Subsurface [FT|Closed]

[Arcerion]

Huskar
Surface

The sounds of gunfire echoed throughout the cavern's walls, bouncing off of shoddily poured concrete and rebar homes, and reverberating through the shattered remains of what was once a market. Blinking slowly, the dusty rifleman yawned, refocusing through his electro-binoculars as he shifted slightly in his seat. OP routine wasn't glamorous, but it was a part of the job. Just not one that was advertised all that frequently. He blindly fumbled at his feet for his water bottle, unscrewing it without removing his eyes, and took a sip, the water having a different taste after it had been chemically cleaned by some rear-echelon type a few kilometers back. He grunted, almost to himself, that at least he wasn't trying to use purification tablets on shellhole water anymore. The first few weeks had been pretty miserable for that until headquarters had gotten their act together and sorted some semblance of a supply line out. The cavern boomed and dust sifted down onto his armour and shoulders as some ship, he could only guess as to whose, hammered the surface with some form of orbital bombardment. He frowned and tilted his head, realizing it could just as easily be a building collapse or artillery, but by now he was fairly confident he knew orbital cannons impact by feel.

"Hey, you're relieved." His replacement came in, placing a day bag and rifle near the doorframe, and crept up to his seat, nudging the rifleman out. "Anything good?" He asked, fiddling with the electro-binoculars settings until he found his preferences. The rifleman shrugged, and moved in a low crouch towards the door. "Nothing, man. It's been painfully quiet." His replacement chuckled softly, not moving his eyes from the screen in front of them, "Well hopefully that means you get some uninterrupted sleep." The rifleman didn't respond, just picked up his own bag and slunk out the door to the apartment's hallway. Once out of view of the OP's door, he shrugged it on, finding his fireteam partner, Vasily, lying with his back against a wall, sheafing through a well-worn paper book. "What, are we pretending you're literate now?" The rifleman said, grabbing the book by the handful and forcefully removing it from his comrade's grip. Scribbles in a foreign tongue and strange motifs and writings, which to the rifleman's mind amounted to pure space garbage fit for the firepit. Vasily slowly moved to stand, years of soldiering weighing down on his joints. "Don't be rude, Anton. Let's get to the hide and go to sleep. I'm so god damned tired of being awake. Or alive. Hard to tell anymore."

The pair moved through the apartment's maze of bombed-out rooms, hallways, and stairwells, intermixed with sandbags, revetting, and the occasional soldiers here and there watching the line. The trenches, hastily assembled, took them to their troop's hide, where the majority were snoring, making tea, or using their personal devices to fight their second enemy, boredom. Their troop Warrant Officer saw them come in, and grinned, standing up. "How's the dream team, huh? Good shift?" Vasily and Anton sat on upturned ammo crates, taking the cups of tea offered by the Warrant, who had procured them from the Squadron's signaller, sitting nearby curled up around his radio, headphones still on, taking a nap. "Thanks, old man." Vasily said, to which Anton scoffed. "Warrant that shift made me realize if the Huerdaens don't kill me I might just kill myself and save myself the trouble of sitting there for another eight hours." Anton scowled, his mood only slightly softened by the slightly above average tea. The Warrant laughed, which quickly morphed into a soldier's cough. "Well don't worry. We'll be moving out in an hour. Coming off the line to go to the surface for a refit. Apparently things are going well up there and the Fleet was able to get more supplies down," the Warrant raised his tea mug. "To the Fleet, may they sometimes do their jobs." Anton and Vasily returned the toast before retiring to any cot or pile of soft equipment they could find.

Anton undid his boots, and placed his socks over the top to dry, musing that he only had one more clean pair and he would wait until he had laundry in sight before using his reserve socks. He stripped to just a tshirt, unbuckling his pants, and from his bag pulled a camouflaged blanket out, to which he had sown fleece to one side. His combat shirt, dirty, and covered in diesel, oil, blood, and dust was tucked inside a less-than-clean t-shirt to form a crude pillow, which he laid his head on, welcoming sleep.

~~~

"Wake up! Ten minutes notice to move let's go you poor excuses for human beings!" The Troop Sergeant growled, kicking cots and sometimes soldiers he didn't care much for. Anton sat up, rubbing his eyes. he swore, realizing he didn't know how much sleep he got as he didn't check his watch before going to bed. And being below surface, he didn't exactly have a sun or moon to base it off of either. He pulled on his socks, now dry, so he assumed it had been at least an hour. Boots next, then combat shirt. He tucked his belongings into his day bag, and then shrugged his armour and helmet on, helping Vasily with his, as his abdomen wound from last week's blast had left him in pain when reaching his arms above his head. The pair followed the column of soldiers further from the frontline, to where their Squadron laager was, and he saw his armoured personnel carrier sitting there, the squat grey and green beast so quiet. The vehicle crew inside was flipping switches and plugging in headsets as the dismounts entered the back ramp, and friendly insults and welcomes were exchanged. Vasily grinned as he settled in, making himself comfortable, "Time machine here we go!" He laughed, referencing his inside joke that once the ramp was up and you were asleep, it would drop in a different place when you woke up, just like a time machine. Anton shook his head at the bad attempt at humor, instead opting to look at the Huerdaen book he had grabbed from Vasily. Yet as he flipped through the pages his eyes grew heavier, and he fought a losing battle with sleep.

