Book 6 - Chapter 39 - Heavy Assault
“So… why did you call us all here?” Wild asked as she crossed her arms across her chest. “Shouldn’t we be out on the battlefield, killing Antithesis, now that the anti-Fungal has been deployed?”
“We could be causing a lot of damage right now,” Mud grunted in agreement.
“This won’t take long,” I assured them, “I just wanted to try and coordinate a little before we get stuck in.”
“We were already stuck in before you called us back,” Mud grumbled. “But whatever… let’s just get this over with so we can get back out there as soon as possible. So why exactly did you think we needed to coordinate? Aren’t you just going to have your forces sit on the battlements and provide fire support?”
“Most of them, yes, but not all of them,” I replied. “I’m planning on taking a decent-sized strike team and pushing towards the hive as hard as I can.”
Wild raised an eyebrow. “Really? Just how many bears would you consider a ‘decent-sized’ force?”
“Two hundred, plus enough armor to carry them all,” I said. “Plus most of my squad.”
“Are you sure that’s smart?” Bern asked, without looking up. I’d provided him with limited access to the command network so he could monitor everything, and he’d been head down studying the feeds ever since. I was actually a little surprised that he’d been paying attention to the conversation until this point. “Don’t the Antithesis have a series of Anti-Air emplacements, and aren’t you relying upon Bear Force One to deal with those custom models?”
“Well, Bear Force One, along with a series of disposable missile launchers. Even though it’s probably a bad idea to move the Strato Carrier over top of the hive and risk it getting shredded by the defenses, it can fire the ICBMs from a distance to support us,” I said.
“Uhhh… the same ICBMs that are getting shot down by those defenses?” Wild asked.
“Not all of them… just most of them. I figure if Bear Force One fires the missiles in volleys, it would have a good chance of getting a couple shots through,” I replied.
Nora cocked her head to the side. “You’re telling me that you’re planning on taking a small strike force, throwing it against an unending tide of enemies, and relying entirely upon spotty missile support to protect you? I don’t buy it.”
“I’m taking two hundred bears, I wouldn’t exactly call that a small force,” I grumbled.
“For you, that’s a small force,” Nora replied, putting her hands on her hips. “What are you planning?”
“Oh… nothing much,” I replied, trying to suppress a smile. “Hey Bern, could I borrow your tablet for a moment?”
Bern sighed and flicked his finger across the screen a couple times before handing it over. “You know, you could just buy another one. “
“That’s true,” I said, accepting the tablet, “but I only need it for a minute to show these guys what I’ve cooked up.”
I quickly glanced down at the screen, grinned, and then handed it over to Nora.
“What the fuck is that?!” she exclaimed.
“That, my friend, is what I call a Mauler,” I declared proudly.
“That’s a super heavy tank,” she replied, glancing up at me. “Where the fuck did you get a super heavy tank?”
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Mud gently took the tablet out of her hands, then tilted it so both he and Wild could look at it.
“I’m a samurai, I got it the same place I got all the rest of my equipment, from Nyx,” I replied.
“You know what I mean… What in the world possessed you to purchase a super heavy tank?” Nora asked.
“Well… Like you said, the hive has far too much anti-aircraft fire to risk Bear Force One in an assault, so I needed something to provide fire support if we ran into any of those Colossal bastards during the assault,” I explained.
“So you sunk all your tokens and points into a colossus of your own?” Mud asked, passing the tablet back to me.
I took a moment to take another look at the screen before finally passing the device back to Bern.
The Mauler was quite a beast. It was thirty meters long and eight meters wide. It required four sets of tracks to support it, and the main turret had both a pair of super heavy coil guns and a pair of missile racks. Those weren’t the only weapons it had--there were a number of weapon sponsons containing both coil guns and rotary laser cannons to defend it against ‘smaller’ Antithesis.
“What possessed you to invest in something like that?” Mud asked.
“When I sat down with my squad to discuss our plans, I realized that my forces relied on Bear Force One far too much, and I needed something on the ground that could both plug a hole and do damage,” I explained.
“But a super heavy tank? Couldn’t you have just made another hover vehicle?”
“Technically yes, I bought the Class III Armored Vehicle Catalog when I bought Bear Force One, but it would have cost exponentially more to install that amount of armor on a hover chassis,” I explained.
“You’re claiming that it’s too expensive to put that much armor on a hover chassis after purchasing the stratocarrier?” Wild asked in disbelief.
“I may have a lot of points,” I said, “but not an unlimited supply of them. By making it a super heavy tank. I dropped the price by about half. I would have had to invest in a lot of miniaturization tech to get all the reactors, shield generators, and weapons onto a smaller platform. Sure, it may need two heavy lifters to carry it back to the carrier once the battle’s done, but that difference in price means I may be able to buy the blueprint this century.”
“So you just have the one right now? Is that right?” Nora asked.
“For now,” I confirmed. “I just sunk a ton of points into updating the bears, and I didn’t want to bankrupt myself purchasing more than one of these bad boys.”
“So, you have something to anchor your line? Is that your entire plan?” Mud grunted.
“It’s the core of my plan,” I replied, and when everyone turned to look at me questioningly, I folded my arms in front of my chest. “What? It’s not like I’m a strategic genius, and overwhelming firepower has worked for me so far, so I’m keeping it fairly simple. If it ever looks like the Antithesis might push back and overwhelm my forces, I’ll pull back.”
“So… if you’re planning on pushing into the Antithesis, why did you feel the need to gather us all here?” Wild asked. “It seems unnecessary.”
“Because I wanted to let you all know my plan and also check if any of you want to join me,” I replied.
Nora nodded. “I’ll follow you. I was planning to strike out anyways, maybe not all the way to the hive, but far enough to do some damage. Plus, if I’m with you, I can pull your ass out of the fire when everything goes sideways.”
“I have a super heavy tank and an entire army at my back--how could things go wrong?” I grumbled.
“You could walk right into a new model, your army could get overwhelmed, the weapons on your new tank might not be strong enough, or fire fast enough to deal with the heavies the Antithesis are throwing out. You’re putting a lot of faith in an untested weapon.”
“It’s not completely untested,” I grumbled. “It’s using my existing catalogs.”
“But it’s never seen combat before,” Nora replied. “Throwing it straight into the heart of the horde and relying on it as the cornerstone of your strategy seems risky to me.”
“Hey, throwing untested prototype tech at the antithesis is what being a samurai is all about,” I exclaimed. When she didn’t reply, I just sighed and turned to my other friends. “What about you three?”
“Bern and I are going to be working together to build a couple enhanced plant strains to try and clear up the battlefield a little,” Wild replied. “If the Antithesis do manage to recover, I want to make sure there’s no biomass for them to recover later.”
“Makes sense,” I muttered. “What about you, Mud?”
“I’m going to keep trimming the swarm, preventing them from approaching the town. I know you’re leaving most of your forces to defend the walls, but I don’t want to stray too far in case there’s an emergency,” he grunted.
“So none of you want to push out?” I asked, a little surprised.
“The Family asked us to hold the line, so that’s what we’re going to do,” Mud replied.
“I guess you would want to be a little more aggressive than that,” I said, “but fair enough.” I glanced over my shoulder at Nora. “Guess it’s just you and me.”
She nodded and smiled. “Just like old times.”