19

I watched the multitude of screens in the command chamber as our fighters - both conventional and aerospace fighters - met the invader's aerospace fighters. It was clear right off the bat who had the numerical advantage: us. 

Unfortunately, dropships fired their own weapons into the mix, and each of their few dozen tons of armor made them impervious to any regular fighter weapons. 

Which was why there were at least one fighter bombers every five conventional fighters. Of the three hundred-fifty conventional fighters currently in the air, fifty of them were fighter bombers. The rest were multi-purpose fighters and dedicated strike aircrafts. 

I watched as our fighters went down first; it was inevitable because of how lightly armored most conventional fighters were compared to aerospace fighters. However, the sheer numerical advantage quickly turned the tide as their sixty or so ASF began to die by droves. 

It was a sight that delighted me. As much as I focused on improving my people's livelihood, there was a catharsis in seeing people who want my people dead or under their foot dying by the droves, and seeing in person was different from seeing numbers on a report or from the mouth of a tired but jubilant senior officer.

However, there was a reason why conventional fighters were not used in large numbers like they were right now here on Sian. 

Aerospace fighters struck harder, toughed out more damage, and flew longer and higher. Those were the characteristics necessary to even contest with dropships.

I winced as one of the screens showing some of the pilot video feeds showed one of the fighters getting streaked by a large laser beam, and it nearly killed the fighter with that one attack.

That was the problem with conventional fighters. Two large laser beams was enough to kill a fighter while a standard aerospace fighter could survive a dozen plus attacks of similar caliber, if not double that if they were medium or heavy ASF. 

"Are the heavy bombers on their way?" 

"E.T.A. 1 minute, chancellor."

"Good, good."

And I began to wait in silence as I watched my people - brave men and women - give their lives in the air and fall to the ground like spent shells. 

-VB-

Brevet General Nathan Armstrong did not feel like a general right now. 

Worse, he knew he made a mistake when he saw those swarms of fighters. Of course, Sian would have other means of protecting itself! Why wouldn't it?! Battlemechs weren't the only means of warfare, even though realities of interstellar war had forced it down on everyone. 

But planetary defense wasn't interstellar warfare, wasn't it? It could use everything it made there, and the Capellans had gone so far as to mass produce cheap conventional fighters. Individually, they couldn't fight a true ASF but -.

The dropship, which was already shaking terribly from re-entry, shook gut-clenchingly as something struck it. 

"They missed Thruster 2!" 

"Damage to lower deck!"

"We're tilting! I need more power to Thruster 5!" 

His grip whitened as the shouting words of his dropship crew ran all around the bridge and in the intercom.

He felt the dropship tilting ever so slightly before whatever it was the captain was doing corrected the tilt. 

And then they began to slow down. 

There was no time. 

He pushed down on his radio talk button within his mech's cockpit. "Soldiers, get ready to embark! We are storming out the moment we land to help with anti-air defence!" 

He got calls and green lights from his battalion and company commanders. 

"3 kilometers to landing!" 

Nathan reached out and gripped his controls. 

If he survived this battle, then he was going to make sure that the Light Horse got its fair share of the pie. This was not what was given to him in the intel. Was this the limit of the MIIO and DMI? 

But even several hundred conventional fighters couldn't do anything against the five dozen dropship fleet of the combined Eridani Light Horse and the two Lyran regiments. 

The dropship shook violently, almost shaking him from cockpit window to cockpit window in his mech's seat. 

… Maybe. Maybe those several hundred conventional fighters wouldn't do much against the five dozen dropships. 

"Two kay!" 

Damn, they were falling quickly. 

Then he felt the reverse thrust. 

He grimaced as gravity sat on him, and his assault mech groaned as it temporarily became over one hundred tons. 

"One kay!" 

Why were they approaching the ground that quickly?! 

"Five hundred!" 

Nathan took in a deep, stuttering breath in as his entire body jumped up and down his seat. 

"Two-fifty!" 

They were slowing down but they were pulling some big risk slowing down that quickly. 

He heard the dropship groaning around him even from within his mech.

"One fifty!" 

He flicked on everything. 

"Reactors, online. Sensors, online. Weapons, online. All systems online," his mech chimed in. He barely heard his Atlas chiming that standard sequence in between the roar of the descending dropship, the muted whirl of the fusion engine, and his own teeth clattering in his mouth from how shaky everything was. 

"One hundred…!" the intercom didn't cut off this time. "Fifty!" 

Nathan braced himself. 

"Touchdown! Opening all bays!" 

As soon as the double doors pulled away, he jumped out of the humble Leopard, which allowed for the fastest deployment of mechs outside of high distance drops, and took a second to see the situation. 

"All units report your status," he grunted as he looked up.

It was as he feared. Even though they had jumped onto a pirate point to prevent this exact mess, the Capellans had somehow enough birds in and around their capital city to respond to his assault in a matter of minutes. 

And now, he lacked aerial superiority to safeguard his troops on the ground or for a safe retreat. 

