Le Mort Homme

[Sea Skimmer]

You can't pull that kind of bullshit if you're hoping to move your official seat of government to the planet afterwards

Bring construction driod's and world devastators. Anyway, its a big city. People wont notice a few hundred trillion lives being lost in some little dispute.

[Singular Quartet]

You can't pull that kind of bullshit if you're hoping to move your official seat of government to the planet afterwards

Bring construction driod's and world devastators. Anyway, its a big city. People wont notice a few hundred trillion lives being lost in some little dispute.

ACtually, as Pablo put out earlier, World-devastaters were banned under treaty, along with super-lasers and sun-crushers, and, I owuld also hope, Galalxy Guns, etc. etc.

[Sea Skimmer]

ACtually, as Pablo put out earlier, World-devastaters were banned under treaty, along with super-lasers and sun-crushers, and, I owuld also hope, Galalxy Guns, etc. etc.

How can superlasers be banned if an Eclipse is running around, and World Devastators are little more then large armed construction driods, the same urban renewal capabilites could be gotten from a number of smaller driods.

[Singular Quartet]

ACtually, as Pablo put out earlier, World-devastaters were banned under treaty, along with super-lasers and sun-crushers, and, I owuld also hope, Galalxy Guns, etc. etc.

How can superlasers be banned if an Eclipse is running around, and World Devastators are little more then large armed construction driods, the same urban renewal capabilites could be gotten from a number of smaller driods.

Well... an eclispse class super-laser isn't a world destoryer, more of a really quick BDZ tool, so I suppose it wouldn't be banned. World-devastaters Ic an see ebcause they can eat planets given enough time.

[Sea Skimmer]

Well... an eclispse class super-laser isn't a world destoryer, more of a really quick BDZ tool, so I suppose it wouldn't be banned. World-devastaters Ic an see ebcause they can eat planets given enough time.

And your could fire the superlaser many times in that period as well.

[Darth Fanboy]

The Eclipse Superlaser is IIRC 2/3 the strength of the original Death Star's superlaser. While it doesnt blow the planet completely apart it does indeed crack the crust of the planet, royally fucking it up in ways the standard BDZ doesn't.

[Pablo Sanchez]

The Eclipse Superlaser is IIRC 2/3 the strength of the original Death Star's superlaser. While it doesnt blow the planet completely apart it does indeed crack the crust of the planet, royally fucking it up in ways the standard BDZ doesn't.

The energy requirements for blasting the crust of a planet aren't even anywhere close to 2/3 of what hit Alderaan. If you put 66% of that energy into a planet it would still blow up pretty nice. It just wouldn't come apart like a firecracker. (and considering that the observed DS Superlaser beat the 1E38 joules minimum by a rather large margin, a 2/3 power superlaser might still be enough to smash the planet to flinders anyway)

I'd put the Eclipse's superlaser firepower much lower. I considered it analagous to a very big conventional bomb or a small tactical nuke. While a weapon of mass destruction, it's "mild" enough that the Empire could sneak it in under the limit. It's deployed on a single battleship at the discretion of a mere captain, after all!

[Darth Fanboy]

I'd put the Eclipse's superlaser firepower much lower. I considered it analagous to a very big conventional bomb or a small tactical nuke. While a weapon of mass destruction, it's "mild" enough that the Empire could sneak it in under the limit. It's deployed on a single battleship at the discretion of a mere captain, after all!

The 2/3 was something I pulled from the Essential Guide to Vehicles, so you're assessment is probably more correct. Though IU will say that the Only ttwo Eclipse SSDs ever produced were commanded by the Emperor himself, so the SUperlaser wasnt really at the discretion of a mere captain.

Forty years after the Vong though, I can see some powerful faction trying to re-arm with as many big toys as possible, so im going to eagerly await the combat debut of Eradicator IV. But I implore, you not to have it destroyed in the same lame way the first two Eclipses were if indeed you plan to destroy it.

Addendum: Just had another thought, perhaps the Eclipse Superlaser was more intended to be a capital Ship Buster in the same way the DSII was used at Endor. If this is the case it really could perform ts role as a "Fleet Buster" by eliminating the larger enemy capital ships with but an afterthough. Depending on how fast it can fire it would take one large and determined Republic force to beat it.

[Sea Skimmer]

The energy requirements for blasting the crust of a planet aren't even anywhere close to 2/3 of what hit Alderaan. If you put 66% of that energy into a planet it would still blow up pretty nice. It just wouldn't come apart like a firecracker. (and considering that the observed DS Superlaser beat the 1E38 joules minimum by a rather large margin, a 2/3 power superlaser might still be enough to smash the planet to flinders anyway)

Someone, Nitram I think came up with the idea that it might be two thirds the magnitude of a Death Star blast, which would be much more on lines of only shattering continents. Still thats a huge blast.

