Gallian Front

Town of Redor

5 Days into the Imperial Invasion

"All citizens must evacuate immediately or report to the central square for militia assignment, I repeat all citizens must evacuate immediately or…" the announcement, blared loudly by an unlucky MP with a bullhorn in a jeep, had been playing for almost an hour now as the car circled the small town of Redor. It was utterly memorized by those men and women still waiting in the central square. For Lieutenant Vernon Marten it was an even more familiar recitation: it was his fifth time hearing it in the past three days.

It's only mid-afternoon, he thought grimly as he waited in his grime-coated Gallian uniform, the way things are going I could easily make it to six. That is, assuming I manage to live through this attack.

By rights Vernon ought to consider himself a very lucky man, he had lived through five attacks by the Imperial armored columns on the hasty Gallian defensive positions thrown up after the impossibly swift fall of Ghirlandio. The losses in those fiascoes had been murderous, high command had simply not possessed a plan for this situation and the Imperial armor was advancing far too fast to allow time to generate one. So here we are, throwing together the defense of yet another town, trying to buy a few hours against their inexorable advance, the Lieutenant struggled to keep his face professional, but the impossibility of the task made it a challenge. The honored dead may have it easier than those of us doomed to struggle on, he considered.

Glancing at his watch, Vernon turned to his immediate superior, a man he'd met at the town gate only four hours before when he straggled in with a few surviving watchmen and soldiers from the last town, Nerlom. "Captain," he offered somewhat hesitantly. "The Imperial vanguard may arrive at any moment. Shouldn't I take the last batch of recruits and move to our assigned position?"

"I should think we have a few minutes yet, Lieutenant," the Captain, Vernon found he could not recall the man's name, remarked with a surprisingly casual tone. "The enemy simply cannot maintain this pace of advancement for long. Why I wouldn't be surprised if they do not attack us here today at all."

Privately Vernon did not agree with that assessment, but he made no protest. The Captain was a trained soldier, a man who'd been schooled for this sort of thing. A week ago Vernon's military experience consisted largely of teaching town watch members what kind of regular exercises they should run. It was not his place to judge. Who knows, he managed a modestly kind thought. Perhaps there are a number of good fighters still in the town who have not yet made up their mind. Our position is not at the immediate front of engagement anyway. His generosity melted at that consideration. Though I'd bet the Imperials will breach the outer line in less than ten minutes.

So he waited; the last of five Lieutenants, all survivors of other, scattered commands or veteran militia members suddenly reactivated, to take command of a squadron of local volunteers. The existing town watch had long since been put into place to defend the town, as had the Captain's modest force and those survivors who had retained any sort of unit coherency. To Lieutenant Marten and his fellows was left the unglamorous task of leading any volunteers in an effort to place every body possible on the defensive line. That much, at least, he agreed with. Everything had to be done to slow the Imperials now, so a concerted defense could save the ragnite mines behind them. He couldn't see much hope for Gallia if those mines were lost.

A scuffle by the edge of the square suddenly diverted Vernon's attention from his dark musings.

"I said no!" a sharp, angry, but still strongly feminine voice snapped. "I'm not joining up! The hell with dying for Gallia! I'm getting out!"

"You came to the square lady! That makes you a volunteer!" a rough voice responded.

Vernon turned to see a tall, highly athletic woman, straddling a, a…bicycle, of all things, struggling with an MP at the edge of the square. The woman's bike was decked out with all sorts of gear, and he immediately concluded she must have been traveling on it for days. Looking past the MP's helmet he caught a modestly pretty face topped by short hair in a particular…

A Darcsen, Vernon realized suddenly. Well, that's one reason not to like MPs very much. Personally he didn't much care either way; he'd never seen any compelling evidence regarding them one way or another. The fate of Darcsens was something he'd hadn't much troubled over.

The woman had a strong will, whoever she was, the Lieutenant noted, as she grappled with the MP and then shoved him bodily out of her way.

The clatter the man's gear made when he hit the pavement finally drew the Captain's attention. "What is going on here soldier?" he demanded.

"This woman drove that bike of hers right up to the square," he pointed an accusatory finger. "But now claims she doesn't want to enlist."

