, as did First and Second Guards. We had our opening, now we had to use it. As my Highlander ate up the ground between the Landing Zone and the Fortifications, crunching glass under its feet, I fired my Gauss Rifle at those weapons emplacements that were still intact. A ferronickel slug impacted an LRM Launcher that was turning to track our advance from one side of one of the breaches, punching into its ammo storage and destroying it, even as the Vulcans returned from the Fleet, armed up and ready to suppress other emplacements.

As we reached the fortification lines, another lance of Mechs, this time of Hunchbacks, emerged from a hidden bunker half a mile to the right, having to clear some of the rubble from the less precise strikes in the process. I fired my Gauss Rifle at one of them as it clambered up onto a pile of crumbled concrete and armor materials, my Ferronickel slug punching into its cockpit as I did so. Another of them, however, managed to get a shot of its Autocannon-Twenty off at me, round punching into the armor on the right side of my torso and smashing off the Ferro-Fibrous Armor plates, even as I janked to the side to avoid another shot, ducking behind a house-sized chunk of rubble to do so. That mech found itself under fire from members of First Guards, punched through by a trio of Gauss Rifle Slugs even as my jump jets ignited and I let off a burst from my Ultra-Autocannon, armor-piercing rounds riddling a second Hunchback before landing behind a chunk of rubble to avoid Autocannon fire.

We pressed the enemy back toward their partially buried Hangar entrance, even as more enemy Mechs arrived, a lance of Commandos backed by a Lance of Manticore Heavy Tanks from a concealed Hangar around a half a mile back from the lines. I popped out of Cover, firing my Gauss Rifle into a Commando, punching through the Light Mech and causing the reactor to Scram, only to wind up taking fire from a Manticore's PPC that boiled the Ferro-Fibrous Armor off my Left Leg. Return fire from my Ultra-Autocannon sheared the turret off the Manticore, but I was forced back into cover by its comrades' SRM fire. To my right, some of First Guards weren't as lucky, as a pair of Rifleman Two-A's went down to massed SRM Fire from the Manticores, and a Rampage Four-X was forced to pull back due to having one of its arms blown off by a Commando. However, one of First Guards' Close Combat Configuration Dragoons managed to let off a full salvo from its five medium lasers to destroy two of the Manticores and force the third back, even as a Rampage downed another Commando.

I popped up out of cover, firing my Gauss Rifle and Ultra-Autocannon as I did so, downing another Hunchback and a Commando as I did so, and as First Guards fired away at the emerging lances of Jenners and Scorpions, taking fire in return but putting out far more than they took, I looked around and saw this turning into a Turkey shoot. I hung back and watched with a grin as First Guards managed to decimate the remaining enemy forces before Streak LRM and ER PPC Fire from the Griffin Twos managed to collapse the hangar entrances. Once that was done, we sent in the infantry to enter the fortifications and waited.

Five Hours after landing, we had managed to clear the first line of fortifications, largely thanks to orbital bombardment. It cost us two Riflemen, Twelve Vulcan Aerospace Fighters, and a Pair of Hipparch Twos Destroyed, and one Rampage Four-X Crippled to do, alongside forty infantrymen killed or wounded. That was just over six and a half percent casualties, a marked improvement on the casualty figures we had suffered in the Oberon War, largely thanks to the new machines and the Orbital Bombardment. I fully expected things to get worse from here, though.

After all, I wasn't going to use Orbital Bombardment against the next two fortification lines. . .

XXXX

AN: All right, so here we have the orbital bombardment and its aftermath. Turns out there's a reason it got used so much during the first two Successor Wars. It makes things a lot easier on your forces, so long as you don't mind potential collateral damage. Here, there weren't any civilians to worry about, but that won't be the case on the next two Fortification Lines, which means that Orbital Bombardment isn't going to be used there. Still, the new equipment that First Guards have been kitted out with worked extremely well and is likely to be pretty effective in the next battles as well. Casualties are a quarter of what they would have been in a similar fight during the Oberon War.

At any rate, the next chapter will be an interlude showing how Third Guards is faring against the forces defending the farming communities deeper in the Plains of the Rim Worlds Republic.

Stay tuned. . .