The polished barrels of the Leopards’s main guns pointed slightly skyward, a salute in 135-millimeter. Each tank had its own shallow indentation dug into the ground, from which it could fire down from the ridge without exposing anything more than its turret.

“Hiedrich, munitions report.” Johann ordered.

“Fifty HEAT and twenty-five high-explosive shells, two thousand rounds for the coaxial machine gun, five hundred for the autocannon.” Hiedrich read off the numbers almost robotically.

“Good. I’ll tell you when to start firing.” Johann replied offhand, popping the tank’s hatch open and popping his head out. Pulling a pair of binoculars from a cord around his neck, he put them to his eyes and zoomed in. Lining the river below the ridge was a gravel road, just barely visible from this angle, from which the last of CAST’s forces had retreated. For as long as CAST maintained air superiority, they would have to use the road to get up onto the ridge.

The sound of tracks on dirt caught Johann’s attention. He looked to his right to see a two-dozen-strong detachment of low-to-the-ground tanks with harshly-angled octagonal turrets and the insignia of the Russian Army painted on the sides of their hulls. Smiling, Johann reached for the Leopard’s radio and pulled the microphone to his mouth.

“What took you so long, dosenpanzer? Over.” Johann asked, his voice automatically scrambled and reassembled into Russian.

“We were busy being in actual danger, you knights of the air conditioning. Over.” a gruff male voice responded, the humor clear within it.

“How long do we have, over?”

“The Poslushi were practically up our asses when we made our escape from the front line. I can’t imagine we’ve long before they–contact, contact, contact. They’re on the road, coming down fast, over.”

“Scheisse.” Johann muttered to himself, dropping back inside the tank and closing the hatch. “Hiedrich, bearing 315.” he ordered, the turret swiveling to the left and the gun pointing down. Quickly, the camera zoomed in and, sure enough, the Poslushi and their walkers were making their way down the road. However, accompanying them was a vanguard of large bipedal vehicles Johann had never seen before. They had no arms and no head, and most of their torso was taken up by an enormous concave dish of polished metal that could swivel slightly. Wherever they pointed it, grass blackened and crumbled, trees exploded into ash, and what was once a formidable forest quickly became naught but an expansion to the road as they burned an ancillary corridor to supplement themselves. Looking back, they were going to need it, as dozens, if not hundreds, of rhomboidal war machines stood on four towering, spindly legs behind them, advancing without pause.

The radio crackled once more. “This is Commander Weiss to all units in the defense of Fort von Richthofen and Fort Zhukov. Additional forces are en route to reinforce you, but you must hold out until then. The fate of your brothers working to get everyone home hinges on you. Now, when I say…”

Johann looked down at Hiedrich. The gunner nodded solemnly. In the distance, Johann could hear the throaty buzz of the forts’ defense cannons as they fired upon what had to be a full salvo of incoming artillery. Still, no one moved. Silently, Johann watched the clouds of dust kicked up by their incoming assailants rise and disperse. His fingers drummed on the turret’s hull once, twice, three times.

“Fire ‘till you glow!” Commander Weiss trumpeted, his radio cutting off then and there. “You heard the man!” Johann barked. Then, all at once, everyone opened up. There was a thunderous crash that left Johann’s ears ringing slightly even from within the soundproof comfort of the Leopard; he felt a measure of pity for the Russians who weren’t so fortunate. The tank bucked backwards as the shell left the barrel. Looking through the gun camera, Johann watched as the volley slammed into the passing formation. The vanguard machines fell first, their microwave dishes crumpled under the onslaught. However, the quadrupeds proved themselves quite resilient, as Johann saw multiple take direct, full-force shots to their cockpits and survive.

“Keep firing! Fire at will!” Johann shouted, taking control over the roof-mounted autocannon. It would be hopelessly ineffective against an enemy so tough, but he could at least try to thin out the more fragile adversaries. The turret turned downward, its camera zooming in on the tiny Poslushi weaving their way through the forest of mechanical legs, running like mad for a chance at survival. Johann’s finger twitched on the joystick’s trigger and the gun let forth a rapid burst. Johann watched as a Poslushi in an exosuit fell, his broken body leaking white all over. Turning his weapon slightly, he downed his companion with another shot, and then another, and then another.

