NationStates Jolt Archive

Prologue - When God's not looking ...

Planet Braxis,
Capital of the Braxian Empire,
24 months until T-Day,

The snow, on other worlds, often fell slowly and with some grace. Upon Braxis, this was never the case, the planet for the last three hundred years had been engulfed in the 'Eternal Blizzard', or at least that is what the Braxians called it. By meterological standards, the Eternal Blizzard was completely and totally impossible on any inhabitatble world. The temperature hadn't risen upon negative twenty in the last fifty-five years, an entire generation had come and gone and never experiance anything warmer. Though at the same time, few of the Braxians could complain about the situtation. It was they who had started it, with terraforming experiments hundreds of years ago. They warped Braxis around their own design and forced the planets weather patterns to change dramatically. All these artifical changes to it caused some primal, something formed deep within the planet's mechanics, that jumped started a resortation phase. While on the surface the planet enjoyed unlimited beauty, perfect tempatures, and bountiful crops every year -- the planet viewed this all has unbalanced. Soon the planets tempatures plummeted by tens of degrees every year and all those terraforming experiments couldn't do anything to prevent it. Now, five hundred years later, the planet was frozen over and the population all but extinct.

"It seems to be getting warmer," said one of the Emperor's ever optimistic adivsors, it was the same line given to every Emperor during every Enviromental Council, which before the freezing of the world was a moot thing, some Emperor's didn't even bother attending them -- after the freezing, if a Emperor wanted to live longer than a few years, he would attend every Council, every chance he got.

"There have even been unconfirmed reports from the Homeworld Defense Fleet that they have spotted openings in the cloud's over the southern poles," said the same advisor, his voice bland, almost as if he were reading a script and in some sense, he might as well be.

"This is all very good, sir, but can you given me anything that can be confirmed," stated the Emperor, his voice showing nothing but hope, even though it was a thick mask to disguise his annoyance.

Like every month's Enviromental Council, the advisor merely hung his head and gave a short, "No, milord."

The Emperor, his name long ago lost even to himself, turned and looked at his top military commander, Lord of the Fleets, Admiral Nordson. "And the fanatics?"

"Know nothing of Braxis' freezing, they only preach it, but again they have no proof to give to the rest of the Empire or the rest of the system."

Braxis' freezing would have shattered the Empire and would have caused its enemies to pounce on it all at once. The Braxian Empire was the premier military power for nearly ten solar systems in every direction, all of her enemies -- such as the fanatics of Solarious, were actually just breakaway states of the original Great Braxis Empire. Thousands of years ago Braxis lost its prime and its exploration stopped, with a stagnate economy and no new life found in the universe after so many centuries of searching, the people turned on each other. The Empire was now a shell of its former self, hardly capable of maintaining its borders, the news of the freezing was so sensitive that as soon as the Eternal Blizzard started, the Emperor of that time, ordered the entire Home System locked down and cut off from all trade and free communication with the outside systems. The majority of the Imperial Fleet was sent out to keep any recruits from outlying systems from spreading world of it. The system was dark, dull, and in every sense of the word dying. Rebellions seethed in every corner of the system, as all of the Home Worlds tore themselves apart trying to lift the Emperor's rule and reestablish contact with the outside systems. All attempts had failed, save one which has reached Solarious, but with no evidence and such a boast unrealistic, few of the other breakaway kingdoms, republics, and empire's gave it any real credit.

"However, my liege, we are beginning to run dangerous low on manpower and ships. A recent rebel boarding party managed to disable a cruiser, bringing our total number of Homeworld Defense ships down to a merely thirty. And there are reports of another rebellion occuring on Braxis III, a red level insurgency already exists and with our lack of manpower there, we are reaching world-wide revolution status," said Admiral Nordson, taking neither a moment to breath, or a moment to think -- he knew exactly what had to be said.

The Emperor pondered silently for nearly ten minutes, pulling up maps on the main screen, along with statistics. Finally the silence was broke by a tall, thin, pale man, who was nicknamed "Wrench" by the rest of the Emperor's court, which mainly consisted of advisors now since all the nobility was banned from the Home System.