[phongn]

Actually, I think Edam came up with that idea first.

I personally lean towards the magnitude side, since it seems rather unreasonable that such a relatively small ship can have a superlaser nearly as powerful as the one on the DS1 itself.

[Pablo Sanchez]

Le Mort Homme
Chapter Three
Landing Procedure

----
"It is not unusual when making a combat landing for the soldiers to become frightened and anxious. In order to maintain order and morale it may be necessary for the morale officer to intercede and offer counsel. Here are a few phrases which may help in your efforts. Remember to use his first name, rather than his rank and surname, in order to create a sense of familiarity and comradeship.
1. 'Calm down, [NAME], we're all in this together.'
2. 'Come on, [NAME], be a good sport. We've got to do this for the glory of the Empire.'
3. 'You're the only one panicking. Be a man, [NAME].'
4. 'Everybody has to die sometime, [NAME].'
5. 'It's time to cowboy up, you pussy.'

"Remember that you don't have to stick to these specific phrases. Tailor them to your particular situation. Experiment with different techniques. Above all, remember that it is sometimes necessary to get tough in order to keep the soldiers' heads in the game (see chapter 3: Getting Tough)."

--Excerpt from Imperial Morale Officer Handbook, Chapter 6: Entering Combat
----


The fleet exited hyperspace in formation with shields up. Admiral Wells glanced at the status report, which consisted of a list of the flotillas in action, 30 in all. Each showed green and one hundred percent ready now, but as the battle continued the command computer would calculate their vitality and the color would travel down the spectrum until it hit dark red, and then it would go black when the flotilla reached less than ten percent effective strength. This would certainly happen to a few of the leading formations.

All in all, Wells had around 34,000 capital warships at his disposal. Most of these were screening ships smaller than Imperators, another component was the ten thousand or so Imperators or equivalents, and then there were the four thousand odd larger vessels. He nodded appreciatively; even with the much more efficient war mobilization of the modern era, he was still in command of a force that compared favorably to any in prior history. Yuma had stripped the rest of the fleet to the bones for this operation.

It was, of course, too much for anyone to effectively command. It was broken up to ten admirals below Wells, then to 30 rear admirals below, and further and further down until you hit the ships' captains themselves. The fleet itself was organized in the formation which characterized engagements of this size. In essence, the ships were organized into a sort of cloudbank style which was designed to allow maximum concentration of firepower, with various outremers and screens to probe for weaknesses. If an extended limb was faced with an aggressive enemy movement it would fall back into the larger whole so that firepower could be directed against the incursion. Theoretically, the battle would develop with both sides assuming this posture, and then each would move towards the other like two stormfronts. The outremers would attempt to find advantageous fields of fire against the enemy, and to refuse the efforts of their opposite numbers to do the same.

Essentially a slugging match. Ackbar and Thrawn might have prized maneuver, but they were fighting in the pre-Vong era, before mass mobilization of shipbuilding resources had rendered that element of battle (save for occasional flashes of luck) almost obsolete. Guns and shields would decide the battles of this war.

'Or not,' Wells thought as he surveyed the scanning information on the enemy fleet. It looked like the Imperial Naval Academy had packaged this battle up rather nicely.

The Republicans had, of course, come to the very same conclusion as the Empire regarding the necessary action. They had assembled their forces with the same rapidity and urgency, and in the much larger numbers their greater size afforded them. But Imperial Officers were better trained at organization than their counterparts in the New Republic, and that made all the difference in assembling a fleet from scratch for this sort of battle.

The Republican Fleet was strung out piecemeal all through the system and still arriving bit by bit. By far the largest concentration was around Coruscant itself, but the ships orbitted all around the planet with little semblence of formation. About 10,000 loosely arranged capital vessels were nearly in engagement range for the Imperial Fleet, and there was no way they would be able to concentrate sufficiently in time to make a stand.

"That's a hell of waste of some fine ships and men," Admiral Wells said quietly, then he barked out, "All flotillas move to engage, maneuver plan is 'Split 16.'"

The Eradicator IV's ion engine's fired up and she accelerated towards the enemy fleet. Thousands of screening vessels lay between her black hull and enemy turbolasers. It would have been safer to have stick the ship somewhere lightyears away, but the light superlaser couldn't be spared. Coruscant was the most heavily shielded planet in existence, and the fleet's torpedo spheres could have taken days or weeks to make sufficient cracks.