Johann’s ears registered a high, screaming whistle from overhead as the Poslushi walkers shrugged off their initial shock. Johann watched as the quadrupeds’ hulls folded out partially and two railguns, one on each side, emerged from within and let forth bursts of deadly hypersonic rods in their direction. Then, the camera feed cut.

“They took out the autocannon!” Johann shouted to Hiedrich. Hiedrich nodded wordlessly, sweeping the turret around to strafe with the coaxial machine gun after sending another shell careening into a quadruped. All the while, incoming projectiles continued to detonate above them, the CIWS in the rear painting the sky red with tracer fire. Then, Commander Weiss got back on the channel.

“Watch your heads, men; hypersonics coming in for counter-battery fire, over!”

The air above was split by the cruise missiles as they shot overhead faster than the human eye could register, a howling engine screech accompanying their passage. Before the Poslushi could even attempt to intercept them, they were already making their impacts on the horizon, as the sources of their shelling went up in tall pillars of black smoke. Johann was quite impressed as the tank rocked backwards once more. The din of battle was unfathomably intense, with the pinging of railgun slugs off of the tank’s armor, the incessant gunfire, and the other Leopard commanders barking orders over the radio mixing together into an almost surreal collection of sounds. Then, another voice joined the chorus, female and with an odd filter about it.

“This is Captain Bernier with the French Air Force! We’re holding off the Knights as best we can, but we’re running out of munitions! Finish up, now!”

The Leopard’s cannon boomed over and over and over again, and quadruped after quadruped fell, but they simply did not stop coming. For every walker Johann and his crew put out of commission, two or three would step over its wreckage and keep moving. By this point, the sheer volume of fire had thrown up a cloud of haze over the killzone, and yet their inexorable advance continued. Still, if he could keep firing, just keep firing, maybe the tanks could thin out their ranks enough to give the two forts a fighting chance at repelling them.

Captain Bernier’s voice came over the radio once more. “We’re out of ammunition! Returning to–merde! Attempting evasive… I can’t shake–!” an earsplitting squeal of static punctuated her final message.

Or not.

Johann counted six firings of the gun before the first reports of enemy landings in the vicinity came in. Three more, and then, “Pull back! All armored forces, retreat from forward defense positions before they bomb you! Return to base and defend the shuttle pads at all costs!”

Hersch looked up at Johann quizzically. Grimly, he nodded, and then the tank backed out of its dugout and hightailed it back to Fort von Richthofen.

—

The defense guns were blazing away like there was no tomorrow, but Svetlana could tell it wasn’t enough. Looking around frantically, she saw people running in all directions, equipment being laced with explosives and blown up, and on the outskirts of the base, the flash and pop of gunfire. A makeshift cordon had been established surrounding the cluster of shuttle pads in the center of the base, where a cluster of scared-looking soldiers manned the defense in wait for their ticket out. Chief among them was Commander Weiss, who maintained an air of near-serene calm. Svetlana, not knowing what to do, ran his way.

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The calm was briefly broken by a look of surprise as he saw her. “Lieutenant-Colonel, what the fuck are you doing here?”

Svetlana, in the heat of things, couldn’t think of a lie. “Sir, visiting my boyfriend, sir!”

Weiss cracked up slightly. “At least you’re honest. Look, there’s a Poslushi data tablet in my office; the Combine can’t know that we know what’s on it. You’ll know it when you see it, now go!” he said rapidly, drawing his pistol from his waistband and setting up behind a pile of crates.

Svetlana didn’t address him, but simply took off running for the base’s offices at full tilt. Along the way, she loaded and cocked her handgun, her thumb flicking the safety latch off in preparation. She didn’t even stop to open the building’s door, knocking it off its hinges with a shoulder-check instead and doing the same to the office proper. Everything was as it was when she had last been there, with no tablet in sight. Thus, she got to work ransacking the place, overturning every object marginally large enough to potentially hide the tablet underneath without regard to its welfare. Then, she remembered that his desk had a drawer, and found it immediately upon opening it. Flustered, she quickly removed the device and placed it in her pocket, preparing to leave.

