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More from Atrocity-Divide
Art by http://www.furaffinity.net/user/fishyboner/
All mongrelhorror reserved
The opening stages of the last war were fought primarily in the fierce wildland commonly known as the Scarbryush. Mornings are chill and damp, the night lingering in the form of long shadows. In winter, nothing moves at night. The sun never touches the deepest valleys, and frost grows there for weeks. Spring brings intermittent, ice-cold showers, slow and intense. Summer is a time of smothering mugginess. The scent of mold hangs over everything. Fall combines the worst of the other seasons, and is also the flowering season of the Scarbry vine, for which the region is named. Soldiers of the last generation that fought here had a common saying that 'once you get used to it, it never gets better, and it never gets worse'.
Bloodshed was no stranger to these sparsely populated lands. Virtually inhospitable, the Scarbryush was located along several lines of advance necessary for any continental-sized action. Even in times of relative peace, its logistical importance meant the area was a region of violent struggle between the powers. Generations of warriors had marched, and died, along its roads, in a tradition known as 'falling among the thorns'.
Due to the importance of the Scarbryush's roads and the great emphasis placed by Antherans reconstructionists on the it's logistic value, historians would later call the linked series of battles here 'the truck war' or 'the road war'. While roads were important, and many trucks did serve on both sides, the blood spilled here was largely considered part of the cost of transportation; fuel for the drive to greater destinies.
The driver peered through thick blocks of glass, his pupils narrowed to slits. Outside, milky sky seemed to merge with the brush and rocks of the hills, the clouds roiling and the dead grass waving in a frigid wind. Hensvl -hated- it here. He hated the abrasive thorn dust that kicked up when it was dry and dusty, he hated the shrill silence at night, he hated the dead front of hundreds of miles of empty road. He hated driving around and looking for K even more.
He knew the Kanin could be anywhere, everywhere, but tried to focus on the winding, rolling path that was the most even line between the hills. Smears of dirt on the vision blocks, the glare from the milky sky, and the rocking, jerking motion of the vehicle combined to make it a strenuous task. As much as he hated road patrols or blockade garrison, he hated these moments of claustrophobic hell the most. The constant reinterpreting of the little he could see and the gnawing fear of crushing one of the infantrymen surrounding him had his head throbbing. The deafening rattle of the engine just a paw length behind his head and the noxious fumes filling the interior lent that throbbing a biting edge. He blinked his eyes furiously and did his best to stay focused. He hated all of this...but every bit of hate just made him more determined to do it right.
To Hensvl's left was anarmored cupola, its top open in an attempt to give the commander there a better field of view. Field Kaptain Stengst, gaunt and muscular like a feral beast, turned his weapon from side to side on its pintle, trying to watch every dark thicket of Scarbryush, every cluster of boulders, ever suspicious pooled shadow. Below him, the IFV bucked and swayed like a drunk, setting his ammo belt swinging and rattling. Unbeknownst to himself, he was singing a traditional summer hunting tune to go along. In contrast to his driver he loved it here and took joy in the particulars of this kind of operation. In the open Savannah of the roaming east infantry mobile armor patrols did not have the same range of challenges affored by the tight knit clusters of rolling valleys and snarls of inhospitable forests thickets. Everywhere was just off a main road and also paradoxically nearly inaccessible wilderness. His transfer here was more than just the change of pace that many officers of his rank looked for when transitioning from one battle field to another. The Scarbryush engaged Stengst in a way that made him more alive than any of the other places he had fought. Those were training exercise compared with this, all the factors rolling through his mind as determinedly as the vehicles slicing through the back wild of another hill side. The road-head with a collection of everything he might need as a temporary field post on wheels, the dismounted infantry moving low to the ground doing everything right, the probability of live targets concealed in the under growth before him, all felt as real and under his claws as the trigger safety shroud concealing the trigger of his pintle mounted weapon. He was living up to his ability on a late summer hunt, and was determined to make it all go right.