"My Emperor, I think you know what is nessecary," he said calmly, and he looked around, receiving many nods but the most important came from Nordson, Lord of the Fleets.

The Emperor pondered regardless, as if he didn't even regonize 'Wrench', for several more minutes. Until he brought up another picture, this one of a metal exoskeleton with red eyes, the being was called an Autonomous (http://www.solarnavigator.net/images/terminator_robot.jpg).

"Your machines have proven effective in the past," the Emperor said in knowing tones, "Though, do we really want to rely on them for so much of our defense? They already are defending Braxis VII, VI, V, and IV ... if there is some sort of mechanical problem ..."

The trailing away of the Emepror's voice gave Wrench an opening, "My lige, Braxis IV is a world close enough to strike this very planet. Five years ago one of the various rebellions there gained enough momentum to capture the entire planets nuclear system. Those missiles have enough range to strike us here, and enough power to glass the entire surface," he finally took a deep breathe, his voice however little oxygen was in his lungs, never lost its power, "The Autonomous were sent to the world on January fifthteenth, and by Febuary third, a world-wide rebellion was completely crippled, its manpower reduced by sixty-five percent, and no nuclear weapon was ever launched, enough though the rebels had numerous ways of doing so. The Autonomus are simply more capable of putting down a rebellion at this time than the Imperial Fleet."

The Lord of the Fleets grunted in disapproval, but did not protest the statement, he knew all too well that at the current rate of losses, there wouldn't be an Imperial Fleet in the Home System in ten years. When the Emperor glared at him, Nordson merely nodded in approval. "My lord, as much as I hate to admit it, these machines are highly effective. The Home Fleet knows of Braxis' freezing, they know our terraforming experiments on other Home System planets, and even the various experiments we continue to conduct on the outlying systems are causing a slow cascading effect. Morale is down to rock bottom lows, losses are at all time highs, and we cannot afford to pay for a constant state of both foreign wars and civil wars. These machines are, like I said, very effective."

"Economically speaking," the Emperor said ago, letting his voice slowly die out to allow someone else to answer his question.

"The machines are inexpensive, my lord," said Wrench, "The metals, I admit, are not cheap, but their design is simple, and only complex when it needs to be. The machines can easily be repaired, with very little cost. I've already ran economic charts, my lord, and the cost of maintaining an Fleet of Autonomous is five times cheaper than maintaining a human Fleet."

While the Emperor's face and tones gave glimpses of giving in his questions did not cease, he did not care for the Autonomous for various reasons, chief amoung them ... "And what if we have a ... software problem?"

Wrench merely grinned, it has been the Emperor's chief concern for years, and years ago he's finally developed a solution, "My liege, once more, I assure you that the fail-safe system I installed in the Autonomous will allow you, my lord, at any time to simply turn them all off. The entire system will earse itself and the machines will only be scrap."

Like always the Emperor gave a hesitant nod and merely sighed, "Very well, you have my authorization for the construction of two, and I repeat myself, two fleets. No more, do you understand."

Wrench, his eyes gleaming with happiness, bowed, "Yes my lord."

ooc: is it ok to jump in here?

ic: The Pioneer class crusier 'Tenchi' of the Neo Kirisuban starfleet had picked up signs of technology on its long range scanners and they journeyed to within four light years of the system at warp 6.

http://i15.photobucket.com/albums/a354/nihongaz/pioneerclass.jpg

It looked like a silver round disk with its warp nacacles on the sides and these were the explorer craft of the Neo Kirisuban fleet. Something the Neo Kirisuban Federation liked doing.

The fast agile craft came to a stop and and scanned further and Captain Mariko Toda took a lot at the readings in her ready room with a cup of green tea on her desk. She wore the usual red jacket with black trousers, her crossed katana's badge showing she was a command officer and a member of the Samurai class.

Her own swords were resting in a desk stand and they were live blades even if they were very rarely used or even drawn.

Her science officer would tell her if any communications were received and she had confidence in her all female crew.