The fleet reached turbolaser range with the enemy, and lights began to flash between the two vast groups. The main battle formation of the Imperial Fleet slowed while other segments accelerated. The more quickly moving ships formed into a sort of deep three-dimensional cross and plunged through the enemy mass, guns blazing. Casualties among these ships were heavy, and not a few were destroyed. But the end result was one of great benefit to the fleet as a whole.

Within about three minutes, the ten thousand enemy ships had been separated into four smaller groups; a further two minutes and they were enclosed in spherical pockets and ravaged by waves of turbolaser fire. Imperial fighter wings, corvettes, and other light craft harried the Republicans to prevent them from achieving even a modest concentration of firepower, and the battlewagons hammered out a brisk tempo. It took about thirty minutes in total to liquidate the entire force, and Wells's own fleet took minor losses in comparison. All but a handful showed bright and cheery green.

"Have you ever hunted pack predators?" Wells asked his aide as the last Republican vessels were silenced.

The man, like Wells and most other high naval officers, was an aristocrat, "I have, sir."

"We're dealing with the same mentality, here. It took a very fine Naval Staff College and a still finer tradition to get our officers to where they are. The Republicans haven't got either because they won their war by trusting in the Force and following great alpha males like Ackbar. Depending on intangibles like luck and genius is the path to ruin; proper command is knowing how to deal with ill luck and stupidity," Wells said, never taking his eyes from the battle display.

The fleet moved closer to Coruscant, and the enemy kept up their futile defense. Wells noticed an unusual concentration of activity on the edge of the sensor blindspot created by the planet's mass. He started to issue an order to investigate it, but a flotilla commander had already taken the initiative on that matter and sent pickets to scan the enemy movement. They were transports, probably evacuating refugees. The Republicans had opened up the shields on the opposite side of Coruscant and were getting as many people out as possible. It was difficult to tell with all the jamming, but it appeared as though they had commandeered everything they could lay hands on. The transports were running full burn for open space, hoping to get out of range of the Imperial Fleet's interdiction in time to flee.

A holo representing one of the subcommanders, a Commodore, popped up on the tactical screen and began speaking, "Sir, I request permission to launch raids against the convoys exiting the planet, to force the enemy to devote more ships to their defense."

The Admiral shook his head disapprovingly, "Now, Commodore, we are not barbarians. Request denied, continue operations according to the plan.

He would let them go unmolested, those civilians weren't a part of this anymore. The fleet could continue this piecemeal engagement until the system was cleansed of enemy presence, then peel back the planetary defenses and call in the troops. That was the civilized way to kill people.


----


The transports sat in empty space a few light years away. Within them was a little over one and a half billion men. Obviously this would be insufficient to sieze the capitol planet of a galactic power. This was but the assault wave of the operation, which would seize the landing zones, expand them enough so that many more troops could be deployed, and destroy whatever defensive batteries came within range.

Private Peren Atkins felt tremendously small every time he thought of all that was going on around him, so he tried to move his thoughts to something else. Nothing comforting came to mind, so he considered how he might perform in combat. He had never killed a man, and had always been taught that it was a sin. It was the worst sin of all; worse than thievery, lying, sodomy, and even rape. He wasn't sure he would be able to do it.

He had read somewhere that only a small fraction of soldiers in combat actually fired their rifles directly at the enemy, and so accounted for almost all small-arms fatalities. The rest of the troopers in a unit just discharged their weapons at the area immediately around the enemy. Peren's drill instructors had thought this behavior intolerable goldbricking. No honest soldier should depend upon his fellows to do his work for him. Imperial Fusiliers had a reputation for accuracy that had to be maintained, so Peren was supposed to shoot to kill.

He looked mournfully at his unloaded blastech A-280 as it lay inert on the bunk next to him. If a bolt from that at the standard setting struck a man in the head, the cranium and its contents would become a red mist. If it struck the chest, it would blow out a fist-sized entry wound and an exit wound the size of a basketball. The A-280 would kill a man if the bolt struck anywhere near a vital area, and even if it struck the limbs of the target it would probably tear them clean away and kill him by shock or blood loss in seconds.

Atkins felt sick when he thought of shooting someone with it. Then he thought about possibly hesitating in the moment and being shot with one himself, which also made him sick. Peren didn't know which thought was worse, though his upbringing had always tried to teach him that it was better to be killed than kill. Something in him had always resisted that holy teaching, and it worried him that he doubted. Nature wanted to live and would do anything, but wasn't reason and religion the thing that lifted a person above nature? He rubbed his face.