The infantry officer at the front of the platoon raised a hand. The armored car rumbled to a halt, its engine a deadly-sounding purr. They'd found another one—a rusted-out 622 tank, turret askew and hatches blown, a small tree rising up through where the coax had been. A dead giant from another age. Once shrouded in an aura of invincibilty, it was now an unmarked grave, cloaked in loneliness, haunted by wind and the echoes of memory. The small combined unit stood a short distance out, elements beginning to prowl out around the flanks even as the officers conferred. On instincts as much as order the group broke up into fire teams that spread out to find cover or advantageous sites, while the IFV was brought forward, pace steady, engine growling confidently.
A four-soldier team hustled up a nearby slope, a female Antheran in the lead despite the bulk of the Assault-machinegun she carried. She was separated from the others by the squat set of her body by her lack of the mane her male peers cultivated and took such pride in. Her look of perpetual exhaustion and pale blonde fur made her seem a ghost of the thornlands. Her partner, a heavily built male saddled down with ammunition, was not far behind. A wide smile was plastered across his muzzle, unchanging, and his eyes were wide, but not alert—the village idiot, pleased to be given an errand. Both wore the same thick leather gloves for handling heated barrels and potentially snarly chains of ammunition. Had it not been for the obvious relation of their equipment the mind would be hard pressed putting the two of them into any other sort of mutual context.
The two others moving with them had a look right off of a recruiting poster, as though they had been cast from the same mold for the express purpose of escorting the fire team into position. Scrambling upwards, doing their best to keep their assault rifles at the ready and their ears and eyes alert, they occasionally traded hand signals or knowing looks. Partway up, the female in the lead spotted a rocky outcropping overhung with dead, thorny vines—a natural bunker with grenade netting. She made for it even as the ranking escort made a hand signal to share his discovery. The rest of the team had seen that defiant look in her eye and as she wordlessly began to set up, and they set about finding someplace useful to be near by. Over the barrel of her gun she watched the IFV belch black smoke as it lurched into place. All around her she was dimly aware of a stalking motion, other teams moving up slopes, clearing areas, beating the grass. On her one o'clock she saw the other heavy team setting up in a good position, and her tail flicked as she imaged the crossfire pending between the positions. Everyone was working together, and this was going to be done just right.
Shouted orders went out, barely audible over growl of engine and the sudden gust of the wind picking up. The scene of the old main battle tank's death spasmed with momentary violence from across the ages. Dozens of weapons opened up as one. The echoes of the command were drowned by the deep, steady booming of exorcising fire punching the frigid air and the hellish raking of impacts on rusted armor. A cloud of dust leapt into the air from the tank and the dirt behind it. Long-cartridged fire tore through underbrush, collided with thin limbed trees, and left angry little glowing welts here and there against the dead tank. And through it all the armored car continued forward, long barreled auto cannon and coaxial mounted machine gun muzzle alert and patient for signs of return fire.
The deafening throb of staccato noise did not deter Field Kaptain Stengst from continuing his jaunty little hunting tune. This was the third time they had done this today. At this stage they were still pretty much drills, but there were landings going on all up and down the big curb. The first time they performed this earlier in the after noon they stumbled upon a light Recon element and tore it to literal pieces. His blood had been up ever since, it had seemed like a good omen for hunting today. No, he WANTED it to be a good omen and kept singing through the storm of fire to make it so.
Hensyl kept driving forward placing his foot just so against the pedal to keep his speed the same despite the wildly varying angles of steepness he was driving through. He practically placed his face against the limited view slot to try and make the most of what little of the driving conditions he could see from the unfriendly angle offered by the incline. Outside the deepened shadow of the late afternoon valley went bright from a momentary concentration of hot blue/white tracers. He knew they were wasting their time,.. he could feel it in his bones. He hated wasting his time,... but as long as he was obligated to he tried to save the prowler's suspension and perform the most professional waste of time he could.