[OOC: Its fine if you jump in, but you're going to have to play by the rules. Meaning, you won't be jumping in the Home System, since all Imperial ships do have the codes, but when they come under attack, the codes are automatically locked and slowly earsed -- only one ship actually has the codes, the flagship of the Imperial Fleet, the JGFS Armaggedon, and there is no chance it will give them up -- hell even it has fail safes to ensure no one gets it. This means you have some options ahead of you:

Option 1: You can jump in-system and have to deal with a shocked Imperial Fleet, who may or may not attack you on site, since the Jagites are in a civil war, well VARIOUS civil wars, so you won't have the luxury of shocking them too much.

Option 2: You can jump in-system and try to convince one of the rebel factions that you're an alien and not some Imperial spy, maybe they believe you, maybe they don't.

Option 3: Hang back and wait for T-Day, and then get some action.

Regardless, as of right now, you won't be able to reach the Home System, its surronded by the Empire's other solar territories.]



Planet Braxis III
Home System of the Braxian Empire,
22 months until T-Day,

An explosion rocked the ground near Private Anderson, shrapnel flew all around him as two of his comrades feel to the ground in a heap. Shrapnel was a deadly thing, even more deadly in the middle of a city made almost entirely out of metal, such as the capital of Braxis III, Rov, was. Two years ago when he was recruited from his homeworld of Braxis, the capital of the so-called 'Glorious Empire', the death of his comrades would have shocked him and he would have wept. However, his friends in the Fleet long ago died, some on Braxis IV, others on Braxis VII, those men who just fell were 'drafts', conscripts from the capital. Hell, twenty years ago, the very thought of conscription citizens from the capital planet was considered completely absurd -- even if it was frozen over. Now the capital world's feeble population was being recruited to help try to maintain order in a solar system attempting to tear itself apart.

Snapping back into reality Anderson raised his high-powered rifle and opened fire on the unarmed crowd of protesters, just as he'd done on the other Braxian planets. The Imperial Marines did not play around, not any more. Not since Braxis froze over. Like always the cries of men, women, and occassionally a child rang out as bodies collapsed to the ground. The citizens, just like on other worlds, suddenly came into the possession of weaponry, and a lot of it. Shots came from the rooftops, from the alleys, even from the crowd. The road blockade, just like all the other ones, was completely outclassed. Anderson didn't even think, he just followed what was nearly basic protocol for this type of situtation -- plant explosives, and possible termal sensitive mines on your location, remotely arm them, and detonate them once you were clear of the area. For two reasons, one to give yourself a flashy cover, the second to kill the murderous mob that no doubt following close behind you.

Anderson did exactly what his training demanded and the sound of explosions shook the ground, as the other Marines followed suit. As they reached the next roadblock, sharpshooters were already wizzing bullets past their head at the oncoming crowd. Once that happened, the unoffical protocol gave every Marine five seconds -- either to get behind the metal barricades of the roadblock, or to hit the ground as quickly as you could. If not, your fellow Marines would gun you down. Luckily Anderson was close enough to jump the barricade and take cover. As he spun around and settled his rifle down on the metal barricade he saw an also all too common sight -- one of his fellow Marines disregarding the protocol and trying to reach the barricade even though he only had three seconds remaining. He was in Anderson's sights, and the private did not hesitate when his mind echoed 'zero', he let loose a burst and the Marine fell, and just as good because right behind him a man from the mob collapsed too as the rounds entered him, he dropped his small missile launcher. Things always worked like that.

The fight was all the same as the first barricade, the Marines, now doubled in numbers opened fire, from either behind the barricade or from improvised positions farther behind it, or in some cases in front of it. Though, to stop a anger mob of thousands at the second barricade was considered impossible. So, just like before he planted explosives and ran as fast he could to the next barricade. Anderson's mind only thought of reaching the next barricade, once he reached it, and he was one of the first, he allowed his mind to wonder for a second while he waited for the sharpshooters from down the street to start pelting protesters. It would two at least three more blockades to fall before the crowd finally gave up. The citizenry was in a rage, and the explosives only did so much, in fact the explosives from the first barricade probably forced all the 'softhearted' to flee, what was left now was the actual rebel forces -- trained and armed to fight the Imperial Marines. That was the only reason why they kept coming. Also because it was discovered by the rebels long ago that the they often outnumbered any Imperial Marine detachment by ten-to-one.