His parents hadn't wanted him to join the army. Perhaps they had been right, but what else could he do? He didn't want to be a leech like his father and brothers were content to be, getting all the benefits of the Imperial rule without any of the costs. Atkins understood that he owed a debt to his country that he could never really repay, but he was going to try nonetheless.

The question was whether or not he could kill. He had heard the sermons about righteous retribution and war in the name of God, but he wasn't quite gullible enough to believe that. Peren was smart and had never gone in for the glorification of childlike and unquestioning faith in the will of God. A child had no doubt because children were too stupid and inexperienced to question much of anything. Praising that sort of response in an adult was just wrong, but if the holy book said that God wanted his followers to behave so then it must be right. Atkins was very conflicted.

Sergeant Davis broke into his reverie, "What's wrong with you, kid?"

"Nothing, sir," Atkins replied politely.

"Bullshit. You're running a loop, looking at your rifle, then your bunk, then closing your eyes and shaking your head. We're going into combat any time now, and I haven't the time for macho bullshit nor for keeping secrets. I need my platoon and squad up to speed when we hit dirt, and no breakdowns afterwards. It's about the kill, isn't it?" Davis interrogated, not unkindly.

Peren nodded.

"Everybody thinks like that, the first time. Probably the rest of the times, too. If it's easy for you then I suppose you've got some bad wiring. I've killed a few people, myself--aliens and humans. After a while it gets to be automatic," the sergeant said.

"I-I don't want it to be automatic," Atkins said.

"Nor I. But that's the way it is. Just think of it the way I do, alright? Remember that if you don't take the shot and aim for the kill, you're giving the guy you didn't nail a chance to pop one of your friends. Whatever your responsibility to this God person or to yourself, there are people counting on you to watch their back."

Atkins thought about it, and it actually did help.

"Thank you, Sergeant," he said.

Davis shook his head, "You can thank me by doing a good job."

Then the klaxons sounded for everyone to buckle down, because the transport was about the make the jump to hyperspace.

The skipper came on over the intercom system, "Good luck, Fusiliers: In all things daring."





Appy-polly-loggies for the relative shortness of this chapter, and the extra length of time it took me to get it put out. I've been a bit busy lately, and I hope to speed things up and release longer chapters. I'm also wondering if anyone would be willing to offer assistence in the form of pre-post proofing and criticism. Any help would be most appreciated.

[Singular Quartet]

Well... looks like I'm first...

Excellent chapter. I'd be willing to do some proof-reading (I don't quite know how much help I'd be, though.) If you need it, you can PM me or email me at vybo@juno.com

[MKSheppard]

"It is not unusual when making a combat landing for the soldiers to become frightened and anxious. In order to maintain order and morale it may be necessary for the morale officer to intercede and offer counsel. Here are a few phrases which may help in your efforts. Remember to use his first name, rather than his rank and surname, in order to create a sense of familiarity and comradeship.
1. 'Calm down, [NAME], we're all in this together.'
2. 'Come on, [NAME], be a good sport. We've got to do this for the glory of the Empire.'
3. 'You're the only one panicking. Be a man, [NAME].'
4. 'Everybody has to die sometime, [NAME].'
5. 'It's time to cowboy up, you pussy.'

"Remember that you don't have to stick to these specific phrases. Tailor them to your particular situation. Experiment with different techniques. Above all, remember that it is sometimes necessary to get tough in order to keep the soldiers' heads in the game (see chapter 3: Getting Tough)."

--Excerpt from Imperial Morale Officer Handbook, Chapter 6: Entering Combat
----

Best line of the chapter alone.

[Sea Skimmer]

Good work, the shortness is acceptable, for now...

I can't help but love when action becomes bound completely by the N squared law, the silly rebels where outmatched by a factor of about eleven or so, assuming the two fleet compositions where similar.

I'd offer assistance proof reading, but I'd be worse then a computerized Grammer checker, I will offer my services in criticism but I'll suck at that as well if your story is written in the style I expect.

[Grand Admiral Thrawn]

Ah, the glorious A-280. Able to penetrate most body armor and cut a person in two at range. Didn't know the Imperials used it.

[phongn]

Yeah, if you need proofreading and/or criticism send it my way and I'll try to get some done.

Good chapter, though the Republican inside of me slightly cringes. N-squared indeed; that was a horrendous beating. (Even if it can't quite meet Marina's Second Coruscant in scale).

[Pablo Sanchez]

My self-proofing is usually adequate but occasionally (often?) a mistake will slip through without my noticing. The largest part of what I'm looking for is a plausibility-checker, someone to tell me when I make a mistake pertaining to the tactics and situations represented. I don't want to be pulling the same kind of errors that permeate most fanfiction and a lot of published Sci-Fi.