There was no return fire, and the guns stopped firing almost as one, a lifetime of discipline culminating in a sudden, eerie silence. In synchronicity, dozens of paws moved to replace magazines. Shouts and gestures went up as squad leaders made snap decisions, moving teams forward into better positions. As the squads moved, machine gun teams strobed fire into anything that caught their attention, the precise two second bursts coming in shifts from one team after the other.
Over the wind and bursts of heavy fire, only those receiving orders could make them out, and even then only in the vaguest sense. They were orders given by rote and followed more by implicit understanding of intent than they were out of instruction. Grenades sailed forward, throwing up columns of earth beside and around the tank. A moment later, the hills were silent once more, and as the dust began to clear from the air a great roar went up, mixed with the rattle of small arms fire as an assault element rushed the tank, firing as they came in under the protecive watch of their fellows.
The maneuver might have come from a textbook, but the assault team moved with coordinated focus that was a beauty to see, long strides striking down at almost exactly the same time, a single wave united in purpose. The team leader hopped onto the tank, firing down into a ragged opening, then dropped a grenade through. Glancing once where he was going, he leapt clear with a powerful grace that carried him well clear of the fierce crack as his grenade detonated. The young mane landed and rolled, weighed down by his gear, but was up and sprinting toward cover even as two more grenades were slung under the wreck by the rest of his squad as they swept around it, hunting targets among the bushes already torn by machinegun fire.
The world shook briefly as the shock wave slapped the assault leader's brain, sending everything out of focus. When he could see clearly again, he was facing the still wilderness, debris and thorn dust sifting down all around him. The familiar wet stink of thorn duff carried by smell of torn metal, propellant, and the slightly acrid touch of explosives came to his nose as the scent of accomplishment. No movement came, no targets appeared. Another squad was still moving in from the flank, carefully, keeping the site covered as the secondary 'tail' element reinforced the recently dominated objective point. They had done this one right, under the watchful eye and protective shadow of the command prowler. Now it was time to move on—there were more K out there.
See also:
Antheran portal http://www.furaffinity.net/view/8164398/
StGMG http://www.furaffinity.net/view/9460834/
Sturmacht http://www.furaffinity.net/view/8333851/
All mongrelhorror reserved
The opening stages of the last war were fought primarily in the fierce wildland commonly known as the Scarbryush. Mornings are chill and damp, the night lingering in the form of long shadows. In winter, nothing moves at night. The sun never touches the deepest valleys, and frost grows there for weeks. Spring brings intermittent, ice-cold showers, slow and intense. Summer is a time of smothering mugginess. The scent of mold hangs over everything. Fall combines the worst of the other seasons, and is also the flowering season of the Scarbry vine, for which the region is named. Soldiers of the last generation that fought here had a common saying that 'once you get used to it, it never gets better, and it never gets worse'.
Bloodshed was no stranger to these sparsely populated lands. Virtually inhospitable, the Scarbryush was located along several lines of advance necessary for any continental-sized action. Even in times of relative peace, its logistical importance meant the area was a region of violent struggle between the powers. Generations of warriors had marched, and died, along its roads, in a tradition known as 'falling among the thorns'.
Due to the importance of the Scarbryush's roads and the great emphasis placed by Antherans reconstructionists on the it's logistic value, historians would later call the linked series of battles here 'the truck war' or 'the road war'. While roads were important, and many trucks did serve on both sides, the blood spilled here was largely considered part of the cost of transportation; fuel for the drive to greater destinies.
The driver peered through thick blocks of glass, his pupils narrowed to slits. Outside, milky sky seemed to merge with the brush and rocks of the hills, the clouds roiling and the dead grass waving in a frigid wind. Hensvl -hated- it here. He hated the abrasive thorn dust that kicked up when it was dry and dusty, he hated the shrill silence at night, he hated the dead front of hundreds of miles of empty road. He hated driving around and looking for K even more.
