15
On Styk, Ardan Sortek looked at the numbers available to him, and instantly knew that it wasn't enough.
Currently, he had twelve regiments at an average of 70% readiness after his reinforcements landed. This meant that, in actuality, he had nine regiments to put to use. The most outstanding regiments among them was the Davion Heavy Guards, Twentieth Avalon Hussars, Fifteenth Avalon Hussars, and the mercenary regiment of the Crater Cobras led by Colonel Richard Westrick. The rest weren't elites or even veterans but mostly regular soldiers. There was even a fresh regiment made up of mostly green soldiers. He was going to have to mix the green mechwarriors with veterans to ensure that he didn't have a wholly green regiment going up against the enemy's cutthroat guerillas.
The enemy was led by three officers: Major Tormano Liao in Hegemony Bay, Colonel Eren McWire-Shung defending the planetary capital of Lorelei, and Colonel Shu-Huang Ju in charge of the aerospace and orbital control. They had only two mech regiments under their combined command before their reinforcements arrived, but now, they had ten mech regiments.
This did not include the six infantry and armored militia regiments. Those militia-turned-guerilla fighters was actually worse than fighting the Capellan mech regiments because they only ever ambushed. Those ambushes left his mechtechs constantly at work reapplying armor plates onto the damaged but not downed mechs…
And that was starting to become a problem.
He was running out of armor plates.
Yes, armor plates. The thing that no one ever ran out before they got ousted or conquered a planet. His reinforcements brought their own armor plates and enough of it to share to boot, but ultimately, having more mechs only meant that he was starting to see that stockpile dwindling even faster than before.
The constant fighting across all of the fronts was not working out as had been planned.
No.
If he was going to achieve victory here, then he was going to have to radically alter his plan.
He hummed as he looked at the map of Styk.
The most problematic location was Hegemony Bay. That was where the Tao 'Mechworks and other smaller factories were, churning out parts and mechs to replace any lost by the defending Capellans. It was a wonder how they managed to keep it operational despite the currently year long siege preventing easy access to materials.
'Another evidence that they had to have been stockpiling materials because they knew about the war,' Ardan thought as he nursed his left temple.
… But there was a good news among all of this mess he found himself in. He made to send a message using the "Fax Machine" to Hanse about the presence of the Red Lancers here on Styx. If the chancellor himself hadn't come here…
Then that meant that Sian was now exposed without its most elite defenders.
-VB-
Along with the overall defense commander Colonel Eren McWire-Shung, Tormano Liao met up virtually with the commanders of the Red Lancers, McCarron's Armored Cavalry, and Gray Death Legion.
Colonel Judith Abermarle of the Red Lancers.
Colonel Leo Hickney of 4th McCarron's Armored Cavalry.
Colonel Robert Heptig of the 5th McCarron's Armored Cavalry.
Colonel Marcus Barton of the newly formed 6th McCarron's Armored Cavalry.
Colonel Grayson Carlyle of the Gray Death Legion.
Between them and their aides, there were about a dozen people in the holocall.
And the news was not good.
"Militia under my command is at 40% readiness," Tormano reported tiredly.
"Mine are at 51% readiness," Colonel McWire-Shung grunted.
This meant that the defenders had been holding on by a thread, using what was essentially just two mixed regiments of armored, mech, and infantry against at least three fully operational mech regiments. Or at least until the Suns' reinforcements arrived.
"So we have seven regiments, including the non-mech militia, against their twelve."
'Probably closer to six mech regiments,' Tormano thought from the front of his computer.
"Not exactly," McWire hummed. "I suspect that they have lost as much as we have, if not more. So at most, they have ten regiments."
"So seven regiments to their ten. We're still outnumbered by a significant margin," Colonel Abermarle hummed. "And I assume our average mechwarrior is green?"
"No. I would say that they are at least regular in experience," Tormano interjected. "Many of the survivors have been fighting for months now, and the most experienced 'new' recruits have been fighting since the Federated Suns first landed here with the Davion Heavy Guards. Speaking of which, do we know how depleted they are?"
