295 Retaking body 4A 2

Regrouping with Solaris after destroying the Titan drone, Alice made sure that her friend was alright before she quickly hugged her.

"I-I'm fine, my drones were destroyed by that large thing there. I was just about to call for backup when you contacted me, thanks, Alice."

Although slightly flustered by Alice's closeness, it was nevertheless clear to Solaris that Alice cared about her, something which brought a smile to the angel's face.

"Okay, let's get out of here before more of those cyborgs corpses turn up."

"The what? I've mostly been running into old modified drones like that heap of scraps over there."

"Okay, in that case, you're better off not knowing what I had run into before this…"

With a far off look in her eyes, Alice quickly convinced Solaris not to dig deeper into her words. Contacting the others over the radio to report that they had met up and Solaris had lost her drones to a Titan, Alice and Solaris continued through the ruined city towards their rendezvous point, as they did the Emergence resistance gradually increased until it became an almost constant stream of ambushes and firefights, whatever they were moving towards, it was clear that the Emergence didn't want them anywhere close to it.

"Solaris, cover!"

"I see it!"

Taking over the role of defence, Solaris erected a wall of compressed rocks just in time for it to be hit by an anti tank missile while Alice ducked out of cover and located the shooter, sending a magic enhanced bullet in return. Having blown out the apartment building where the Emergence drone with the anti tank weapon had hidden, Alice returned her focus to the countless other drones currently rushing her position.

"Damn, they just keep coming!"

The Emergence drones attacking Solaris and Alice did so by relentlessly rushing them from nearby buildings and both ends of the street they currently found themselves surrounded in, all opportunities of retreat already long since cut off by the endless waves of relentless Emergence drones with little in the way of a self preservation instinct visible in their frankly reckless level of aggression.

"We're starting to run low on ammunition!"

"I know!"

While Solaris and Alice could keep fighting long after they had run out of ammunition for their rifles and pistols, the same couldn't be said for the drones which covered their flanks.

Things were starting to turn desperate. Turning to the last option available to her, Alice grasped her radio.

"This is Alice and Solaris! We're facing heavy resistance and are running low on ammunition and drones, requesting immediate resupply and close air support, over!"

[IMI ON STATION, REQUEST CONFIRMED. CAS AND RESUPPLY IN ROUTE, ETA 90 SECONDS.]

"Tch, buckshot!"

Having given the rest of her ammunition to the drones under her command, Alice had surrounded herself with spears made out of compressed rocks which she rapidly fired at the closing in Emergence drones which seemed to endlessly pour out of the nearby buildings, to make matters even worse, even tanks and armoured vehicles had started appearing in ever langer numbers.

[CAS ON STATION, DESIGNATE TARGETS.]

But as the roar of multiple VESMIR thrusters suddenly overpowered the constant gunfire, Alice regained her hope as she shouted into her radio.

"Manoeuvre 4, execute wide area purge!"

[IMI ON STATION, DIRECTIVE CONFIRMED, ANNIHILATING ALL IMMEDIATE CONTACTS.]

According to Alice's orders, a pair of twin engine Lazarus Hornet close air support crafts flew in over the buildings and came down almost to street level as they opened fire with their Menhit rotary cannons while letting loose a furry of fragmentation and high explosive anti tank missiles, quickly wiping out all hostile resistance before one of them climbed altitude while the other one remained hovering in just above building level.

[IMI ON STATION, AREA PURGE COMPLETED, STANDING BY FOR DIRECTIVES. RESUPPLY 6 SECONDS OUT, INCOMING HOT, READING BEACON 5 BY 5.]

"IMI cas, remain on station. Provide air cover until we're reached rendezvous point alpha, then return to normal duties."

As a group of drop pods containing drone reinforcements and supplies landed right about 20 metres from them, Alice gave the pair of Hornets new directives.

[IMI CAS CONFIRMES, PROVIDING CLOSE COVER, CAS 1 BANKING LEFT, SECURING FLANK, CAS 2 ESTABLISHING OVERWATCH, STANDING BY FOR TASKING.]

With the pair of Hornets protecting Alice and Solaris, the two of them were able to resupply without issues and quickly made their way towards the rendezvous point, running into Mare and Lilly on the way there.

-

Finally grouping up with everyone in an abandoned concert house, Dax chose to brief the others in the main concert hall which had been used for an evacuation point just before the moon was abandoned.

"Based on the newest available intelligence we've determined that the Emergence jamming device is located deep inside the drydock Delta-19 which is about 20 kilometres from this location, coincidentally it has also been identified as a possible site for this moon's Emergence nerve cluster, so taking it will be killing two birds with a single stone."

An Emergence nerve cluster was a local command point for its galaxy wide hive mind and was usually a massive collection of quantum communication nodes as well as a collection of countless organic and mechanical processors, eliminating such a nerve cluster would greatly impair the Emergence's ability to fight. 

"That's where all the positives end, dry dock Delta-19 is a fortress unlike anything else, it is completely covered with anti air and anti tank railgun batteries, to make matters worse we can't just nuke it, as we need to retrieve the quantum jamming device intact… That leaves us with the only unfortunate choice of a straight up assault on that fortress. To that end, 6 drone battalions have made landfall around the fortress and will help us take it."

Picking up where Dax left off, Phillipa explained the unfortunate parts of their current situation, something like taking a fortress like the one they currently faced without heavy air support would be downright masochistic of them to even attempt. 

"Sadly this is the job we've been given, so there's nothing else to do other than fulfilling the objective flawlessly! We're all Hellwalkers here, and flawlessly completing a fool's errands like this is what Hellwalkers do! I don't think I need to remind anyone, but this is the first time within recent history that we're striking back against the Emergence! As Hellwalkers we're the head of the spear, thus we are not allowed to fail! By successfully completing this campaign we will reinvigorate the entirety of the Galactic Empire who stands behind us!"

Stepping up to inspire his subordinates, Dax wore a cold smile which slightly lessened in intensity and bloodlust as he glanced at each of the reliable subordinates he had obtained.

"I know this will be hard, but I would never ask the impossible of any of you guys, taking this fortress is possible even without using magic, but luckily we don't need to fight fair! Let's crush this sad excuse for a hive mind! Then push on to completely annihilate it from the face of this galaxy! ARE YOU WITH ME!?"

""""""SIR, YES SIR!""""""

As the concert hall lit up with a thunderous response to Dax's rhetorical question, the war of annihilation between the Galactic Empire and the Emergence finally started for real.