I mean, I'm not exactly Marina writing ingenious and perfectly set up engagements

[MKSheppard]

I mean, I'm not exactly Marina writing ingenious and perfectly set up engagements

You're doing just fine man.

Keep up with the Imperial Indoctrination Manual!

[phongn]

/waves the flag of the Republic

Hrm. You could try to get Marina to bounce from naval ideas off as well. She's usually online.

[Pablo Sanchez]

Le Mort Homme
Chapter Four
Check Your Corners

----
"Begin charging sequence."

"Weapon is charging. Optimum capacity in five... four... three... two... optimum capacity reached, weapon is ready to fire."

"Targetting point selected, grid reference FR223.5, that is two-two-three point five."

"Coordinates recieved and targetted. Say goodbye to Second Army Headquarters."

"Cut the chatter."

"Awaiting confirmation from the bridge."

"Confirmed, final safeties are released, weapon is free."

"Firing main weapon."

"Sensors report immediate planetary shield failure over grids 220 through 230, secondary effects from elimination of Lapuda Shield Generator Complex have resulted in failure over grids 180 to 300. Second Army Headquarters liquidated. Firing sequence completed, power down the weapon."

"Powering down. Oh, and by the way... kaboom."

"Cut the chatter, damn it."
----


The entire length of the Eradicator IV shuddered with the firing of the massive axial superlaser. Although the acceleration compensation prevented the crew from feeling the full effects, the superstructure of the vessel still shook gently as the big ship drew a green line to Coruscants shields. The weapon didn't bear comparison to the devices that had been used on the Death Stars, but it was still enough to overwhelm the defenses of any planet in the galaxy.

The beam drilled through two layers of planetary shielding and lanced into the twisted city scape with much-diminished but still potent force. Huge amounts of smoke and vapor that had been a military complex flashed up and out, some of it fully escaping the atmosphere, but most settling into the upper atmosphere as a dark cloud lit red by the massive firestorms just beginning to rage.

"The zone of shield failure is only about 500,000 square kilometers in extent," Admiral Wells' aide reported.

The admiral nodded, "A bit small, but it will have to do. Bring the first wave of transports in, and order our Victories to enter the atmosphere and engage point targets."

The vast armada of troop-carrying vessels was only minutes away by hyperspace; the Imperial Fleet's interdiction was timed to their lightspeed jump so that the transports could arrive directly over the planet. As soon as the last elements of the first wave had arrived, the gravity well generators came back online to prevent Republican relief efforts.

Meanwhile, waves of Victory Star Destroyers flew through the gap in the planetary defenses. The knockout blow against the shield generator complex had caused power fluctuations throughout half the hemisphere and disabled most of the nearby defensive batteries, so the repulsor-equipped warships went for the ground. The lower their altitude the greater the deflection in the shots taken by the republican batteries, and hence a lower probability of hit. The Victories took scattered but accurate fire from those nearby guns which had gotten their independent generators working, but by ferocity and speedy concentration of firepower the positions were silenced.

Nonetheless, a few destroyers took heavy damage. Their repulsors failed and they crashed to earth, tearing great gouges in the cityscape. A handful of those suffered multi-gigaton loss of containment in their ammunition or reactor systems, and great mushroom clouds of vaporized ferrocrete and other debris rose into the upper atmosphere.

But the great majority managed to get to their firing positions and begin to undermine Coruscant's defensive systems from within the shields. The network of turbolaser batteries and shield generators gradually fell. Within a few minutes, enough guns had been knocked out to allow the transports to begin landing. They would hit ground like a rising storm; first would be the smaller ships, transporting individual companies and regiments. As they secured the landing zones with fire support from the Victory-class destroyers and the more distant orbiting fleet. Then divisions would begin landing and expand the strongpoint, so that larger and larger formations could land and increase the volume and tempo of the symphony in progress.

Finally, the landing zones would spread out until they consumed the entire planet, liquidating enemy resistance and taking Coruscant. So the plan went.


----


"Clear the fucking ramps!" a naval non-commissioned officer to Peren's left screamed.

The soldier scrambled down the unloading ramp onto a ferrocrete plain and followed his platoon in a quick sprint to their rallying point. The navy files were very anxious that the disembarking areas be totally cleared of traffic. Normally this would have been done to allow the division's vehicles and artillery to be quickly offloaded, but Atkins didn't see the point. The vehicles and artillery would be useless in the urban rat's nest that was Coruscant, so they would just be left in the hold anyway. The higher-ups were apparently just being by-the-book.