~~~

"Prepare to dismount!" came the cry, and the electric whirring sounds and voices of his section woke Anton. The ramp dropped, sunlight, seemingly foreign after weeks underground, came filtering into the crew compartment. Anton stretched as he exited, seeing that the flurry of activity and movement, and the clean-shaven faces of soldiers running around in recently laundered uniforms meant he must be in a rear area. He looked around, squinting in the sunlight. "Alright, 12 Troop let's go! Tents, showers, hot food, and if none of you have a negligent discharge then maybe even a movie!" The Troop Sergeant yelled, to which there was a mixture of jeers and cheers, as they all shuffled off. Anton looked and saw columns of other armoured vehicles moving, some filthy ones looking like gypsy caravans driven by exhausted nomads clearly coming off the line, and others filled with full troops, platoons, and rifle companies heading into the caverns and cities below, likely coming out with less men and sanity than they entered. His gaze went up to the sky, where the Fleet sat in orbit, the occasional pulse as an orbital weapon sent matter through the atmosphere at some distant target, ripping through the sky like a shooting star at midday. Anton marveled at it, before tripping over his own foot to Vasily's chagrin. "I may be illiterate Anton, but at least I can walk like a normal person, eh?"

[Huerdae]

Division HQ, 206-3-4th Jas'Karra "Gatekeepers", 2FR-3rd Division Heavy Infantry
Planet Huskar, Frontier Zone 104.223

The very air seemed to shake when the round impacted some kilometers away down the line and above, as the enemy orbital support struck some target or another on the surface. They had been routinely taking shots along the edge of the massive theater shield that protected the Huerdaen settlement and the surrounding areas. The strikes had begun getting more regular, and most of the structures that were vulnerable to the secondary shockwaves of the shells down under the surface were already rubble. Still, the sound of the poorly-reinforced masonry could be heard crumbling to the ground nearby, this time not accompanied by the screams of others from his unit caught beneath.

Their enemies had shown up with little warning, striking at the corporate fleet above and chasing away the warships that protected the settlement in short order, but not before the turtle's shield went up. That massive, transparent blue umbrella had been above them for weeks now, turning aside the orbital fire, but nowhere near powerful enough to stop a ground assault.

So the Gatekeepers rolled out, taking up positions in the half-abandoned undercities and caverns that had been both a source of study, and easy shelter for hundreds of thousands of people across the planet. Many had fled toward the area the Huerdaen held under their shield now, begging for protection from those they had treated with contempt just weeks before. In the center of the shield lay the Huerdaen city-base known as Nu'Veen, built of the characteristic black steel and sitting in the middle of one of the largest sections of arable land on the honeycombed moon. The refugees that came streaming in outnumbered the local Huerdaen by almost twenty to one, and the 206-3-4th by more than ten times that again.

Their defense, such as it was, had been limited. They couldn't attack out from under the shield, even beneath the surface, and the enemy had as yet made no progress against the forward lines, but that was a matter of time. Citizen militias had been called up to help maintain the defense, but the Imperial Force that normally supplement them with higher grade equipment were forced to maintain order in the refugee camps that now clustered around Nu'Veen. The heavier weapons, armor, and equipment that they normally had in place to help with the defense simply wasn't there. It put a lot of weight on the Gatekeepers, even with some of the refugees taking up arms to fight.

So, despite the Shield being in their heavy Kratos suits of armor, the militia, as well as the few refugees who stood up to help had no such protection. Their weapons were mismatched, their discipline was lacking, but they were determined. Commander Pan'Daesi's own Division was swelled from its normal 625 soldiers to almost a thousand, tasked with holding one of the larger caverns this side of base. In addition to the Gatekeeper's Watchman walkers, the stout heavy-weapons carrying exosuits, the citizen militia calling themselves 'Knights' had supplied his sector with a pair of the Arashi assault guns, though one had been disabled and now lay abandoned between the two opposing forces.

Their command center had once been some sort of shopping center, built with multiple floors along one of the major thoroughfares in the underground city. A warehouse in the back had been repurposed as a machine shop and motor pool where the Knights bunked up and performed maintenance on their one remaining assault gun, while the upper floors were for the lightly armed refugee soldiers. Many had little more than a hunting rifle, but they were quick to respond to enemy incursions, and served as a capable reserve if the enemy got too close.

But despite the heavy tracks and armor of the Arashis that had given their enemies such trouble, it wasn't those that kept them from gaining ground. The Gatekeepers had secured much of the city with defensive positions, using the field guns, autocannons, and Watchmen that were so prominent in formations to turn the streets into killing fields, and tear chunks of buildings used by the enemy. It left a string of shattered, unsteady structures through the city where attacks had tried to break through, making the entire zone treacherous.

