FSE

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“HEAT UP!” The loader screamed as the commander strained against the CITV display. Thick dust shrouded some of the view to world outside, though he could just about see the building, the now present flurry of activity. Small figures moving about the windows, these smalls blots of bright colour against the dull display.

There was so much to take in and even as bullets bounced off the armour giving that uncomfortable metallic (dink!) The commander needed to make sure he had the target right, fire now and that gave the enemy a good three to five second window.

He held a little longer till the important target presented themself, a figure on the rooftop. This glowing figure. There wasn’t much detail about them just a green glowing shape but the commander could feel the gaze upon him. The figure placing something onto their shoulder; an act that was played out to him before in so many training scenarios.

Something finally clicked.

“GUNNER AT ROOFTOP FIRE FIRE!!”

#################

Roland’s ears were still ringing, this horrible dullness in her head. She tried to draw a deep breath but every attempt only drew a combination of dust and micro particles.

The explosion had taken her by surprise, it took them all by surprise. Yet by some grand blessing from above the building she was by did not or least was yet to explode… She tried to dispel that thought from her mind.

The air compress again as the nearby tank fired and thus the world became dull again. Though it was only seconds after the tank fired, a lighter explosion then went off, followed by a feeling of heat… Roland looked to her side, the tank war burning. A roaring fire spurting from the top hatch, a disconcerting crackle of ammo cooking – off. The crew had to be dead. Yet the front driver’s hatch frantically pulled open; though it was trapped by the gun as it slumped down.

Roland however did not give it much attention; her thoughts racing to the fact the compacted metal can full of ammo was on fire; “Oh fuck” she whispered under her breath.

Roland spurred as much energy as she could jumping away from the wreck laying as flat to the ground as she could as the tank finally exploded; tossing the turret off and into the sky and then settling a couple paces away from the body.

How could so much go wrong with so little time.

The fact some of the blocks just exploded and fallen was something yet to fully process. The chaos of that was still settling as troops moved about to try and find officers or comrades in some attempt to reorganized the force that was now in complete disarray and attempting to batter back the militia they thought they’d so easily roll.

Looking to the ground the dullness in her ears slowly worked away and the chaos she only watched began to gain a clearer sound; screams, shouts, gun fire and explosions.

A pair of boots appeared and steadily came forward, a Yersin officer. Major Crook, though Roland had only seen him in passing.

He seemed to stand there with a lack of concern, a commanding calm but sternness and awareness to what was going on. It was a bad situation, he seemed to know that but he did not let it break his stride.

“Corporal!” He called with a commanding tone, not shouting because he wanted to only that he needed to with the sound of conflict going on around him. Roland finally looked at him, this conflicted face; a slight look of frustration, calm and reservation.

“I need you to cover this street; you see anyone coming and you shoot them dead!”

Roland nodded her head. “Corporal!” Crook shouted again, likely not sure of her willing or even psychological presence till she finally responded.

“Aye Major!” Roland gave the response as she finally moved up from her low position, weapon at the ready.

Crook nodded his head appreciably; “I’ll have you some help as soon as I can… Private!”

It was only at that moment Roland had taken notice to the fact Koppa had set up not too far from her side. The few spent shells around him showing he’d already been firing at the enemy for some time. He was quick to draw back to cover before addressing Crook.

“How can I help Major?” The Timber spoke with confidence.

“I need you to give me cover while I see what I can peace together from this mess”

“Roger that Major” He moved to the Yersin’s side with only a small hunch to his posture; a small indication to modicum of concern he had.

With that Crook nodded his head as he began to make his move along the line, Koppa following in toe as Roland was left to her devices, a confidence bestowed on her that she could handle herself.

She quickly checked the belt on her MG6; ready to go.

All she would wish for now was some extra help, even more so wondering if her team was okay…

#################

“What just fucking happened?” Cu called as she twisted back. She heard the explosion, the rapturous sound lasting a couple minutes before she chimed in.

It took her by surprise, the fur on her tail puffing out as the generally uneventful search was broken.

A small anxiety did stew, was this building meant to go? But quickly that concern was pushed back as the sounds of gun fire became the immediate concern.

“There must have been a trap” Hassel chimed in as he came forward; there was an odd coolness about him, as if the explosion meant nothing, just another part of the day.

The peace broke again, more rounds, much closer now, much closer.

*BANG*

A chunk of dry wall burst forth with a nice suspension of dust and other particulates.

Cu ducked down to the side and slipped to the side. The shot put her right on edge; the shock having her exhale all the air from her body while adrenaline made her not care.

