Ravens of Eternity

Chapter 82

82 Massacre at Dendrus, Pt The captain’s fist slammed down on his controls out of sheer frustration. The Hussars brought their heaviest weapons to the battlefield. Their intent to collapse the bunker was one hundred percent clear.

And to top it all off, they were more than double their numbers.

“All mecha squadrons,” he ordered, “enemy Hussars inbound, eight hundred strong. Stay sharp!”

A shiver ran through his command as he displayed their loadouts over comms. Some had seen those hammers in action, and never wanted to see that again.

But now, they had no choice.

“I want all RR units to head back to the bunker asap,” he continued. “One wing from each squadron will escort all of you back to base. The rest... we stay here and provide support to the pillboxes.”

“The hell you say?!” cried one of the RR officers. “We’re only halfway done with the repairs. No way are these buckets going to last against those blasted Hussars!”

“Be that as it may, it’s all we can do. You all focus on reinforcing the bunker – we’ll buy you enough time to do that, alright?”

“No way,” said another RR officer. “None of you are gonna last long without us backing you up. We need to be on the field!”

.....

“Your lives are too importa-”

Before the captain could finish his retort, another RR officer interrupted him.

“Listen here, flyboy! All of you are always trying to hog all the damn glory. Well screw that! If I wanna die fighting, then I’m for damned sure gonna do that! Write me up for insubordination or contempt if you want, but I’m not going any damn where!”

The other RR officers mumbled in agreement.

“Dammit, you sons of bitches!” yelled the captain. “Since everyone’s so damn keen on dying, then I’m not gonna stop you! Everyone – protect your pillboxes with your lives! Watch each other’s backs, don’t stray from formation. If your pillbox is compromised, fall back to the next nearest pillbox and regroup. Understood?!”

“Hooah!”

~

The colonel led her column of 800 Hussars with grim determination. After they were rebuffed by the pillboxes, she decided to come back with a seething vengeance. She squeezed her grip on both of her flight sticks, and her mecha tightened its grip in response.

Almost as though it wanted to fuse with the two-handed hammer it was wielding.

She scanned the battlefield and identified multiple sections where the pillboxes had the least amount of coverage. It was through there that she laid down their main attack vector.

The bunker came into view as they blasted in from the northeast. Most of the operational pillboxes were at the southern end. Many of the northern pillboxes had been severely damaged, or flattened outright.

Since their coverage towards the north was thin at best, a northern assault was her best path to victory.

Their scans showed that each pillbox had been repaired to some degree, and was now accompanied by a small detachment of 24 mecha. There was a larger contingent that stationed themselves to the southeast, close to the bunker’s airlock entrance.

“They’ve fielded three-hundred and eighty-four mecha,” reported a Hussar officer. “One hundred and ninety-two are acting as pillbox support, one hundred and fourty-four are loose on-field, and the final forty-eight seem to be defending the airlock.”

The colonel waved it off.

“They don’t have what it takes to threaten us,” she said. “Stick to your orders.”

“Yes, colonel!”

“This is it!” she cried. “We’re going in hot! Loose formation, evasive maneuvers. You’ve done the exercises a million times – now it’s time to show what we’ve got! Clear?”

“Oorah!” they replied.

“We hit ’em hard!”

“Oorah!”

“We hit ’em fast!”

“Oorah!”

We send ’em straight to hell!”

“Oorah!”

The shielded mecha led the charge into enemy territory. Though they were well within range of many of the guns, only a few had the right angles to hit them. Those few fired as many rounds as they could, but ultimately were far from effective.

The forward shield mecha then opened up little pods on their shoulders, and shot large bursts of glittering countermeasures into the air around them. Brightly-lit chaff fell all around and scrambled the pillboxes’ targeting sensors greatly.

Without precise targeting, any shots fired by the pillboxes ultimately went wide. Those that struck were easily absorbed by the Hussar shield mecha – their B-ranked shields were an even match for the pillbox guns.

Beyond that, the Hussars’ legendary agility shone as they weaved through the streams of gunfire. The few that slipped through tore into a handful of limbs and dented some of their shields. Soil kicked up around them as most of the bullets completely missed their marks and embedded themselves into the ground.

Once they hit the 1500 meter mark, the colonel barked out an order to her units.

“Fan out! Destroy everything!”