As the platoon reached its rallying point, the various soldiers plopped to the hard ground for a breather. Atkins was in better shape than most, so he wasn't too winded, despite the thirty-odd kilos of equipment he was carrying. He tossed his helmet carefully onto the ferrocrete and sat on it.

"Bunch of... assholes..." Private Corning gasped, "I'll catch them on a dark night, I will."

Peren looked over at his squadmates, who were already setting up a bullshit session only minutes after landing. They were going off to secure some buildings very soon, and would potentially die. It was therefore vital that they get straight to work on talking shit about the chain of command.

Private Morys, who was from the much-looked down upon Kardhif area and a natural whiner, was in his element.

"What the fuck's wrong with 'em, really? Making us sprint about and waste our lungs in this smoky concrete shithouse, it don't make mil't'ry sense," he said.

Sergeant Davis was not breathing hard at all. "Well, shit, Bryan, why don't you send them a letter informing them of your opinion on this 'miltry' matter."

There was an insufferably bright flash a few kilometers to the north. Atkins was facing south and escaped harm. A few people who had been looking in the direction of the blast exclaimed in surprise and pain as the center of their vision was consumed by a bright purple blob. Something big had blown up, and after a few seconds the crack and roar of the explosion washed over the landing zone. Off in the distance, a mushroom cloud made up of particles from former buildings and former people rose up into the atmosphere. It joined the enormous darkness spreading across the horizon where something truly big had struck very hard, possibly even the Eradicator IV's big gun--though the soldiers didn't know for sure.

Atkins sighed and sniffed at the air. It reeked of smoke and ozone, despite the stiff wind that blew across the rooftops. All those big blasts were taking their toll on air quality, and the winds precipitated by the many firestorms could only spread the stink around. Atkins hoped that this would be the worst smell he would have to encounter in wartime, but he knew he would soon be encountering very unpleasant scents. It wasn't a good train of thought, so he got back to the bull session.

"What the fuck are they doing over there?" Corning asked.

Atkins turned around to face back at the transports. The divisional vehicles and artillery were being unloaded from the transport. They were all clustered together and being recklessly driven over the huge ferrocrete expanse of the landing pad, and they would have made a perfect target for enemy artillery and air support if such a thing had actually existed. The horde of repulsor vehicles, walkers, and wheeled and tracked ground vehicles roared across hundreds of meters of flat and sturdy rooftop, right up to the edge of abyss between buildings, where they stopped.

"What the fuck?" Morys asked no one in particular, "Why are they leaving those here, they're useless in this sprawl."

"Making room?" Atkins guessed.

"Room for what?" Morys said angrily.

His answer came quickly. A solid wave of people emerged from all the buildings near the landing zone and converged on the transport. Tens of thousands of refugees poured towards the vessel, covered by soldiers of the division. They came from every direction, carrying bundles of their belongings. It seemingly took forever for them to board, and for the whole duration, the platoon sat silently and watched the stream of dispossessed moving by. Finally, the transport was filled beyond capacity and the loading doors were shut. Those thousands still stuck on the tarmac cried out, and Atkins heard the officers with loudspeakers trying to calm them down. The transport wobbled into the air on it's repulsorlifts, loaded with far more people than it was meant to accomodate. It gained altitude and slowly shrank into the distance while those left behind wept and moaned.

Then a bright red point of light whipped out from someplace close to the horizon and intersected the transport's hull, turning it into a puff of smoke. Hysteria overtook the remaining refugees as their friends, family, and neighbors lazily tumbled back to Coruscant--at least those who hadn't been vaporized.

Atkins wasn't angry or sad, because it was at that moment impossible for him to understand what had just happened. Perspective was denied him, because of the enormity of the occurence. His mind chopped it down to a level he could understand: he had seen a female twi'lek with three children go to board the transport, and they had almost certainly been on it when the trip ended. His eyes teared up.

"God," Sergeant Davis said quietly, then he jerked to alertness as a transmission came over his radio, "the company is moving out, beat your feet, boys!"

"Which way?" Corning asked.

The sergeant looked back at his squad as he put his helmet on, "Just follow the grumbling."

Atkins put his own helmet on and got his outfit assembled. The input/output cord came out of his rifle's butt and linked into the jack on the arm of his combat suit. His combat suit featured plasteel plates integrated into the camouflage fabric--the mottled brown camouflage fabric, which was a joke on Coruscant. The division was supposed to be on a planet of grassy plains and rolling hills, but such was life in the business of death. His helmet had a visor that linked with the rifle's scope and helped him aid. The suit was effectively a cheap knock-off of stormtrooper armor, which Atkins would have killed for. 'Stormie' armor had full climate adjustment and would have filtered out the reek of ozone and smoke.