The distant crash of a door being forced open reached her abruptly. Gasping, she ducked back inside, grasping her handgun firmly. Footsteps echoed down the hall, accompanied by a mechanical whirring. Svetlana held her breath as the noise got closer. For a moment, it halted, and then, “Hetsat krakensis duto, sroki itrop. Hetan ses.”

“Sesirik.” another voice responded. The footsteps resumed, perilously close now. Svetlana looked around frantically for anything she could use to get the upper hand. The chair behind the desk would make a good bludgeon. Thus, she waited with it, and as the tip of the Poslushi’s energy rifle rounded the corner, she made the first move, smashing the metal seat into his face so hard that the rivets came undone and the chair broke apart.

He staggered back with a pained yell but held on to his weapon, pointing it at Svetlana just barely too late to prevent her from grabbing it and driving her knee into his elbow as leverage to wrench it from his hands and throw it away. The Poslushi reacted to this by grabbing Svetlana by the calf and roughly tossing her out of the room, striking her head on the doorway hard in the process. Svetlana came to a stop against the opposite wall, her ears ringing and her gun in between her legs. In the blink of an eye, she grabbed it from the ground and pointed it at the Poslushi as he turned to face her, pulling the trigger.

The gun snapped back with a pak! and the round struck the Poslushi right between the bulging eyes of his helmet, but only ricocheted off in a shower of sparks. Svetlana didn’t have the time to fire another shot before the Poslushi was back upon, her, his hand drawn back in a vicious, servo-powered fist. Svetlana yelped in alarm, ducking as the Poslushi pounded a hole into the metal wall. However, he had made one fatal mistake, extended himself a centimeter or two too far, and now Svetlana had an opening, as she jabbed her handgun into the soft chink in his armor that separated the head and neck and squeezed out one more round. Instantly, the Poslushi went limp as a ragdoll, collapsing onto Svetlana. “Eugh!” she cried, forcing the body off of her and revealing a large white stain on the abdomen of her uniform. Then, she stood, panting with exertion. She turned around and made sure that the tablet was still in her pocket. Perhaps if she hadn’t done so, she wouldn’t have turned her bad ear in the wrong direction. Perhaps she would’ve heard the second assailant before it was too late.

As the pounding footsteps finally registered in her brain, she turned with a gasp, her left hand raised to guard her as she heard the hiss of steel on leather. The only thing her maneuver did was cost her her hand.

Time slowed down as the officer’s saber cleaved through her lower arm effortlessly and continued to her chest. There, she felt in excruciating detail the tip of the blade dip below her skin, grind against her ribcage, ultimately shatter the bones and proceed out the other side. As the swing came to an end, it left an arc of deep red behind it, a beautiful, agonizing paintbrush. As Svetlana lost her balance and fell backward, she screamed, she screamed, she screamed!

—

The Leopard continued its course towards Fort von Richthofen, Hersch gunning the engine in the vain hope of making it in time to protect their comrades. Johann and Hiedrich faced the opposite direction in the turret, but the only enemy behind them that they could see were the inbound dropships, too high and fast to track with their gun. Hopefully the defense cannons in the fort had them covered.

Johann took deep breaths in a steady rhythm, trying to calm his pounding heart. Contrary to how it was portrayed, extreme emotions almost never made anyone a better fighter. True combat prowess lay in the ability to remain calm and calculating under fire. Johann tried his best to exemplify this warrior’s ideal, scanning the battlefield, saying nothing beyond what was necessary, but ready to tell Hiedrich where to point the gun at a moment’s notice.