"I took a wrong turn, that's all!" she barked back. "Why the Hell would I sign up to fight?"

"Young lady," the Captain attempted to remain reasonable. "Universal conscription is official Gallian policy. You'll no doubt find yourself called to defend your nation sooner or later."

"We'll see," she hissed. "Maybe the Imps'll finish Gallia before that happens."

Vernon would have found the discussion amusing, if not for the expressions on the faces of the other dozen-plus volunteers standing before him. They fingered their rifles and machine guns nervously, doubt spreading between them. That was not something needed now, not if he was to get anything out of this highly irregular force at all.

He was on the verge of stepping in to intervene when there was a low screaming noise, followed by a thunderous boom.

Artillery fire! Vernon sprang into motion. He grabbed one of the last extra rifles from a crate, marched over to the biker, and tossed it at her. She caught it smartly in both hands. "The Empire just decided for you," he ordered. "You're now a scout in the 5th Irregular Squadron. Fall into line!"

She chose to obey by wheeling her bike over to the others, but Vernon had no time to press it. "Captain, permission to move to our position immediately?"

"Yes, yes," the officer appeared rather flustered by the sudden onslaught of artillery fire. Vernon wondered how much the man had truly been hoping the Empire would wait a day. "Counting on you to hold that road if the gate fails Lieutenant."

"Will do sir," Vernon responded with far more confidence than he felt. When the main gate fails we will do what we can, there's no ifs involved here. "5th Irregulars, move out!"

Real soldiers would have fallen into columns behind a point man, but Vernon was forced to lead his ragged little grouping forward himself, trotting along carrying a rifle and a small portable wireless. Inured to the indignities of this chaotic defense as he was, the Lieutenant was still regretful. He should be guiding the group in a tank, he'd rated out to command one, and he ought to have a real squad of soldiers, not a gang in cast-off blue smocks carrying old weapons last used by trainees and with only the memory of their mandatory school-day training to guide them. Well, there's nothing for it. We've got to meet the Imperials all the same; they certainly aren't giving us a choice.

There were three major roads leading from the east side of Redor to the town's center. Vernon's 5th Irregulars had been tasked with holding a secondary defensive position on the southern-most of these corridors. Two of the other irregular units had similar postings, while the final two had been stationed north and south in case of potential flanking maneuvers. The Captain wants to stop them at the eastern edge of town, the Lieutenant knew, and then use his mobile troops to counterattack or reinforce as needed. However, if everything fell apart, and any honest assessment held it was only a matter of when the Imperials achieved some kind of breakthrough, then it would be critical to slow the advance down these roads so a column could stand to and render a fighting retreat possible. We'll be the ones who decide whether Gallia pulls back from Redor, or another unit is swallowed up by the massive Imperial war beast, devoured utterly.

"Take positions across the road!" Vernon called the orders as he arrived at his 'position.' The engineers had made only the most meager preparations. No comforting sandbags lay across the road, only overturned vendor carts, frail creations of wood and lacquer. He spotted a stray truck, abandoned with some kind of engine trouble on the right side, next to a print shop. That's my position, the Lieutenant realized with one of the snap-judgments of intuition he was learning to utterly rely upon as the war continued to chew on his fiber.

"All shocktroopers, get that truck overturned!" he shouted the orders. "Scouts, break into that shop and take all the paper you can find, layer it in front of our barricades. Move people, we've only got minutes here!"

"Sir, can't we just stay in the buildings and fire at them from there?" one of the volunteers, an older man, easily twice Vernon's age, suggested.

The Lieutenant snapped his head around, sizing up the strong measure of support he saw in the eyes of the intimidated troops at this suggestion. They want to hunker down, spray some covering fire, and then turn tail. Like everyone else who hasn't joined up yet, they claim to want to serve Gallia, but they've no real will to risk their lives. It sent a stink of derision burning through his chest, how could any man not take up arms in such a time of trouble? But he knew judgmental words would not work here. "This isn't EWI, the walls of these townhouses won't save you from today's machine guns. Worse, if the Imperials find you in the buildings they'll simply launch a tank shell in, and then all that brick and mortar means your death. Fortify the road! Now!"