Hassel seemed unbroken, the only visible change being the move of his rifle to the ready.

Yet everything stopped again; not the outside chaos, but the current danger seemed to go away. No chatter, no follow – up. “Where did you fucking go?” Cu mumbled as she waited.

The small figure then appeared to pear; only a tiny fraction maybe even less, a peek the average person might not have picked up but with the stress these troops were under the single shot was returned with a relative hellfire as round tore up the corridor. The body fell to the ground obscured by the dust.

“Go to hell bastards!” a voice called from the smoke cloud though no one came out to back the words.

“Will push on them” Hassel said, his steel eyes almost not blinking despite the dust.

Cu nodded her head, “roger”. She gave a small flick of her hand; she didn’t need complex or loud orders right now, least not to single off to the enemy what they were doing.

On the gesture Zeb came forward a grenade already in hand, primed and ready. He had no need for an extra push tossing it down the corridor.

“SHIT!” Was the final call before a chaos of frantic movement followed by the moderate blast.

Cu charge forward, meeting the turn a matter of seconds before rattling down a few rounds in preparation.

“Er – fuckers” They were gone, well just pulling back; the fledgling sight of these men escaping just in time. The only sight of injury visible in the way a human slinked his lepus partner against him…There was only a single blood trail.

“Would have expected something better” Cu’s monologue as Hassel closed in.

“They do run quick” Hassel spoke back to no reply from Cu. He didn’t comment on that, giving his own signal as he looked to his troops, “Make sure they’ve really backed off; I don’t want any surprises”.

Yuri and Melin started to move forward, a quick but cautious pace to their movement.

Given the calm Hassel had a small look back to the body, “not much of a soldier is he?” Hassel commented looking down to the dead man… Another human, not too far from Hassel himself. A younger man, working trouser, though the jacket seemed surplus, the revolver on the floor was definitely no military issue.

“I hope you ain’t getting sentimental” Cu said, only peaking at the body; what was one more? The roads to plant was paved in them.

Hassel gave no reply, only whistling to Yuri and Melin; they were already looking down the next turn off and the lack of shooting was reassuring. “You see anything!?”

Yuri called back, “No Sarge; they’ve gone”

Well a little bit of good news; a small reprieve.

“I think we should we should pull back; find out what the hell just happened?” Hassel said as he turned to face Cu, she was still close to the ground, she seemed to be thinking; pull back? We just moved fucking forward.

The vixen stood back up, the smallest look of irritation on her face, “we’ll pull back”.

#################

Alex continued to rattle his pen against his hand. Things had still been slow, slow as they had been since they got here. The space battle had been nothing; the simplest cracking of a couple PDF ships… Well one, the others ran and then… Nothing, no rescue, no saviours.

The only traffic had been the odd arrivals; single cargo ships or a transport, the last one had been four days ago. A moderately sized transporter; it just sat on the fringe of the system a tiny spec from the window and just about visible on the radar.

Events transpired to an awkward standoff; two hours of attempting to establish contact.

(The destruction of a civilian space craft was not something anyone wanted).

The transport never picked up and by the third hour it slowly turned around and exited from the system.

It didn’t spur any feeling. At the start of the war Alex would have feared the chance someone would head back and say something to someone… But this wasn’t the start, this wasn’t even the end, this was the epilogue and it was running to long.

When I’m out of here I’ll filing my resignation… So sick of this shit.

“Commander message from the Admiral-”

Alex repressed the urge to jump. Though he had been waiting for this moment to come at some point, it would seem his prep had made him quite jumpy, as if there was anything to worry over up here.

“- she looking for a situation update”

An update; ah yes I’ve watch my corvette orbit our four ships for the 100th time.

He shouldn’t have been so harsh; he had been like her once, a need to know and be sure of every details and ongoing event to a near real – time picture.

It was a near impossible standard to keep up and only frustrated the head and their underlings.

“Well, you can inform her that we have received no reports from the force on the ground; communication are still jammed from the surface” Alex paused, watching as his adjutant took down the report.

“We have nothing on radar; only residual feedback which could be anything…”

Alex only shook his head and giving pause to his comment. He knew far too well the vagueness of his comments would only make Verna worry and question her judgement.

If there was going to be an issue it was no difficult matter to send a communication back to her flagship; they were only a single jump away.

“Is that all Commander?”

…

“Belay that” Alex interjected as the officer lifted his head, “message to the admiral: situation nominal, nothing to report”

Why bother causing a fuss with his sarcasm

With that the officer left to rely his message as Alex turned back to the viewing window, out and at the glory of space.