Anderson heard the crackle of the first sniper go off and one of the various charging faces fell to the ground -- luckily this time all the Marines got to cover before the five second grace peroid was up. Like before, they all left loose a fury of fire, using gernade launchers, missile launchers, and even the newest Imperial device -- plasma gernades. Anderson activated one, and tossed it quickly, since it was more than mere rumor that the gernades user only have three seconds before the thousands of nanobots stuck to you. One of the protesters screamed as the gernade hit him right in the head, and instead of bouncing off, it stuck. The man screamed in horror, obviously he'd seen how one worked. Five seconds later he, and everyone within five feet of him all got a close up look of how it worked.

Anderson's squad leader, Seargant Pilk, was surprisingly still alive. Officers had become high canidates from headshots from the rebel snipers. Pilk, though, had always had some kind of aura about him that suggested he wouldn't just die randomly -- it'd require something big to kill him. Then again, hundreds of officers had reputations like that, and many of them now laid in graves. As Anderson noticed the mob breaching the 'security' line, an invisible line on the ground that all Marines watched constantly -- if the rebels managed to get that close, then they needed to fall back again. Anderson, once again, planted more explosives, albeit this was the last he had on him. He noticed other Marines just getting up and running, they'd squandered their's far too quickly. As Anderson finished setting his, he began to retreat, though as he ran he noticed a lot of Marines weren't moving at all, the rebels had dealt a heavier blow than expected. That would, inevitably, make it harder to stop the assault. The rebels were keen on doing such things -- starting a riot, knowing the Imperial Marines despite all laws and military orders, were forced to allow riots to take place so long as they did not involve too much violence -- it allowed the people a chance to vent. The rebels often worked their way into such crowds, hell they were sometimes the majority of the people in the crowds and when that happened, situtations like this developed.

The Marine private kept up his diligent pace, as he ran down the street the tall metallic skyscrappers that towered above him seemed more like an entrapment than anything else, he'd give anything to be aboard one of the orbital ships right now. His wishful thinking was shattered when he heard a great chorus of praise come from in front of him. He slowed his sprint down to a sharp run and saw in the distance the flag of the rebels being waved at the next roadblock, with a great deal of them quickly filling in from behind it. His sharp run now began a slow jog -- he and his fellow Marines were trapped. Though, like always, years of combat had forced nothing but instinct to coarse them him. The same went for his comrades as they formed two lines, one pointing towards the advancing rebels, one at the stationary ones. They didn't wait for orders to begin firing, and already several of them were calling for air support. Anderson, from experiance knew that air support was scarce, and what could make it here would only give limited aid before rushing back to base. The idea of dying for your comrades faded long ago in the Marines. He, however, knew that it was the Imperial training that instinctively had them call for air support.

One of his not-so-close comrades suddenly gasped in shock, "Are you serious? Two minutes?!"

Anderson looked over at him for a moment before continueing to fire on the rebels, who ran from cover to cover, trying to force the Marines inbetween a rock and a hard place. Threw all the gunfire and screams he heard the incoming sounds of aircraft -- though it wasn't the Planetary Fighters he'd grown accustomed to hearing ... but the low rumble of Transportcraft. His heart skipped a beat when he actually saw them. Getting air support wasn't common, but it wasn't uncommon either. Getting manpower support was more than rare, the only time it happened was when the war's outcome depended upon it -- or at least thats how it felt. The transport craft also weren't the generic types normally sent in even those rare circumstances, they were armed and they let the enemy know it in a hurry. Opening fire with high-powered rounds and artillery shells, slamming into the ranks of the enemy with pinpoint accuracy. That was something that the Marine private also noticed, almost instantly. Accuracy amoung the Air Force was extremely poor, given that their recruits recieved only the most basic of training.