Without hesitation, half of her regiment broke off into eight. Each of those detachments headed straight towards each of the remaining operational pillboxes.

Each one charged towards their target, shields high and nanorepairs maxed. They wove inwards chaotically and randomly. As the Hussars neared, their siege mecha fired their rockets into the defenders and the pillboxes. Streaks of white clouded the battlefield as they fired one after another.

Federation mecha quickly adjusted their shield walls to face the oncoming attacking mecha. Many shivered as they bore the onslaught – they were all outnumbered by more than two to one!

The rockets slammed into the defenders’ shield wall, and knocked them asunder. Many were blasted into pieces, while others were dented and torn heavily.

Some who braced the shields from behind were also thrown violently, and took severe damage to their arms. A few pilots were concussed, and struggled to get back on their feet. Some were killed outright.

A number of the rockets passed right by the frontline defenders and smashed into the pillboxes behind them. RR mecha were thrown to the side as pillbox chainguns were shattered into scrap.

Hussars cheered as their enemy suffered great losses from their initial assault. But their celebrations only lasted moments as the Federation mounted their counterattack.

As the Hussars neared and their chaff faded, their evasive tactics became less and less effective. The remaining chainguns were able to concentrate their fire into the charging enemy, and tore into them with a vengeance.

The support mecha at their side were also able to contribute, and also fired into the oncoming enemies. Although the Federation forces were incredibly diminished, a great amount of Hussars fell in battle, and never stood again.

And though they took steep losses, they didn’t stop their charge. In fact, they didn’t even slow down.

The Hussar shield mecha veered off at the last moment, and allowed their siege brethren to finish up the charge. They slammed hammer-first into the Federation shield walls. The severe force that they caused crumpled every shield they came into contact with.

In fact, the damage was so great that they even wrecked the mecha holding the shields.

Thanks to their superior numbers, the Hussar’s initial onslaught was severe enough for them to shatter the Federation defenses easily. While they were busy dealing with the front line, a few of the siege mecha slipped through and headed straight for the pillboxes.

They immediately slammed their hammers on the chainguns, and bent their barrels into inconsequential scrap.

“Retract pillbox guns on the double!” ordered the perimeter commander.

He was frenzied and panicked at the attack. Although he already knew that the Hussars were going to come in strong, he didn’t think they would have been so brutally effective. And whether or not the guns had been pulled back in, the siege mecha continued to pound on the pillboxes.

They slammed on the armor enough to dent the viewport out of shape – enough to make them nearly useless. The only way to get the guns to come back out was to strip the pillbox of its armor.

A number of Federation mecha reacted to their incursion, and shot them to pieces with their rifles. But the damage had been done, and most of the guns on every pillbox had been disabled or destroyed.

The only ones left at full strength were the ones flanking the airlock doors.

While half of the Hussars attacked the pillboxes, the other half didn’t stray from their objective – the hill itself. When the captain realized what they were going for, he dashed to intercept. It was almost suicide for him to do so – 144 standard mecha against 400 siege. But they had to do what they had to do.

The moment they crested the hill – which had now become a plateau – so did the colonel’s unit. Federation mecha immediately entered a firing line and blasted the oncoming Hussars with rifle fire.

But the Hussars were nonplussed. Though they took some damage, they leaped up into the air, assisted by powerful jump jets. As they ascended, the colonel scanned the hill below her, and targeted its most vulnerable weakspots.

“On my mark!” she yelled. “Fire!”

Four hundred shoulder-mounted rockets immediately blasted onto the hill. They all landed with a resounding BOOM as they struck the ground. Dirt and rocks flew in the air as the ground shook from the combined impact.

The captain and a number of his mecha were blown off and scattered to the ground below the hill.

The female captain and a number of the techs around her were visibly shaken as the barrage struck them from above. The sound pressure of it bore down on them and made their ears ring loudly.

Dust fell from the ceiling as the cracks widened even further.

“Breach!” yelled one of the techs.

One of the supply depots at the northern side had weakened to the point that its ceiling had fully collapsed. The Hussar rockets had finished the job that the tungsten barrage had previously started.

When the rockets struck, whatever was left of the ceiling simply broke into pieces and caved inwards. Tons of soil and rocks tumbled in as well, and collapsed onto the men and women who were working in the depot.

Some were there to cart out their supplies, some were there to repair what they could, and all were lost to that decisive strike.