Thursday, March 16, 2006

Martian Intafada part 12

The Martian rebels, calling themselves the Second Army, were still more than 5 kilometers from the Japanese military base Akagi. Their mission was pretty simple, infiltrate the slope above Akagi and keep the Japanese soldiers pinned down so that they cannot go to help defend Kyoto on Mars. The 6th and 8th security groups were stationed at Akagi. As the 9th, 10th, and left security groups were on the other side of Mars. This would mean that Kyoto on Mars would only be defended by the 1st, 2nd and 12th security groups.

Colonel Fugi had predicted an attack on Akagi would come from the slope above and had deployed the bases APG’s in a defensive position. The rebel 2nd Army ran smack into them with disastrous results. The Japanese hit the rebels by surprise, sending them scrambling in shock. And while the initial hit was hard; the group was much larger than Colonel Fugi had ever anticipated. The rebels were able to regroup and counter attack flanking the Japanese APCs. Using their, heavy Gauss guns with devastating effort against the APC’s, it was only after the engagement that the rebel 2nd Army realized how hard they had be hit.

“So what you are saying is we are out of air.” Said Khalid exasperated to his assistant Abu-Hamza.

“The trucks carrying the air miners were hit as was the truck carrying the spare oxygen tanks. We have managed to salvage a few from the truck and a couple from the Japanese APC’s.”

“So how much air do we have?”

“About 14 hours, sir.”

“So, we keep them pinned down for 14 hours and suffocate and then they…”

“They, sir, move out and slam into the rear of the army that we have sent to capture Kyoto on Mars.”

“Ok, I must say I don’t like that plan. So we come up with a new plan. How about this? We attack Akagi. All out assault capture their air miners and spare air. Don’t suffocate and then we can actually move on to help with the attack on Kyoto on Mars. How does that plan sound?”

“Much better than the suffocation plan sir.”

The Intafadas Second army gathered on the slopes of Olympus Mons above Akagi. As their job had been to simply keep the Japanese forces trapped here, they had no rockets or the larger rail gun cannons. The heaviest guns they had were the equivalent of a 50 caliber machine gun and would not penetrate the heavy stone and brick walls of Akagi. They would have to get men to the air locks to blast them open with the small amount of explosives they had taken from a tunnel construction site.

They decided to turn the remaining vehicles’ engine to powering large make-shift fans they built. The idea was to force a wall of dust and sand down the slope to provide cover for the as they charged down the hill.

Morale was low to Khalid, who fancied himself somewhat of a singer. Khalid tried to raise their spirits by singing.
" When I die boys
Bury me on Olympus Mons.
When I die boys,
Bury me on Olympus Mons.
Where the rain don’t fall
And the wind don’t howl
Bury me on Olympus Mons….."

The attack was brutal with the bulk of the 2nd Army getting down to Akagi under the cover of the dust and sand. But, those who survived the initial charge found themselves in fierce room to room fighting with the Imperial security force casualty’s being very high.

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