He knew the Kanin could be anywhere, everywhere, but tried to focus on the winding, rolling path that was the most even line between the hills. Smears of dirt on the vision blocks, the glare from the milky sky, and the rocking, jerking motion of the vehicle combined to make it a strenuous task. As much as he hated road patrols or blockade garrison, he hated these moments of claustrophobic hell the most. The constant reinterpreting of the little he could see and the gnawing fear of crushing one of the infantrymen surrounding him had his head throbbing. The deafening rattle of the engine just a paw length behind his head and the noxious fumes filling the interior lent that throbbing a biting edge. He blinked his eyes furiously and did his best to stay focused. He hated all of this...but every bit of hate just made him more determined to do it right.
To Hensvl's left was anarmored cupola, its top open in an attempt to give the commander there a better field of view. Field Kaptain Stengst, gaunt and muscular like a feral beast, turned his weapon from side to side on its pintle, trying to watch every dark thicket of Scarbryush, every cluster of boulders, ever suspicious pooled shadow. Below him, the IFV bucked and swayed like a drunk, setting his ammo belt swinging and rattling. Unbeknownst to himself, he was singing a traditional summer hunting tune to go along. In contrast to his driver he loved it here and took joy in the particulars of this kind of operation. In the open Savannah of the roaming east infantry mobile armor patrols did not have the same range of challenges affored by the tight knit clusters of rolling valleys and snarls of inhospitable forests thickets. Everywhere was just off a main road and also paradoxically nearly inaccessible wilderness. His transfer here was more than just the change of pace that many officers of his rank looked for when transitioning from one battle field to another. The Scarbryush engaged Stengst in a way that made him more alive than any of the other places he had fought. Those were training exercise compared with this, all the factors rolling through his mind as determinedly as the vehicles slicing through the back wild of another hill side. The road-head with a collection of everything he might need as a temporary field post on wheels, the dismounted infantry moving low to the ground doing everything right, the probability of live targets concealed in the under growth before him, all felt as real and under his claws as the trigger safety shroud concealing the trigger of his pintle mounted weapon. He was living up to his ability on a late summer hunt, and was determined to make it all go right.
The infantry officer at the front of the platoon raised a hand. The armored car rumbled to a halt, its engine a deadly-sounding purr. They'd found another one—a rusted-out 622 tank, turret askew and hatches blown, a small tree rising up through where the coax had been. A dead giant from another age. Once shrouded in an aura of invincibilty, it was now an unmarked grave, cloaked in loneliness, haunted by wind and the echoes of memory. The small combined unit stood a short distance out, elements beginning to prowl out around the flanks even as the officers conferred. On instincts as much as order the group broke up into fire teams that spread out to find cover or advantageous sites, while the IFV was brought forward, pace steady, engine growling confidently.
A four-soldier team hustled up a nearby slope, a female Antheran in the lead despite the bulk of the Assault-machinegun she carried. She was separated from the others by the squat set of her body by her lack of the mane her male peers cultivated and took such pride in. Her look of perpetual exhaustion and pale blonde fur made her seem a ghost of the thornlands. Her partner, a heavily built male saddled down with ammunition, was not far behind. A wide smile was plastered across his muzzle, unchanging, and his eyes were wide, but not alert—the village idiot, pleased to be given an errand. Both wore the same thick leather gloves for handling heated barrels and potentially snarly chains of ammunition. Had it not been for the obvious relation of their equipment the mind would be hard pressed putting the two of them into any other sort of mutual context.
The two others moving with them had a look right off of a recruiting poster, as though they had been cast from the same mold for the express purpose of escorting the fire team into position. Scrambling upwards, doing their best to keep their assault rifles at the ready and their ears and eyes alert, they occasionally traded hand signals or knowing looks. Partway up, the female in the lead spotted a rocky outcropping overhung with dead, thorny vines—a natural bunker with grenade netting. She made for it even as the ranking escort made a hand signal to share his discovery. The rest of the team had seen that defiant look in her eye and as she wordlessly began to set up, and they set about finding someplace useful to be near by. Over the barrel of her gun she watched the IFV belch black smoke as it lurched into place. All around her she was dimly aware of a stalking motion, other teams moving up slopes, clearing areas, beating the grass. On her one o'clock she saw the other heavy team setting up in a good position, and her tail flicked as she imaged the crossfire pending between the positions. Everyone was working together, and this was going to be done just right.