But the fighting was vicious. The cavern didn't allow any real artillery to be used, with its low ceiling and countless tons of stone and dirt above. Neither side dared try to collapse it on the foe because of the danger to their own forces, and that left only infantry mortars and the grit and blood of the infantry themselves to win the battle. A sharp rapping sounded on the sheet metal door, followed by Calla Lanyi, a sergeant from the Knights. She had long ago stopped trying to manage a military salute, and just got right to the point.

"Some of the 'fugee boys out front saw another group moving up. Looks like they're trying to deploy their mortars forward again for another assault."

Pan'Daesi tapped his armored fingers against his thigh in acknowledgement, as the faceplate of the powered armor would hide any nod, and immediately moved to stand. Even in the armor, he stood just under two meters in height, standard for most Huerdaen. Sgt. Lanyi, by contrast, was Babylonian by birth, blond hair with eyes so light brown they were almost orange, and stood almost two meters herself. Like all of them, she was covered in the dust of the war, from masonry and concrete that didn't stand up to the concussions from above. Her squad contained a crew-served Glyptar on a tripod, and had long been supporting his troops in responding to enemy incursions. She had also been pivotal in training many of the refugee soldiers in how to respond to enemy attack and function as a team. Had she been so inclined, he'd have suggested she take up work as an officer in the Shield.

Instead, she had on several occasions mentioned how she had every intention of turning back to her own career as soon as the battles were over. Recognized as she was as a scientist in some field or other, he wasn't sure she'd have much work left on Huskar. Most of what had been there to study in the old cities was now rubble, and that which remained had been marred by war. Still, her skill and charisma had helped him manage many of the more dedicated assaults the enemy had made, getting the heavy Glyptar into position and shredding enemy assaults from unexpected angles. It was her quick reactions, as well as the sharp shooting of a kitsune tod and his husband from the refugee camps that had helped get the crew back from the abandoned Arashi. Even now, the vehicle's forward-facing Aegis barriers flickered, cracks appearing in the energy barrier as it sputtered and tried to hold itself together so long without command.

The vehicle served only as bait for his men now, and it would take a dedicated assault to get it back. It was a street and a half ahead of where he could safely move across the surface streets, and even the utility systems and tunnels beneath the city were fortified against incursion by both sides. He pitied the refugees most, though. Left with draconian light-discipline, only a few rooms were able to have lights active, meaning that those among them who weren't cyborgs had very limited distractions.

Still, they had taken to firing flares at enemy troop movements, trying to blind them and reveal their position to friendlies. While their weapons weren't as effective against enemy armor as the standard Maedar that Pan'Daesi even now carried, they were still lethal on a clean hit.

As he stepped out into the command center, he could see Calla and her squad gathering up supplies, to move out. Fingering his way over to active comms, he spoke to his officers. "Captain Heis'Zaek, get two platoons on their feet, now. Work with Sergeant Lanyi to take out their mortars. Do not deploy Watchmen, we don't want them hearing you coming like they did last time."

The affirmative ticked over on his display, and he turned to the refugee groups, considering them even as Heis and some of his soldiers stood up seemingly at no signal, including the now-notorious Second platoon. That platoon had been cut off in the utility tunnels for almost three weeks, assumed lost, only for it to suddenly reappear under an enemy strongpoint. SLT Ara'Goji had made quite a show of their return, earning her quite a reputation. But what stuck out most was that almost all of her soldiers had come back with her, leaving only a handful of their own behind.

The refugees were different though. Most didn't have any form of leadership, milling around looking for orders from him or another officer, and they looked up expectantly now, a mixture of fear, anxiety, and determination crossing their faces in the dim red light that lit the small room. They had come from all over the world, some from settlements the Empire hadn't even known existed, with how small they were. Some were common races, such as human or kitsune, but others were less common. All of them showed the same apprehension as he moved to them.

"Two groups, no more than six each. You're spotters and watchers. We're making a move for their mortars. Let the Shield make the assault, you're looking for anything to indicate it's a trap, or a counter-attack. Fire flares on their positions and move away. Don't get caught in a drawn out fight."

The group nodded, huddling together to figure out their teams. Sometimes they came along, sometimes they didn't. The disorganized rabble didn't have any leadership among them, so sometimes putting together a team took longer than they could wait. Sometimes, there were more people than they needed.

Today he was lucky, as two groups had gathered. One of seven, including a young man carrying a stolen support weapon from an enemy, and another of three. The second group included a small woman carrying only a flare gun and a sidearm, but her jaw was set and she seemed steadier than the others.

With a quick gesture to Calla, the woman called the teams together, getting everyone ready to move out to where their scouts had found another incursion. He waited until they had filtered out of the room, the refugees taking with them some of the low-light mining goggles to operate in the field.

He could only hope that most of them would come back. Or that the Star Navy would finally arrive to push the enemy fleet out of orbit. Slowly, he slumped back down against the reinforced wall, watching the weak readouts of the makeshift command system as it displayed his battle sector.

Maybe this time they'll give up and find somewhere else to attack. Maybe today, we can get some time away from this damnable cavern.

It had been the better part of a month since the last blockade runner had slipped by the enemy fleet and under the edge of the theater shield. He only knew that because he'd had to send a squad to investigate the cavern roof when the ship had been downed directly above them when it tried to exit the atmosphere again.