"I would say they are at most half-strength," Colonel McWire grunted.
Good. That meant that the Suns' most elite regiment wasn't even operating at half capacity.
"Is this going to be a battle of attrition?" Colonel Carlyle spoke up for the first time since introduction.
"No, we need a decisive victory here," McWire hissed. "If we don't clear Styx of the invaders, then the supply line to the Tikonov Commonality will be constantly under attack. But because the invaders are attacking on at least four different fronts, we can't afford to amass our strength to decisively take down any of their regiments."
"... Then I have a proposal."
Everyone turned to Grayson.
"Go on," Abermarle said as she leaned forward.
"Major Liao has been equipping his militia with SRMs and tanks, yes?" he asked.
"I have been as have everyone else," Tormano nodded, not sure where Carlyle was going with this.
"Why don't we take it a step further?" he asked. "We leave the defenses to the militia and assemble half of the mech regiments into a single cohesive unit to flank the Davions outside of Hegemony Bay?"
Tormano thought about it. Hegemony Bay was not too far from the planetary capital, which was also under siege. As far as he knew, there were one and a half regiments sieging them at each location, though that was now four and a half regiment per location since the Davions reinforced their people.
Leaving a single regiment to hold the line while three mech regiments moved to strike the Davions from behind…? Risky and unlikely to work.
"It could work in only one condition," McWire suddenly said, drawing the room's attention. "We bait them in into a valley where the militia ambushes them. And when they flee like they usually do, our mechs can hit them from behind."
Tormano thought about it.
And he had a plan.
"Colonel McWire, how many Cataphracts do you still have?"
-VB-
When the Denizens Get Uppity
By Arnold H. Ritzherald, 3080, New Avalon 7th District Press
Chapter 6: The Battle of Arleon Valley
The defining moment in the Battle for Styk (3028-3030) was the Battle of Arleon Valley. With a plan devised by Tormano Liao and Grayson Carlyle, the CCAF wanted to use their superior understanding of the local geography and environment to decapitate the larger AFFS force on the ground led by Marshal Ardan Sortek.
The plan was simple. Colonel Grayson Carlyle of the Gray Death Legion would lead two battalions of armored and infantry militia regiment along with two of his own mercenary mech battalions against two and a half regiments of the AFFS, composed of the entire Twentieth Avalon Hussars, the mercenary regiment Crater Cobras, and a battalion of the Davion Heavy Guards. Led by Colonel Richard Westrick, a veteran commander and mechwarrior. The CCAF would attack first and then feign retreat into the Arleon Valley. This valley was a critical artery into the Hegemony Bay, and so gaining a foothold there would allow the AFFS to pour into the Hegemony Bay itself instead of hammering away at the peripheral defenses beyond the bay itself. AFFS would have no choice but to take advantage of the CCAF's seemingly failed desperate play.
---
"GO GO GO!" Colonel Richard Westrick grinned from within his Victor-9A as his mechwarriors pushed their mechs to chase after the mostly light mechs of the Cappie militias as they fled into the winding valley.
He knew that this was a very strategic location. If he took it, then this bloody siege might just come to an end.
His assault mech stomped forward slowly but the rest of his medium mech regiment charged forward.
As his soldiers charged into the valley, he glanced at the damaged and abandoned enemy mechs on the ground. Like they have been for the past few months, most of these were militia and their damned Firebees. On this goddamn tropical world, he and his soldiers have been forced to endure an unending salvo of inferno rockets from these bug mechs, and he hated it.
But something was wrong. They hadn't shot much inferno SRMs as they usually did. It couldn't be that they were running out of them, not when they had a whole factory right behind them.
---
When just about half of the Crater Cobras and their AFFS counterparts chased the militia into the valley, Colonel Carlyle sprung the trap.
Mechs rolled over the boulders hidden behind the ridges of the valleys and down the valley slopes. These boulders weren't aimed at the mechs, however, but at the mouth of the valley, which was the steepest and narrowest location in the entire Arleon Valley. The boulders blocked the rear mechs from supporting the front mechs and the front mechs from retreating out of the valley.