Shouted orders went out, barely audible over growl of engine and the sudden gust of the wind picking up. The scene of the old main battle tank's death spasmed with momentary violence from across the ages. Dozens of weapons opened up as one. The echoes of the command were drowned by the deep, steady booming of exorcising fire punching the frigid air and the hellish raking of impacts on rusted armor. A cloud of dust leapt into the air from the tank and the dirt behind it. Long-cartridged fire tore through underbrush, collided with thin limbed trees, and left angry little glowing welts here and there against the dead tank. And through it all the armored car continued forward, long barreled auto cannon and coaxial mounted machine gun muzzle alert and patient for signs of return fire.
The deafening throb of staccato noise did not deter Field Kaptain Stengst from continuing his jaunty little hunting tune. This was the third time they had done this today. At this stage they were still pretty much drills, but there were landings going on all up and down the big curb. The first time they performed this earlier in the after noon they stumbled upon a light Recon element and tore it to literal pieces. His blood had been up ever since, it had seemed like a good omen for hunting today. No, he WANTED it to be a good omen and kept singing through the storm of fire to make it so.
Hensyl kept driving forward placing his foot just so against the pedal to keep his speed the same despite the wildly varying angles of steepness he was driving through. He practically placed his face against the limited view slot to try and make the most of what little of the driving conditions he could see from the unfriendly angle offered by the incline. Outside the deepened shadow of the late afternoon valley went bright from a momentary concentration of hot blue/white tracers. He knew they were wasting their time,.. he could feel it in his bones. He hated wasting his time,... but as long as he was obligated to he tried to save the prowler's suspension and perform the most professional waste of time he could.
There was no return fire, and the guns stopped firing almost as one, a lifetime of discipline culminating in a sudden, eerie silence. In synchronicity, dozens of paws moved to replace magazines. Shouts and gestures went up as squad leaders made snap decisions, moving teams forward into better positions. As the squads moved, machine gun teams strobed fire into anything that caught their attention, the precise two second bursts coming in shifts from one team after the other.
Over the wind and bursts of heavy fire, only those receiving orders could make them out, and even then only in the vaguest sense. They were orders given by rote and followed more by implicit understanding of intent than they were out of instruction. Grenades sailed forward, throwing up columns of earth beside and around the tank. A moment later, the hills were silent once more, and as the dust began to clear from the air a great roar went up, mixed with the rattle of small arms fire as an assault element rushed the tank, firing as they came in under the protecive watch of their fellows.
The maneuver might have come from a textbook, but the assault team moved with coordinated focus that was a beauty to see, long strides striking down at almost exactly the same time, a single wave united in purpose. The team leader hopped onto the tank, firing down into a ragged opening, then dropped a grenade through. Glancing once where he was going, he leapt clear with a powerful grace that carried him well clear of the fierce crack as his grenade detonated. The young mane landed and rolled, weighed down by his gear, but was up and sprinting toward cover even as two more grenades were slung under the wreck by the rest of his squad as they swept around it, hunting targets among the bushes already torn by machinegun fire.
The world shook briefly as the shock wave slapped the assault leader's brain, sending everything out of focus. When he could see clearly again, he was facing the still wilderness, debris and thorn dust sifting down all around him. The familiar wet stink of thorn duff carried by smell of torn metal, propellant, and the slightly acrid touch of explosives came to his nose as the scent of accomplishment. No movement came, no targets appeared. Another squad was still moving in from the flank, carefully, keeping the site covered as the secondary 'tail' element reinforced the recently dominated objective point. They had done this one right, under the watchful eye and protective shadow of the command prowler. Now it was time to move on—there were more K out there.
See also:
Antheran portal http://www.furaffinity.net/view/8164398/
StGMG http://www.furaffinity.net/view/9460834/
Sturmacht http://www.furaffinity.net/view/8333851/
Category Story / Fantasy
Species Lion
Size 1000 x 1200px
File Size 593 kB
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