The bombardment did some damage to the rebels, enough at least to stop the advancing ones and to keep the ones on the other side from advancing. Though nothing, it seemed, could stop the momentum of the assault. That was until the transport aircraft came in low, as if to drop off troops -- in the middle of the fighting. Bullets bounced off the transport aircraft as its heavily armored structure was resisted to all but missile or plasma weaponry. A few missile did strike it broadside, and holes appeared as if to prove the weakness, but instead of fleeing as Anderson expected, the aircraft stayed still and calm. Suddenly its side doors were flung open and from the darkness inside Anderson saw red lights, pairs of red lights to be correct, shine threw -- as if they were looking at them. The lights seemed to come closer until the sunlight hit the bodies they were attached too. Anderson actually stopped firing as his Marine instincts were overriden by surprise. What he saw were the Autonomous, machines created for war and were very capable of fulling their purpose. Once the Marines had subdued the rebellions on Braxis IV and VII, the Autonomous were sent to mop up and keep the people subdued -- or at least thats what the media told the public. The real story was that the Marines were forced to evacuate the entire planet and the rebels actually had a functioning government for nearly a year before the first of the Autonomous attacked both worlds at once and crippled their populations. Anderson had never seen an Autonomous up close and their appearance was menacing, more so than the rumors suggested.

The machines, however, only glanced at the Marines once at they came out -- only to confirm that they were not the enemy. Once that was settled they went like clockwork and started to form up into their own squads. They moved like humans, but with a machine's percision. Out of the four squads formed, five Autonomus in each squad, two went towards the Marines.

"Evacuate immediately, we have the situtation under control," voiced one of the machines in an all unhuman metallic voice. A missile flew into a building close behind the machine, doing nothing to underscore its point, but the Marines, along with Anderson, obeyed -- if a machine could die instead of them, why not run? The Marine private quickly jumped into the transport craft, and as the other Autonomous squad guarded the transport until it left, the other squads began a steady assault -- yes they were performing offensive strikes on the rebels. Anderson could not help but admire them, but also fear them -- if they were capable enough to do with fewer number than the Marines could do, they could be dangerous. Anderson, however, didn't want to think about it for the rest of the trip back to base. He rested his head and was nearly asleep when he heard one of his comrades shout in surprise.

"Holy shit! There's no one piloting this damn thing!"

ooc: i'm cool with the rules and run into a Jagada fleet. You can decide which one although since they'll just be ships to me.

ic:

"Captain we've got multiple contacts on the long range sensors. Several large vessels but I can't really tell much more for now. I'm picking up some pretty large weapon signatures of them as well" the young female tactical officer reported.

"On screen" Mariko asked and these dots could be seen. Even with magification they couldn't see much more unless they got closer.

"Take us in at warp 1 with the shields and cloaking device warmed up. If it turns out to be hostile we can make an escape and get out here in one piece" she said as she gave the orders to her helm and tactical officer.

The lone Kirisuban ship came closer at a reduced warp speed so the ships could get a good look at her. It was also agile enough to make an escape if need be.

Onboard JGFS First of the Damned,
Orbiting Planet Braxis III,
Home System of the Braxian Empire,
19 months until T-Day,

The situtation on Braxis III was improving, to say the least. The Autonomous had already siezed control of Rov, and the rebel forces which had been massing, unknown to Imperial Ops, in the northeast sections of the planet had been sneak attacked by the machines and completely decimated. Grand Admiral Kurtos shuddered at the thought of what would have happened had the rebels launched their offensive with Imperial Marines still on the planet, without the machines assistance. A similar incident had occured on Braxis IV, and it resulted in one of the most humilating routes in Imperial history. Since then he'd lost all hope in the Marine's ability to put down any rebellion within the Home System. He glanced over his shoulder, at Braxis itself, millions of miles away -- frozen and dead. If the Emperor would simply allow the rest of the Empire to know what was happening here, at the very least reinforcements could be brought in to stablize the more important systems; even if that meant the Empire would loose a large swab of territory.

