Janus-class Compact Assault Vehicle
Morningstar Five, outskirts of Aridus Trade City, Aridus
Corporal Laning felt the drop as his CAV rolled out of the Centaur's ramp and onto the blistering sands of the desert world. Even with the treads, he felt as he had left solid and now waded through a marsh. The Janus seemed to sliver quietly and softly mose its way through onto the desert. Shaking his head, the man from Almas turned his attention to the commander's screen, just adjacent to the slot filled in by his R4 unit, which micro-managed the vehicle's systems and performed rudimentary repairs on the tank as needed. He tapped a button on his screen, pulling distant views of the walled city. Missiles fluttered out of the walls, mostly towards the CG-10s rapidly dropping to the world before ascending almost as quickly as they can come down. The gunships fired back, often obliterating the missiles, but a handful of the CAVs equipped with anti-air weapons struck back the missiles, intercepting them at close range with spurts of ion cannon fire and destroying them farther out with their own missiles.
“You see any yet?” called out his driver from his left and forward.
“Not yet Ben, not yet.”
His eyes kept scanning the horizon though. Aridus had been home to a significant Yutrane-Tackata operations, including several factories that had produced tanks for the Alliance in its early days. Tanks that were larger and more powerful than their own vehicle. That information hadn't been particularly soothing to the troops' ears, but the honesty of the nature of their mission had allowed them to more properly prepare for that eventuality, leading Laning to change the armament on his own tank from the standard to a more common urban warfare loadout, albeit he insisted that the other CAV had kept the standard loadout. He thumbed his comlink.
“Six, you ready?”
A short burst of static pierced through his comlink.
Well, I guess it's messing with the comm's too. It's a good thing these things don't rely on too sensitive of electronics. He spared a glance at one of the holo-graphic overlays of his surroundings, noting that Six wasn't showing any external signs of damage or malfunction.
I guess we'll just have to play it with battle drills. He turned his head to his driver.
“Let's get going,” decided the corporal, “we'll just to have to play by it ear.”
The two CAVs joined the dozens of other Confederate vehicles advancing on the city itself. Laning focused the vehicle's HUD on the distant gates of the city, expecting them to swing open to unleash a Reaver horde against the advancing Confederates. But minutes later, the Confederate vehicles had nearly reached the gates without a shot being fired. Laning frowned.
They're showing an unusual amount of restraint for their reputation. Could it be that there's simply not that many of them, or that the radiation has just made them weaker...or perhaps just different. Laning glanced at the other Janus CAVs converging on the gate besides them. Most of them retained the standard loadout of a medium laser cannon and the Irollan developed Fireshard Cannon. While this would make them effective as light to medium opponents, neither of those weapons had the firepower to beat down either the walls or the gates. Several of the Janus from Dorumaa, still sporting aquatic weapons and blue camouflage rumbled forward. Laning scratched his chin.
They might actually be able to do something with their general purpose launchers...but still...I bet they're expecting us to blow open the gates then. Laning turned his gaze to the back of his driver's head.
“Take us a little bit to the left of the gate.”
Trena briefly acknowledged the order and skirted the tank over to the side of a couple of the Janus outfitted in a infantry support role. The corporal flicked over to weapon's control and began rotate the squat turret of the vehicle to focus on an area just offset of the gate. Selecting the Irollan-designed siege beam, more properly called a particle cannon by the rest of the galaxy, he spared a glance at the oddly shaped astromech just in front of them.
“R4, better get handy with the blaster. Here we go.”
He held the trigger of the turret's left-mounted modular weapon's compart. A bright yellow beam sprang forth with a sizzle into the desert air; the wall began to crumble and disintegrate under the heavy beam. With the first holes in the wall forming from Morningstar Five's attack, the infantry support Janus's began to lob fragmentation and proton grenades through the holes causing small explosions and shrapnel clouds around the gate. His siege beam stopped, automatically moving into its cool-down cycle, but the damage was already done. Several of the support Janus rolled through the small hole, followed by several more of the more standardized Janus. He noticed flashes of light and explosions smack into the first few and let out a sigh of relief; the modular shields of the support tanks had been outfitted with Anticoncussion Field Generators, allowing them to withstand several missiles or shells that struck them. The standardized Januses rolled out in front of the other Confederate tanks and formed a protective shield wall; the support tanks began to hurl out EMP grenades into the Reaver horders seeking to beat the Confederate assault out of the city walls. The grenades detonated with brilliant flashes of blue light, electrocuting the organic parts of the reavers and frying the circuits of both the nanites and the Reaver vehicles around them. Fortunately for the standardized tanks, they had been sporting EMP shielding, which protected them from most of the nearby explosions. Autocannons and repeating blasters began to chew away at the individual reavers that had still survived the attack, while Fireshard cannons punched through the lighter armor on the handful of T3-B tanks forming up to oppose the Confederate advance. Laning thought he could see smoke and bits of fire coming out of the hulls where the Fireshards had hit, but his view was obscured by the sheer volume of laser cannon bolts coming from either side. His console binged, indicating that the siege beam had finished recharing and recooling. He spared a glance at his hypermatter and generator controls, indicating they weren't running low on fuel or power to keep fighting.