Which meant that he had to cause enough chaos on the ground for his command to be able to leave. He aimed up and began shooting at what his targeting software identified as being close enough. 

"General Steiner, are you on the ground?" he radioed. 

Static. 

He cursed. 

That man better not have died before they landed! 

"All troops, assist our ASF! Fire at will!" 

The dropships and mechs alike roared as one as they fired into the sky above them, and finally, they began to see a change in the aerial supremacy fight. 

"Brevet general, this is General Steiner, over."

Finally.

"Where are you, general? I do not see you and your dropships near me, over."

"We're ten clicks southeast of you, over."

Fuck. That's a lot of ground to cover. "We'll -"

CRASH!

He whirled around and saw that he had completely missed a fighter gunning for him, and it was only because of Leopard's own guns downing a conventional fighter that he hadn't been kamikaze'd. Even if a conventional fighter was light compared to aerospace fighters, a fully loaded fighter was still ten to twenty tons of metal. If that struck him at full speed, then he would die.

He shuddered. 

"Fuck," he muttered as he whirled around, taking care to keep his eyes on the sky better. He radioed again. "General Steiner, we'll meet you in the middle of our two positions. Is that good with you, over?"

"Negative. There is a mountain in the middle, over."

Wait, really? 

He turned to look… and yes, there was a mountain.

Was anything going right today? 

"General, bombers! Northwest"

Nathan's eyes snapped towards the northwest sky and paled. 

Ten… twenty… thirty…?! Forty?! 

FIFTY?!

"Shit," he paled. 

And then his eyes widened.

This was why the Capellans tried to overwhelm his aerospace fighters! This was why their pilots were so hellbent on fighting to their dying breaths! 

They intended to turn their capital into a bombed out graveyard for any invading forces.

Without a sizable aerospace fighters complement of their own, they would be sitting ducks against their interceptors and bombers, the latter of which was too high up in the air. Worse, they were heading straight for the landed dropships. If the dropships took off, then they would fighting off against a literal swarm of fighters and aerospace fighters…

"Damn you, Capellans!" 

"General, contact, southwest!" 

Before he could even turn, he heard it. No. 

He saw it.

The atmosphere rippled and boomed as something screamed through the air and struck one of his Phoenix Hawks. The forty-five ton undamaged mech almost flew off of its feet as its left shoulder tore off its hinges. 

Nathan whirled to see and saw those new Cataphract heavy mechs the Capellans have been fielding everywhere. 

His identifying software ran hot trying to identify the mech and its weapons…

And he paled. 

Gauss Rifles. 

Gauss Rifles on all of the Capellan heavy mechs! 

"Focus fire on those Cataphracts!" he roared. Those Gauss Rifles can cripple mechs and dropships alike. If they tried to run, then they would be killed from above and below! 

The radio crackled. 

"This*crackle* Colonel Nahyinya Cho of the Death Commandos 2nd Battalion," the radio crackled. So the Death Commandos had been here, waiting for any invaders. "You have invaded the capital of the Capellan Confederation and did so foolishly without overwhelming firepower. Did you truly think that our Celestial Wisdom would leave our capital world so defenseless? Did you think you can just waltz in here like a standard raiding party and ruin. Our. World?!"

Gauss rifles fired from a dozen Cataphracts in unison from a distance that was far beyond any of his mech's firing range. 

They slammed into dropships and mechs alike. Damaged mechs dropped like flies while dropship armor chunked and flaked away, leaving them dangerously vulnerable to the approaching bombers. 

"Eridani Light Horse. I'm going to enjoy turning you all into glue."

And then the bombers above began to drop their loads.

-VB-

Federick Steiner cursed himself. 

It just had to be his luck that he landed five clicks north of their artillery park! 

The Capellans already had a good idea about where they were going to land, apparently, because they had their men, mech, fighters, and artillery moving to intercept them on the ground! 

… No, that wasn't true. Jumping into a pirate point had been for a surprise attack, but the Capellans had enough fighters across their water world's few landmasses to swarm them. It was his luck that that's where they focused their military defense on instead of static defense. 

It was his luck that he didn't bring enough aerospace fighters, which now left him utterly vulnerable to aerial attacks. 

No, he had fucked up.

If he didn't have a dozen Rifleman across his two regiments, then this would have been even worse. However, even Riflemen were not the solution here because the Capellans were beginning to bombard them from their artillery park.

The artillery shell whistles came and then the entire area around them blew up.

"Report!" 

"Hawk One, minimal casualties."

"Seal One, minimal casualties."

"Dandelion, damage to dropship, minimal casualties."

"Charles Three, heavy casualties. Charles One and Two are down, over."

Shit. 

Staying put would end them all. That meant that he had only one choice: attack.

"We need to take out those artillery! Hawk, flank left. Seal, flank right. Dandelion, with me! Charles, reinforce defense! All Riflemen, detach from your command and join Command Charles for defense!" 

Frederick wondered for just a moment if this would be his Charge of the Light Brigade. 

… and if it was, how high of a toll he would reap from the Capellans before he went down