He sighed and turned his attention back over to the hologram in front of him and watched as the Autonomous gathered to mount another assault on yet another makeshift rebel fortress. The machines used less of everything in whatever they did: less manpower, less ammunition, less armored vehicles -- all of this eventually saved the Empire billions of icons, icons which were needed either to pay tribute to breakaway states to keep them from invading the least defended parts of the Empire, or to increase funding so that more fleets could be raised to defend the Empire's hyperextended borders. When he finally began to focus back on the machines he noticed their plan of attack was very simple, it was all they needed afterall. Its was all anyone really needed against rebels like this -- the Imperial Marines simply lacked the 'will' to fight, it was why highly complex and 'soft' plans of attack had to be thought up, most of the time on the spot, to ensure the Marines even fought. From what Kurtos could gather threw the various holographic images, the Autonomous were going to force the rebels to focus the majority of their forces on the eastern side of the makeshift fort. However ... there was no secondary force, no reinforcements to attack to western wall. The once simple plan he'd thought they were using suddenly became highly complex. Perhaps a malfunction? He was tempted to enter his Override Code and insert manual commands -- but his experiance with the machines told him to give them a few more minutes.

Weather it was instinct or simply faith wasn't known to the Grand Admiral, all he did know, was that twenty minutes later he wasn't sorry for not entering his code. The Autonomous assault began tragically, as dozens of the machines were seemingly cut down by the rebel firepower, which did in fact exceed all expectations for a fort that size. The Autonomous began to withdrawl, when the Grand Admiral saw blips appear on the screen -- green blips, the blips used for Autonomous units. They appeared, to his surprise, inside of the rebel base. A moment later they disappeared and the Autonomous that had launched the attack on the eastern wall were now gone completely, moving at great speeds away. Kurtos kept the hologram up -- had the Autonomous actually suffered a humilating defeat? Sure, the machines had lost before, hell their losses were more than what they should have been, or at least thats what Wrench kept saying in his feedback from the reports he kept sending him about the machines results in battle. Still, to loose this quickly, to give up, it wasn't like them. Suddenly the hologram went dead and the word 'Error' flashed in red. Kurtos looked puzzled and immeidately opened a communication to the Autonomous commanding unit down on the surface.

"This is Grand Admiral Kurtos Aglarmar, authorization code 4452," he said dryly, as he had to do everytime he established contact with one of the machine's command units, "Status report on the recent assault on a rebel fort in the Fire Sector."

A few moments of pause were ended when an all too mechanical voice responsed, "Ground units state that a low yield nuclear weapon was used to disable the fort. Reasons where that rebels had an extensive underground tunneling network under the base."

The Admiral paused for a moment -- a nuclear weapon release, even if it were low yield and for those reasons was still a bit of an overkill. He shook it off, "Don't use such excessive force unless absolutely nessecary. Nuclear weapons aren't cheap."

"Confirmed and noted Grand Admiral."

Kurtos changed the 'Error' display to another section of the battlefield and watched the Autonomous prepare to mount another assault. This time he watched carefully for any more type of excess. If it happened once, it could happen again -- the only difference was, it shouldn't. If a human used excessive force, even after being told not to, it could be overlooked as a mere accident or absolutely nessecary. A machine, once told, should never disobey. If it did it showed the machine had ulterior purposes, beyond the mission and that could be potentially dangerous.

---

Onboard JGFS Imperial God,
Neo Nova System,
Three days travel from Neo Nova II,

"Captain," stated an ensign, out of the various ensigns on the deck, this one however commanded the sensors, "We've got readings three hundred miles away, and closing slowly."

Captain Graticus brought the sensors to the main screen of the JGFS Imperial God, a Battle Lord-Class Destroyer. An older ship, but not too old, it still had many more years of service to the Emperor before it was sent to the Scrap Worlds. The ship on sensor was small to say the least.

"The ship is closing on us?" asked the Captain, although he already knew the answer.

"Aye, sir."

'Change coarse and head straight for this ship, as soon as possible hail them," he stated. He looked over at the weapons ensign, "Arm the Ad-Hoc nuclear missiles, and the Titans."

If this was a ship sent by one of the breakaway empires or states, than they would soon regret coming so close to Imperial space. The Empire may be dying, but it was far from dead.

"Captain a ship is changing course and is on an intercept course. ETA given their speed three minutes" the tactical officer reported.

"Helm, Drop out of warp and then switch to 1/2 impulse. Tactical run your data base and try to identify that ship. If you can't at least tell me what we could be dealing with if things turn hostile" Captain Toda ordered.