The first of the quadrupeds, guns deployed, crested the ridge after them. “Hersch, keep moving! Hiedrich, open fire; don’t give it time to line up a shot!” Johann barked. A heartbeat later, the tank rocked forward a bit and a shell slammed into the pursuing walker. Wounded but not decommissioned, it didn’t stop despite the gaping hole in its shell. Hiedrich gave it no reprieve, riddling the area around its vision-slit with MG fire while the main gun reloaded. However, the great machine was undeterred, its gun lining up and letting out one well-placed burst into the Leopard’s back.

All of a sudden, the engine cut out. Johann’s heart dropped as the tank started to slow down. “Engine’s out!” Hersch yelled. At the same time, Hiedrich finally downed the quadruped with a second blast. The few following it were focused on other targets, and the base entrance was just up ahead; this was their only chance.

“ABANDON TANK! RUN FOR IT!” Johann screamed, knocking the hatch of the Leopard open and scrambling out, the others hot on his heels. The fort was just up ahead, its checkpoint abandoned for more secure positions. Johann gave the barest of glances back as he sprinted for the shuttle pads, making sure that, indeed, his comrades were behind him. That was all he needed to keep running, bursting through the base entrance as though the Devil himself was behind him (he was, metaphorically speaking).

“Commander Weiss!” Johann cried as he saw the steadfast CO of his unit, coming to a stop beside the makeshift barricades. Hiedrich and Hersch followed immediately afterward.

“Where’s your tank?” Weiss asked.

“We had to abandon it, sir.”

“Join the defenses, then. Where’s your gun?”

Cold fear gripped Johann as he grasped at his holster and found nothing. “It must’ve fallen out on the way here, sir–”

Weiss tossed a trench shovel to Johann, who barely caught it. “A man needs to defend himself.”

Johann opened his mouth to thank Weiss, but at that moment, a scream, fell and terrible, resonated through the base, briefly reaching greater intensity even than the approaching gunfire. A ragged gasp of abject horror escaped Johann’s lips.

He knew that voice.

That was the last thing he remembered.

—

Never in her life had Svetlana known pain of this magnitude. As she lay on the ground helpless, she tried to muster her strength to try to keep fighting, to move at all, but any command her mind sent to her body was lost in her agony. All she knew was the warmth of her blood coursing out of her, the coolness of her tears doing the same, and the pain that eroded her very capacity for thought. A face looked down on her, a Poslushi’s cruel face that drifted in and out of focus.

His voice was muffled and almost unintelligible, but he did speak. “I must admit, taking out a powersuit when not similarly empowered is impressive. But an ape like you wouldn’t know not to try your luck twice. Any last words, animal?”

Terror seized what little of Svetlana’s lucid mind remained. She wanted to beg for her life and beg for her death at the same time, but all she could manage was a quiet, pathetic gurgle.

“Ah, you’re shy. Don’t fret, softskin; it’ll be over nice and quick…” the Poslushi uttered, his voice dripping with disgust. He raised his saber once more.

I wish I told Uncle, and Johann, and everyone. I wish I told them I loved them all, Svetlana thought.

But it was not meant to be.

A clashing of metal brought Svetlana back to her senses for a brief moment, as her failing eyes illuminated the blade of a shovel intersecting her imminent demise. Looking back to its holder, she saw Johann, but something was fundamentally wrong with him. His mouth was agape, his breathing was shallow, and his eyes were wide and foreign. Alien. Animal.

Svetlana could not clearly recall what occurred next, as she drifted in and out of consciousness, her heart pumping faster and faster to move blood that was no longer there. What she did remember were horrific sights, one of a bent-out-of-shape shovel covered in white blood being pounded against… some sort of meat? And a voice, “FUCK YOU! DON’T HURT HER! FUCK! YOU!”

Then, a pair of arms were carrying her, cradling her as they moved her elsewhere. A faint memory flashed before her eyes; her mother was holding her as a baby, singing an old lullaby which she had long since forgotten. Blankets. Her mother under the blanket, the cloth pulled over her head. Driving. Driving to go see Johann. Driving to go identify her mother and father. Regret. Regret at all the “I love yous” she never said. Regret at not having the chance to see another day with Jo. Regret. Regret…

Her mind switched off.