And of all the places out there, I’m here.

#################

“What the fuck was that!” Kreek shouted as he looked at the mess of officers amongst him. It was nearly half the number he had to start with and much to his displeasure commissar Walsh was amongst them. A thick coating of dust was on his uniform and the expected look of displeasure on his face.

If the commissar made it back the report would likely not be favourable, Kreek held his hopes battle would shine that luck upon him; commissars always liked to be on the frontline and that uniform tended to attract attention.

It was at that time Kreek realised he was day dreaming; he only snapped back as he watched Walsh give a salute. The gesture seemed out of place and it was then noticing all the officer attention had come away Kreek knew something had changed.

He twisted around greeted the sight of general Ovex and the approaching formation of reserve troops most of who seemed to look upon the sight with concern.

“Major, get down there and get that foothold secure; I will die before giving up this city!”

Ovex called out with a fever as Kong nodded his head waving the troops to follow him.

“What the hell is this?” Ovex said as he looked directly at Kreek.

The human took a long swallow, the horror of having a superior before you was one thing, but having him here with everything in such a state of disarray…

“General I – I, I can explain!” Kreek stuttered, from the last time he seen the general he only recalled this lost, tired character; a man with less interest in living let alone interest in the war.

But now…

“WELL! What happened!?”

“There was a surprise attack General” Walsh was quick to jump, a confident and analytical tone to his voice. “The Federal set bombs in some of the blocks, three gone, one damaged and the last two are fine; we haven’t ascertained if they were all meant to go… They also seem to be probing us; maybe to see if we’ll run”.

Ovex nodded his head, his attention staying on Walsh before slowly coming back to Kreek; “so what are you doing about this Colonel?”

“He was just figuring that out”. Walsh added the comment with a knowing tone to his voice; he didn’t need to say it but he loved the way Kreek sank.

The Colonel had no words, responses or even B.S to hide his loss…

“Guards” Ovex spoke up “Take colonel back to base; clearly he’s in some state of shock”

Two of the general’s guards came forward, grabbing the colonel as they pulled him away.

Kreek mumbled some complaints but it was only by the time he was too far off he finally shouted something or other, but it was no use by that point.

“Commissar” Ovex started by directing his request Walsh but looking around at the other officers he widened his scope “gentlemen” he corrected his tone picking it up “We will not be pushing today, but we are not falling back; I need you to get out there, secure this area have everyone on the same page. Make sure the Feds won’t come forward; if they are you make them pay, when we are secure start searching the rubble for survivors; get me runners and when you can come back to me, we’ll put together the plan to take this city; are we clear?”

“AYE GENERAL!” the quire of supporting calls seemed to put Ovex at ease, the officers moved away from the desk. Walsh was the last to go, as if the Commissar wanted to stay at the back and watch the other men go; being sure of their willingness as a good commissar was meant to do.

With that Ovex seemed to loosen up, a sense of control had come back, a security that for right now he was still holding the threads of this operation together.

He turned back to his following staff and guard troops.

“Right then gentlemen shovels out; we’ve a new HQ to get started!”

#################

There was always that feeling of time dragging along as you waited, Roland hated it. She hated it so much. Crouched here in the relative silene of her place with nothing but the ambience of battle to keep her company. The distant gun fire, explosion, combat and calls seeming to echo throughout the city.

She did get some activity; distant figures running at the far off windows.

She found it hard to fire upon them; shooting a none threat never felt right, but even then that smallest anxiety sat in the back of her head. Were they trying to tempt her? Get her to fire, give away her position, make her the prime target for some sniper? The Federation was full of good shots.

She let the thought role by, she was already on a tight enough rope of trying to watch everything in her view; the street, the cars, the block next to her the rubble on her other side and the block down the way.

The tank was still burning out but the sound was channelled out and the cooking rounds had finally calmed to a meek off timed rattle of single MG rounds.

Two figures appeared at the far end. Clearly two Federals, a rabbit and a human. The rabbit hobbling, just about helped by his human partner as he gripped tightly to the lepus’s shirt collar. They were both armed, well the human clearly as he tightly gripped a rifle with his free hand while the rabbits SMG hung loosely by some straps; he was more concerned by his wounds.

Roland’s finger lay on the trigger; she knew what was expected to do but willing herself to do it, to shoot these men in the back as they ran… These weren’t really soldiers, the human in just a boiler suit while the rabbit apart from having his plate carrier seemed like nothing more than your average man off the street. Her finger anxiously tapped till finally a voice called out:

“H – HEY! GIVE US A HAND!” A soldier was shouting from across the street waving his hands with a sense of desperation about him.