The orders were carried out and they would be able to cloak and slip away if need be. Only now did she leave her office and enter the bridge ready for anything.

Rov,
Capital of Braxis III,
Home System of the Braxian Empire,
15 months until T-Day

The large, bulky transport ships of the Empire came threw the smoke and ash filled skies above Rov. A few short months ago coming threw those clouds would have meant the transport was well within range of the anti-aircraft weapons the rebels had set up all over the surface and the chances of it being hit and taken down were relatively high. Now ... now the transport merely met the eerie silence that seemed to engulf the simmering city. The transports thrusters and counter-thrusters worked in unison to gently guide the transport to a makeshift landing site. Its tripod-system of legs allowed it to land as smoothly as possible too. Once the hatch hissed open, Private Anderson squinted due to sudden flood of light into the troops transport compartment. Just a few short months ago, if that armored door had opened like that, with no initial bombardment of the area, he and his fellow Marines would all probably be dead. It had in fact happened several times, enough times that there were actually 'Drop-In Massacres'. Entire companies worth of soldiers had been lost because of a lack of initial bombardment.

As the Marine private stepped out of the transport, he didn't even bother to raise his gun, for what greeted him wasn't altogether alive anyone. The cold, red eyes of an Autonomous met his as he stepped down the ramp onto the broken cement ground of Rov. The machine didn't even acknowledge him, merely turning its head to the side and pointing to a location where he and his fellow Marines could wait. Anderson obeyed, and so did the rest of the Marines. The only one who didn't was Seargent Pilk, their commanding officer, who stopped to chat with the Autonomous. Anderson kept them in his perifial the entire time and watched as the seargant merely nodded and walked over to his Marines.

"Alright, listen up," he said loudly, "The machines have vaporized all resistance in this city, however, there is a major battle going on north of here and the robots need us to hold the fort here, so they can go blow the hell out of another one."

Anderson and his fellow Marines gave the famous battlecry, "By the Will of the Emperor!"

"Damn right by his will," Pilk shouted, "We've got a one square mile patrol radius, starting at this very airbase. You'll occassionaly meet up with other patrols doing the same thing, maybe even some machines from time to time. If you do happen, for whatever reason, to see rebels, try not to die immeidately."

With a grin the Seargant divided the eight man squad up into two fireteams. Fireteam Red and Fireteam Blue. Anderson was in Fireteam Blue, and was in fact put in command to his very surprise. "But sir, I'm hardly the most expe-..."

"Nonsense! You've shown me at least half a dozen times you know what you're doing with that gun, plus I've never seen you make any mistakes, any big ones at least."

Anderson knew he had made plenty of mistakes, more than he could count actually, but maybe Pilk was right -- he didn't remember making any big ones. Maybe he could actually pull it off. Even if he thought he couldn't, it wouldn't make Pilk take him off the leadership role. So better that he accepted it and liked it. Besides, it was only patrol duty.

Fireteam Red was of coarse under Pilk's command, and the Seargent seemed to take just as much pride in commanding a smaller force as he had in a larger one and his skills were no less potent. Pilk soon called Anderson over to him and the two looked at local maps, which were in fact on paper -- something Anderson was not accustomed too, but since the planet's holographic network had been more or less smashed and communication with the Orbital Fleet somewhat hampered by the radiation from nuclear weapons release, paper was probably the only practical way to go. While he didn't like it he suffered threw it, the Imperial Marine Academy had actually taught him how to read a paper map and he so he understood, basically, what he was doing. Pilk pointed to black box he'd drawn in manually with a marker.

"This is Blue Sector," he said before grinning, "Now as your first test of leadership, who do you guess will patrol the Blue Sector?"

Anderson faked ignorance perfectly, "You."

Pilk looked at him in depressing tones, finally Anderson gave a sly smirk and his commanding officer laughed out loud, "Nearly thought I'd made a mistake there!"

