The Grey Chronicles Part Two: Under Siege.

Chapter 9: "S" As In Shitstorm.

Baseplate Sierra, surface of Stonehaara One, August of 8096 AL.

Augustus walked through the doorway and into the center of the base. The command post was a triangular room about four meters wide. Several doors led off into other parts of the base, and a large triangular table dominated the center of the room. Upon closer inspection the table was identifiable as a campaign map; similar to a starmap, the campaign map projected a holographic plot of the surrounding area. The map activated as they entered the room, holographic mountains and trees and hills rising from the surface of the table with a grid patterned onto the terrain. Salem stepped up to the map and analyzed it; the base was centered, with roughly five kilometers of open ground on every side. The landing strip was half of a kilometer to the south. Surrounding the clearing on all sides was the same thick forest Salem had seen all over the planet. A range of mountains surrounded the forest, forming a bowl that wrapped around the valley on the western, southern, and eastern sides. To the north and east beyond the forest and mountain was a barren waste, all sand and rock and scrub brush.

"The Blood Forge is a little over two hundred klicks north of northwest, we have two options," Augustus said, as he walked across the room to a small table holding a decanter filled with whiskey. He poured himself a glass in an instant, drained it in another, then smiled as he refilled his glass again. Augustus replaced the top to the decanter and walked back to the map, standing across the table from his brother with a glass in his hands and tomatoes where his cheeks ought to be. Seth, Zacharias, Korana, and Harper stood around the table, examining the map and listening intently.

"And those would be?" Salem asked, looking up from the map.

"We can try and move through the desert," Augustus said, pointing to the wastes, "Or we can move soldiers over the mountain with the Phantoms and move from there."

"If we go through the desert, we'll be taking a shorter, more direct path, but we'll have no cover whatsoever." Salem said, mostly to himself.

"We'll also be moving through a radioactive waste," Seth cut in, "The radiation storm we passed through came from the desert in the east, we were lucky to avoid landing on this side of the mountains."

"Well, I suppose that's not an option," Salem rubbed his chin, "If we move over the mountains we'll be set back several days unless we leave the tanks behind."

"Which we can't." Korana added, "And the amount of fuel we have is limited; we can't afford to burn any extra hydrogen cells for the Phantoms, shuttling the tanks over the mountains isn't doable."

"So, neither of our options are actually options." Salem sighed, "How many soldiers do we have?"

"At our disposal we have two regiments of Machinae infantry; regiments 296 and 305," Seth answered, "Then we have a regiment of your heavy armor, an airborne regiment, and two regiments of supportive infantry and cavalrymen. All of them are SHOK, and they total about one hundred and thirty thousand soldiers. We have another seventy thousand of my own soldiers, but they're mostly support and stealth units; artillery, doctors and medics."

"So, we have two hundred thousand soldiers," Salem muttered, "And no good options."

He looked at the map more intently, studying the terrain.

"Could we take the middle ground?" Seth suggested, "We can't go through the desert, we can't go over the mountain, so why not skirt around the desert and the end of the mountain range. We can head due west until we're past the mountains, then we can move north towards the forge."

"Not bad," Salem smiled, "But they'll still see us coming; it's impossible to move two hundred thousand soldiers without someone seeing."

"Then we create a diversion," Augustus said, "We can firebomb several strips of forest in every direction. Then the Titanus won't know which direction we're heading. The smoke should help cover our movement from any satellites they have."