The company hoofed down the wide boulevards which were common around landing pads. Every building had the same dangerous look to it, as their fusillier's training revealed a potential machinegun position in every window. Thankfully each building they passed featured prominent charring and was in some state of damage, indicating that it had been cleaned out, or at least the levels of it which had lines of fire onto the street were clear.

Occasionally an echo of blaster fire would suddenly make an appearance from a blasted-open doorway, or it would climb up from the abyssal and infinitely deep airshafts that laid next to the road like mouths leading into the depths of hell. A few of these poured out flame and smoke from fires down below, where men were still fighting. The company was lucky not to be down there, roasting in their body armor and forced to wear their gasmasks constantly for fear of smoke and fumes.

Gradually the sound of fighting became more constant and loud. They were entering the war, now. A few hundred yards down the street, they could see men behind cover, throwing up walls of red light at windows and doors, trying to suppress the enemy, so they could assault across the open street and enter the doors. Then they would clear room to room.

Atkins prayed that he wouldn't have to do that. The company halted there on the street, and Atkins took his prayer necklave out.

Morys sat down on the street and looked at Peren disdainfully, "Don't waste your breath. Whatever God there might have been was on that transport when it exploded."

Peren stopped praying briefly, "I can't stop believing just because some people died."

"Then you got a problem, brother. My old man couldn't stop drinking. I think you got the same problem as him, just a different poison," Morys said, not unsympathetically.


----


Captain Arpad crouched down and radioed his CO, Major Prote. In the terrain, the battalion had been split up into several elements; the headquarters was separated from him by a city block full of tall buildings, but it was still close enough for the command radio (conventiently located on his assistant's back) to punch through the concrete, metal, and jamming.

"Reservoir, this is Aqueduct Three, over," he said. Reservoir was battalion headquarters, Aqueduct 3 was himself. Codenames were important, if only for maintaining the illusion of order in this shithouse.

"Aqueduct Three, I recieve you, what is your status, over?" returned Major Prote's gravelly voice.

Arpad cleared his throat, "We have arrived at rallying point Tau with... two casualties, a broken ankle and one case of heat exhaustion, requesting orders, over."

"Aqueduct, there should be another captain from the eleven-hundred and third infantry division in your area, he'll tell you what you need to do, over."

"Affirmative."

Arpad wrangled with the frequencies for a while, eventually getting the man on the line. After receiving a quick summary of the situation, he divided up his platoons and issued objectives. They would fade into the buildings and go completely beyond his capacity to command. This planet was going to require a war of squads and fire teams.


----


Sergeant Davis and his squad moved through a street-level doorway and into the office building. The lights were still functioning, so it was easy to navigate. They were supposed to deal with the threatening Republican infantry formations that were lingering in the levels below, threatening to break up to the surface and advance on the division's landing zone. Of course, it was difficult to say where the enemy was, and in what strength, but it wasn't Davis's job to think about that. He was supposed to kill the Republicans and ensure that a minimum number of his soldiers died in the process.

They moved through rooms covered in blast holes and scorch marks from previous combat; Davis led the way to the emergency stairwell, and then down. Three flights down, there began to appear corpses in Republican uniform.

There were the first combat casualties that Atkins had ever seen, though he had supposedly been trained to deal with such things, as with all soldiers of the regular army. But now that he was actually faced with the reality of the situation, he felt as if it had been entirely useless. The soldiers had been clustered around a landing, trying to defend the stairs when they had been quite literally blown to pieces. He found himself staring intensely at the wound characteristics... blaster bolts cauterized and blew apart whatever flesh they struck. There was even burned meat stuck to the walls. He felt the sickly sweet fluid rising up in the back of his throat.

But all the time his feet kept moving on their own and presently he had marched past the bodies and down the stairs. That was probably the intent of the training--to make him an automaton. Just as they hit the next landing, there was a muffled thump that shook the floor under their feet, and the lights failed.

Atkins flipped the light amplification on his helmet visor, and the scene reappeared in green.

"What the fuck was that?" Morys asked.

Sergeant Davis shook his head, "I dunno. Probably an orbital bombardment."

Corning grinned in the darkness, "Do you like the feeling? If some fuckass navy file forgets to carry the one on his trajectory calculations, he might drop two-hundred megatons of green light in your lap, and you'd disappear into a cloud of water vapor so fast that you wouldn't even realize that you were dead."