Anderson merely nodded and turned his attention back to the map. The area labeled Blue Sector encompassed several roads, but the one that stuck out most to Anderson was Reeds Dr, which cut right threw the middle of the sector and kept on going, from it branched three secondary roads -- each spanning until they went out of the sector. They were: Rownson, Meadows, and Trifecta Rds respectively. At the corner of Rownson and Reeds sat a Library, or maybe only what was left of one since the private doubted anything so substantial remained intact. At the beginning of the sector all the way up to the first secondary road, Rownson, were nothing but small commerical stores, sometimes called 'Strips'. Rownson, however, jutted from Reeds on the right side of the road, and only the left the first road was Trifecta, and it was only the secondary road on the left side. From the beginning of the sector to Trifecta on the left side was a sprawling park, something Anderson also doubted was anything more than simmering ash. At the corner of Trifect and Reeds, across the street from the park was large office building, to its left and continueing until the end of the sector was more 'Strips'. On the right side of the road, inbetween Rownson and Meadows was nothing but 'Strips' as well. And even beyond Meadows to the sector's end. This was obviously a highly commerical area. Though Anderson soon realized that once you turned down any of these secondary and got past the roadside stores, you found low-rent housing units. Neighborhoods that, probably prior to the revolt, were probably in a state of near anarchy already. Low-rent housing usually meant high crime rates, an increase in illict drug useage, and overall a poor quality of life. Anderson growled as silently as he could, checking each of those abandoned hellholes would be pain staking -- and they would have to be checked to ensure no rebels were hiding in them. It would take all day, and maybe all night too.

Finally once he memorized as much of the map as possible he looked back at Pilk who was finishing up memorizing his own sector, which was nearly identical to his own, save a monestary existed in his, along with a armaments plant. Maybe Pilk had purposely given Anderson the seemingly easier sector? The private would never know since Pilk wasn't likely to tell him either way.

Pilk gave a smirk to Anderson, "You can take the map Private, I've got all I need up here." He then pointed to his helmet protected head.

Anderson nodded and folded the medium-sized map up and placed it in one of his pockets. He and Pilk spoke for a few more minutes and agreed that within the next hour they would begin their patrol, since they were already an hour behind schedule. Anderson walked back over to his men, who were double checking their equipment, not out of diligence or out of respect for the weapons, mainly out of boredom. A poor excuse to clean and checks ones gear, Anderson thought, but at least it got it done.

"Alright, we move out in one hour," he said giving them a glance, "We've got a lot of urban patrols to do, including house-to-house. Now, don't get bitchy, we've only go to do this once and then its mainly a 'look inside and check' thing from now on', alright?"

Weather his men agreed with his promotion or not wasn't known to the private promoted leader, but when he spoke they at least acknowledged he existed and was talking to them directly. They cursed and grummbled like all Imperial Marines did this day -- Anderson absentmindedly wondered if the Imperial Marines on the Border Systems, who knew not of the Empire's slow, inevitable decent into frozen chaos, were just as demoralized as he and his men. He put the thought aside for now and instead went to checking his own weapons, he even pulled the paper map back out and began to plan a basic patrol route. He and his men would of coarse entire the sector from the south-going-north, on Reeds Dr and would follow it all the way until they reached the first secondary road, which would be Rownson, and there they would turn down the streets and go about the time consuming task of checking each of the abandoned houses -- since they were the most likely places rebels would be hiding in. Once that was done, they'd move out and hit the next secondary road, Trifecta, and would follow the same plan, until they hit Meadows, and once that was done -- he intended to give the sector one more quick sweep before bringing his men back to the airbase for rest. Anderson's mind suddenly began to calculate and ponder things he'd never pondered before -- tactics. He saw how much simpler it would be if ... if he drew a box around Rownson Rd and the houses and commerical units south of it, and dubbed it the Rownson Box, he did similar doodles on the Trifecta and Meadows secondaries. The only place which was not encompassed was the Park and it was given its own box, as it would require its own sweep -- which would virtually take half a day to fully get done. Once the private was done he smiled, he seemed to have a talent for this command thing.

Before Anderson realized it, an hour had come and gone. He only realized this when Pilk and his men began to rally together, and his seargant gave him a weary eye. Anderson quickly rallied his men and after another check of their equipment, which seemed to drag on a lot longer than nessecary to Anderson, the Blue Fireteam was beginning their trek towards the Blue Sector.