“Take us through the breach,” decided Laning, “and let's follow those boys from Dorumaa and see what they're up to.”
The blue and tan splotched CAVs from the water moon rolled in right ahead of his tank, firing their sonic cannons. The first tank seemed to have its cannon on a focused fire, obliterating individual reavers and ripping away at many of their impromptu barricades. The second tank used its sonic cannon in its stun mode, causing massive and disorientation among the Reavers popping out to fight the Confederates. Most of the reavers stood and wavered as the nanites fought with the body systems of their organic hosts before getting cut down by Confederate weapons' fire. Yet the dorumaa tanks kept moving into a side alley of the city. Morningstar Five fell in behind them, adding bouts of searing fire from its flamethrower to drive back the individual Reavers. Laning snorted.
It's not going to be the Reavers themselves providing any problem out in the open, it's going to be their tanks. Trena kept their individual CAV in the pair of the Dorumaa's tracks, but the two tanks ahead of them suddenly slipped and disappeared into the aquifer running through the center of the city. He shook his head.
Of course they'd want to fight on their own terrain. But that aquifier isn't the sea shelf of their world. But let's see what they're up to.
“Follow'em,” gestured the Almas man, “it's not like we can't go there either.”
Trena snorted, “It's just that we'll be without weapons...well...reduced weapon range...but gotcha.”
The driver took the tank down the stone embankment and into the aquifier that ran into the southern mountains.
Thank the maker it's a sealed environment in here. That and the desert air probably is pretty hot. While their vision was limited by the dust and sand being thrown up ahead by the other tank's tracks, his other sensors showed that the Confederates had managed to push in a little deeper into the city from all sides. But running through the aquifier, their tanks had pushed the deepest into Reaver-held territory, yet they hadn't encountered any enemy fire yet. He guessed it was because being beneath ten meters of water, the Reavers weren't really looking for the tanks there. A shadow fell upon the water, making their limited vision grow even darker, yet he could see a pair of proton hydro torpedoes jump out the second tank and disappear into the gloomy depths. They exploded in a ripple of bubbles, and the tanks continued forward through the blasted apart metal grates. Laning looked around.
We must be in the municipal building, where the human settlers processed the water for the city and ran everything else out of here. The Dorumaa-based tanks rolled up the slopes of the aquifer and onto the narrow embankment that ran alongside the aquifer. Laning winced.
We may be small, but this is going to be a tight fit. Both of the Janus in front of him slid back into the aquifier, to reveal a bunch of Reavers rushing towards them. The R4 unit in front of him chirped, activating the light repeating blaster that popped out alongside the driver's ceraglass viewport. Streams of emerald light began to whittle away at the oncoming Reavers.
There's still too many of them. He tapped his rightside trigger, sending out a cone of fire which engulfed the small confines of the room. The reavers disappeared in the intense heat of the flame, but he held the trigger. His R4 unit began to make a series of noises, causing the man to glance at his heat dissipation field. It was growing weaker under the intense heat that flooded through the room. Sighing, the man relented, pulling his finger off of the trigger mechanism. The other tanks popped up from the surface again, with the first tank launche a standard heavy rocket out of its general purpose launcher towards the most distant wall. The orange blob broke through the duracrete wall and detonated, revealing the courtyard of the massive building. In it sat scores of individual Reavers, several Yutrane-Tackata built tanks, and a tall spindly tower reaching towards the sky sat out before them.
Of course, the reaver communication beacon. He immediately squeezed both triggers, sending out a rush of purging fire onto the surprised Reavers, toasting the infected beings alive while he focused his other weapon's reticle on the tower. He tapped the trigger, producing a yellow ray which tore into the beacon, causing it to teeter and collapse into the courtyard. As he did so, the first CAV from Dorumaa released the rest of its rocket payload into the more lightly armored backsides of the Reaver tanks. Explosion rippled across their backsides, and Laning guessed that they were inoperable.
And without their beacon here, I'd be willing to bet they're going to start and lose their coordination too...