Atkins reflexively ran his hand over the pocket on his armored vest that contained his prayer necklace. Nothing in his training could save him from a mistargeted turbolaser blast, so he had to put his faith in God.

After another few minutes of descending the stairwell, Davis led them out onto the floor of rooms itself. This area of the building had once been an office complex, but it had also been the scene of heavy close quarters combat. The cubicles were torn apart and blasted to tiny pieces... not so much out of tactical necessity as from the traditional dislike of the soldier for the very concept of lemming-like corporatism. The smoke was still thick here and the reek of ozone was heavy.

There were more Imperial soldiers here, who had already seen some combat. They had only been there for a few hours, but they were already beginning to acquire the look of crusty veterans. Their shoulder patches identified them as members of the 1103 infantry.

"Hey, you're finally here," one of them called, waving them over.

The squad moved closer, and Davis saw that the man was only a corporal. The sergeant barked, "Who's in command here?"

The corporal smiled wanly, "Me. The chain of command's a little fucked up."

"What happened to your squad sergeant?" Davis asked.

"Squad Sergeant?" the other NCO laughed, "why not ask me about the Lieutenant, the platoon sergeant, the rest of the squad sergeants... or any of the other dead sons-of-bitches?"

"Goddam..." Morys shook his head.

"You mean you're in command of your platoon, Corporal?" Davis demanded gently.

"Platoon? I guess. We're at about quarter strength, ten guys don't make a very good platoon. I better get a field commission out of this anyway, though," the man said.

Davis nodded. "Alright. We've been ordered to move onward. Which way is the enemy on this floor?"

The corporal pointed to a door. "Down that corridor. I've got a couple of men with a T-21 covering it, make sure you don't disturb them."

The sergeant started to lead his squad away, but the corporal grabbed desperately at Davis's shoulder. "Hey! Damn... when's our relief going to get down here? I been in this hole too long."

Davis looked at him curiously, "You've only been here two hours at most, soldier. You've got a while longer to wait."

"What?" the corporal's eyes took on a wild look, "Only two hours? That's impossible. I can't stay down here or I'll die. Shit... you'll die, too. All of you!"

Davis slapped him across the face, and the corporal dropped to the floor without another word. He stared vacantly at the squad as the twelve men moved into the corridor. Atkins looked into the man's eyes and touched his breast pocket again, and then he was in the corridor and moving towards probable death.

[consequences]

So, when do we get to see the NR conscripting civilians, and sending them forward with one blaster per five of them, with E-Web positions behind them to cut them down if they try to run?

[Sea Skimmer]

Very Nice. Though I hope you don't fully dismiss armor and artillery in this story, its always going to be useful, even in the deepest most confined levels (to a point anyway) big guns are still useful, if only to blast entry holes through dozens of building walls at once, going through established doors tends to get suicidal after a point. You could keep a lot of people and guns busy doing that on Coruscant.

On a similar note you might want to include everyone hauling vast amounts of explosives and hand grenades for breeching work as well. One grenade per room, times several dozen quadrillion rooms...

I can't wait to see what the planets sewer system is like.

[Shogoki]

Hey, finally an update, i love this fic.

Just one thing, what's with the "Jesus"? Are there Catholic missions in the SW Galaxy? I think it would be better if you just went for a plain ol' "God" if you really have to bring a deity into the mix, that way at least it sounds generic.

[Lucius Licinius Lucullus]

STALINGRAD STALINGRAD STALINGRAD STALINGRAD STALINGRAD STALINGRAD STALINGRAD STALINGRAD

oh.....did I get ahead of myself?

I dont think so, the Fanfics name "Le Morte Homme" or "Hill of the dead", was the scene of some of the most vicious fighting known to man a place in wich regiments dissapeared in a matter of minutes, in one of the most bloody battles in the history of mankind, a battle in wich the Strategy of the German Imperial Army was to bleed the French Republican Army to death. The battle of Verdun.

Essentially a slugging match. Ackbar and Thrawn might have prized maneuver, but they were fighting in the pre-Vong era, before mass mobilization of shipbuilding resources had rendered that element of battle (save for occasional flashes of luck) almost obsolete. Guns and shields would decide the battles of this war

This quote reinforces this feeling to me (that he is basing this fanfic on the Great War rather then the Second World War).

[Pablo Sanchez]

Hey, finally an update, i love this fic.

Just one thing, what's with the "Jesus"? Are there Catholic missions in the SW Galaxy? I think it would be better if you just went for a plain ol' "God" if you really have to bring a deity into the mix, that way at least it sounds generic.

Oops... you're right, I didn't even think of that. I edited the thing up...