She used that as a break away, lifting her gun over her shoulder as she carefully ran across the open ground.

She was brought to the crumbling entry way of the other apartment; the door way had been blown out with a concerning tilt to the whole structure. Wounded were being pulled free, some getting treatment while the dead had been put to the side.

For a moment Roland didn’t understand what it was she was called for but seeing the human’s concerned face she couldn’t bring herself to refuse; though with the way the ceiling seemed to buckle she knew the situation had to be important why risk this. She quickly found what the issue was.

“Don’t worry Coop we got you” the trooper said crouching to his Lupin friend; the problem was quite clear, a large concrete support had come loose from the ceiling and fell to rest atop the lupin’s left ankle.

He was stuck, bad and deathly silent; he was looking at the ceiling… Knowing well time was short seemingly stuck in a state of utter terror.

“You got to lift that block” the human shouted, pointing at the concrete block.

“I – I what?” Roland was taken aback by the order, there was a lot of things she could do. But this… This was being optimistic, “I – I”

“COME ON DAMMIT!” the human shouted, he was clearly concerned for his friend, for the fact if nothing happened…

“I can’t do this alone; we’re his…” Roland stop as she came around the block, his second was dead; he got that block on top of his head. It wasn’t as gory as one might have expected; it was almost clinical, just the neck with a visible splatter around it; the bulk was thankfully hidden beneath.

“I couldn’t find anyone else!” the human shouted with that growing tone of concern; he clearly was not thinking his focus was on trying to get his buddy out; well aware he couldn’t do much.

“Come on dammit, just fucking try!”

Others had gathered by the entry way, though that was just a racket of sound; concerned shouts and calls. No one could give a time, but there was certainty any minute now that roof was coming down. Roland tried grabbing at the block, pulling as hard as she could… Nothing… She wasn’t an Arctic and even they might have struggled. “I – I can’t”

The trooper paced a little bit; only one solution came to mind. “You grab him and when I tell you, you pull, right?!”

Roland only nodded her head; see knew what was to come.

She reached under the Coop’s arms and held him up, mustering the only words she could find, “you’re going to be okay… We’re going to get you out of here”

He didn’t speak, almost holding his breath as he tried not to look at his friend while he pulled out his sharpened shovel.

There was no build up or preparation Roland was only greeted to Coop’s screams as his comrade brought the shovel down with a hearty force. The first hit did well; a deep cut into flesh stopping at the bone. It wasn’t enough but more than Roland would have expected. There wasn’t even a pause, a second slash and then a third; each hit punctuated with a sound of breaking bone while the last had that unmistakeable snap.

“Pull! Go, Go fucking now!!” The trooper yelled as he pointed Roland back towards the door way.

She couldn’t get him completely up, but this time when she pulled he slid along the ground, with only the nips and grabs of the gravel and rock, but they didn’t matter adrenaline pushed her on though at this point Coop had gone quiet.

They got him out and Roland fell backwards form the exertion. It surprised her how much that act had taken out of her… Had they even been in there that long?

A flurry of activity came about as soldiers scrambled around, some congratulatory, others curt to reckless action. Medics had also come along to fix Coop’s wound; at that point Roland got a look.

It wasn’t the worst amputation; though a surgeon was going to need to clean it up…

There was odd calm now, the fighting subsidised and the troops while still anxious about what had happened they seemed organised, moving with purposes, dealing with the wounded and dead and some keeping watch.

The trooper from before came forward. His expression and manner had flatten, the fear had gone, though relief was yet to be found. “Hey… Thank you”. It was very small thing and after those words he walked away and sat on the asphalt finally given the chance to contemplate what had happened.

“Where the hell did you go!” the familiar voice had Roland jump as she finally broke from a moment of thought. Twisting around she found Cu’s unamused face looking up and down as she was making sure it actually was Roland and not someone else.

“I – I was helping” she replied back, that certain sound of unease coming through as her train of thought spilled from her mouth; she nearly got herself crushed… What a way to go…

Cu stayed quiet as she looked around Roland; it wasn’t hard to miss the wounded Lupin getting set for transport. Well there was only one person here that could have pulled that off…

Maybe you ain’t complete dead weight, Cu let the thought stand before finally letting out a whistle to get Roland’s attention back;

“Come on Roland; we’re regrouping and waiting on new instructions… We’ve got a little bit of rest for now…”