With deep reluctance in their strides they moved, only when the sounds of fighting, the high screams of artillery and the loud whump-boom of tank shells began to reach them did urgency quicken the strides of these pseudo-soldiers. Vernon was not idle, moving ceaselessly to direct the mounting of paper and aid his shocktroopers in overturning the truck. He also caught one idle face.

"You," he demanded of the Darcsen woman with the bicycle. She was standing behind their position, examining it carefully, not helping at all. This one, the Lieutenant realized suddenly, truly understands our chances. She is assessing possible escape routes. "What are you doing?"

"Looking for a good firing position," she muttered absently.

It was a plausible lie, potentially. "You rate out as a sniper?"

"I did, during training," she snickered, clearly holding something back, and enjoying the secret.

"Good for you," he complimented, meaning it; precision marksmanship was not his strong suit. Her attitude, however, was not something acceptable in this situation. "Unfortunately, we have no sniper rifles to issue out in this squadron. However, I still have a job for you. I need a spotter forward, so take that bike of yours and go up to within range of the main gate. The second it falls, haul back here."

"You want me to go forward?" she barked incredulously. "I'm not getting any closer to those Imps! Not on the orders of some prick with a death wish!"

With a snap motion, half training, half instinct, Vernon snapped his rifle up into the Darcsen woman's face. "The Imperial attack might result in your death," he spoke very slowly, making sure he was clearly understood, heavily conscious of the many eyes on him now. This is a risk, but a necessary risk. He made his breathing steady, hiding his pounding heart. "But disobey my orders now, and their advance will only carry them past your corpse. Do I make myself clear?"

"Perfectly, sir," she hissed.

"Good, now get up there, on the double," he gestured with the barrel of the rifle.

Looping a leg over her bicycle, the woman started to lethargically pedal down the road to the gate. He followed her with the rifle until he was certain she wasn't going to turn and try anything stupid. I might have just earned a bullet in the back, but at least we're committed now, Vernon told himself. "Move it people, they're coming!"

Fifteen drafted scouts and shocktroopers scurried into positions behind the truck and carts. Timidly, one young man approached Vernon at his chosen point by the truck's front bumper. "Where do you want the lance sir?"

Ah, that is the question isn't? He looked at the youth, a boy just out of his mandatory training, the only one in the group with anything resembling proper lancer experience. One lance, one lance only, with a total of five charges, against the greatest force of mobile armor to ever rip the vulnerable earth apart beneath the rumble of its treads. "Hang back behind us here," Vernon ordered. "So if the truck gets hit you'll be spared. When a tank comes close enough, I'll wave you up between me and the building wall. You'll fire from there. We've few shots, so you'll have to wait until they're close, make every charge count." With luck we might take down one light tank, the Lieutenant considered silently.

"Couldn't we take lances from the Imps sir?" the young man asked.

"We could," Vernon acknowledged. "But the Imperial commanders aren't stupid. They've got the armor advantage, so their lancers are hanging back, only moving against our tank columns. If we see any we'll have achieved a great victory already."

The young man smiled. He had no idea of the doom that was approaching.

Vernon did, he'd already lived through it, and when the scratchy borrowed wireless erupted in cries of tanks at the gate he knew it had come to them once again. Idle as he stared down the scope of his rifle, awaiting the enemy, he was momentarily distracted by something trivial. I didn't bother to ask that Darcsen woman her name, what an oversight. It's not right to send someone out to die nameless.

Technical Notes

The game shows very little of the initial Imperial invasion, except the defense and subsequent fall of Bruhl and the initial fall of Ghirlandio. We know only that the Empire, using mobile armor, rapidly conquered essentially all of northern and central Gallia. One of the major lines of advance was from Ghirlandio, across the Naggiar Plains, to Fouzen. It is on that front that this piece is staged. It is not clear exactly how long this whole process took, because the game storyline effectively skips over the entire Imperial invasion from the moment Bruhl is evacuated until fighting has reached the very gates of Randgriz. This is confounded by a lack of knowledge regarding the actual size of Gallia as a country. So I will be making some modest assumptions.