Grayson then turned his Shadow Hawk around and taunted the slowly panicking AFFS and Crater Cobras right before Cataphracts pulled up from behind him and Firebess from the ridges before they rained down lasers, shells, and rockets upon the mostly cavalry and scout mechs.
In the exposed rear, Colonel Westrick's ranged backline came face to face with two regiments of flanking mechs led by Major Tormano Liao. While this rearguard was composed of many heavy mechs, they weren't as thickly armored and heavy hitting as main battlemine and linebreaker heavy and assault mechs. On top of this, they were only a regiment to the CCAF's two.
Despite what many historical and battlefield analysts might say about him, Colonel Westrick made the crucial decision to break out of the flanking and slowly surrounding CCAF while also abandoning the trapped scout and cavalry mechs in the valley.
---
"Shoot their legs! Don't let them get away!" Tormano roared as his Cataphract fired off its PPC. The crackling blue energy beam hissed across the empty air before missing a fleeing Blackjack's back.
The AFFS was in full retreat. While the few medium mechs in the regiment moved as quickly as they could, the heavy mechs held the rearguard and tanked as best as they could for their more fragile comrades.
In a battlefield some three kilometers across containing four hundred mechs fighting for their lives, Tormano made the decision to track down the commanding officer of the Crater Cobras, who he knew from intel to be riding a Victor.
And he found that Victor.
In a near brawl range, he opened up with his AC/10 and his four medium lasers.
---
Then Major Tormano Liao happened upon Colonel Westrick of the Crater Cobras and immediately managed to cripple the commander by shooting out his already damaged left leg. A pair of Crater Cobras medium mechs tried to help, but it was too late for the colonel. A Highlander commanded by none other than Colonel Judith Abermarle of the Red Lancers shot its own AC/10 right into the head of Westrick's Victor, killing the colonel and the commanding officer of the Crater Cobras.
The sudden death of their commanding officer and the new commander of the Hegemony Bay siege led to the AFFS's orderly retreat turning into a rout. This rout ended poorly for the AFFS because of Grayson Carlyle's inclusion of armored vehicle pursuers. Already damaged and limping from the battle, the AFFS suffered from the armored vehicles and tanks running circles around them. It wasn't until their aerospace fighters came to the rescue that the CCAF backed off.
If what happened outside the valley was described by AFFS itself as a rout, then what happened inside was classified as a slaughter.
The lighter mechs that had pursued the "retreating" CCAF militia mechs were incapable of withstanding the torrent of firepower directed at them for long. Worse, the CCAF didn't even bother to try to save the AFFS mechs for salvage, and instead tried to drown their enemies with raw firepower.
The most accurate sources note that there were sixty-nine mediums, thirty-five light mechs, and half a dozen tanks that entered the valley. When the CCAF was done with them, they only managed to salvage five mediums, four lights, and one tank.
But the mechwarriors of the Crater Cobras and the Twentieth Avalon Hussars hadn't gone down without a fight. There was an attempt to break out through the valley itself, but the Cataphracts and Carlyle's Shadow Hawk held firm and prevented them from breaking out. In exchange for their lives, the Twentieth Avalon Hussars and the Crater Cobras' 2nd and 3rd Battalions destroyed five Cataphracts, fifty Firebees, and almost all of the participating militia infantry.
To this day, the day of the Battle of Arleon Valley is considered Styk's planetary holiday and a source of Tikonov Commonality's pride. For the majority of the sacrifice and confirms kills came not from the CCAF and the mercenaries but from the local militia mechwarriors, infantry, and armored vehicles.
This was also Tormano Liao's second limelight and a show of Grayson Carlyle's effective tactical usage of armored and infantry against mechs.
The AFFS's major loss led to their reorganization and proved turning point for the defenders. After losing nearly two regiments just at the Arleon Valley, the Battle of Styk went from a siege to a proper fight.
Ardan Sortek, the commanding marshal of the Battle of Styk, noted that he regretted not amassing his superior numbers faster