Post by Adam on Jun 25, 2008 13:24:24 GMT -5
The opening of a story written for some as yet undefined moment in DoS's history. Read and enjoy...
Sol and Lunis hung high in the sky, as if watching with bated breath for the situation on the ground to explode. Beneath their seventy-plus-celsius gaze lay the vast expanse that was the Andromeda salt plain, a baking, wheel-swallowing sheet of compacted sodium chloride marred only by two things.
A city, or rather a great metal-walled fortress, stood solid and defiant amid the whiteness. Square and turreted, it bristled with defensive weapons and counterweapons. It was evidently made for one purpose and one purpose only; not mining, not reaping resources of any kind, but simple survival. It resembled the impenetrable hideout of a supervillain, which in fact it was, to an extent. Like many things, the evil quotient of its leader depended on perspective. This was the centre for a movement with many followers among the world's city-dwellers; one which aimed to restrict, administrate and control the mech-riders in the name of peace. The only problem was the uncooperation of the intended subjects...
Facing it was the all-destructive weapon. An army of a kind that never had and probably never would be seen again. Four hundred and seventy-four mechs stood in two blocks of perfectly measured ranks, an eclectically designed collection of heavily armed killing machines. With the smallest at the front and the largest at the rear, each and every pilot could see the unmoving city through their view-windows and optical displays. They had been there for over an hour so far, standing and waiting, safely outside the range of the defence weapons - as the deep craters in the salt plain a few hundred metres ahead attested. Silent, intimidating, the combined hum and throb of nearly five hundred reactors on standby was the only non-visual clue to their presence. That and the heat haze rippling from them, both from their idling engines and the sun steaming from upper armour plates and weapon barrels.
In the gap, and slightly ahead of the rest of their army, stood a machine that possessed an alien, terrible beauty. Black, with a subtle iridescence, its arms bore long, white, elegant cannons. A faint turquoise glow shone from vents and the cracks between armour panels. It was curved and segmented, almost insectoid but for its upright shape and all-too-human stance. A smooth head rose above it, almost featureless but for three bluegreen eyes. Over fifty feet tall and weighing some sixty tons, this was Opal, the world's most feared mech, and commander of an aggressive defence of the mech-riders' freedom to shoot at and steal from one another.
In their c#ckpits*, despite the intimidation Opal wanted (and was getting), most of the riders were otherwise engaged. Chatting, playing computer games on their mech's systems, meditating, praying, communicating with friends or relatives elsewhere, running system checks. But when Opal gave the order, everything was dropped. A tangible pulse of power announced the coming online of an entire army's worth of reactors. And the mechs began to pace forward.
It took a few steps for them to settle into a rhythm, but they did it all right. For every pounding step of the super-heavies at the back, the lighter machines in front took two or three steps - but whenever those giant feet thudded into the ground, the army joined them in perfect synchronicity. The repetitive steps vibrated through the ground, shockwaves burrowing through strata of salt and back up. The top layer began to skitter, as if the landscape was shivering in fear at what was to come. And the earthquakes began. As if the army had managed to summon the earth's wrath, for miles around, slabs of salt cracked and split from one another, breaking up the smooth plain like a bulletholed window. In the city, soldiers and bureaucrats alike glanced down nervously as the ground shuddered - and didn't stop shuddering. Dust - brick and mortar dust - cascaded from the inner buildings, but the walls and the fortifications remained strong and solid.
Opal gave a signal, and the precisely programmed attack began. Specially-made drone missiles detached themselves from some of the largest machines and blasted towards the city. Automated anti-aircraft systems didn't detect them until it was too late. As they neared their target, the guts of each drone fell out, disgorging a huge shell which began a slow, fatal curve to impact on the fortified wall. At the same time, the metal skeleton that remained of each missile folded in on itself, becoming a tiny, darting attack device that punished the defenders with paired machine guns. By the time the soldiers had shot the drones down, another wave was on its way. Again the walls withstood the concussive blasts of the warheads; again more men died to the head-sized balls of metal spite that remained.
Suddenly, as if by magic, the flyers appeared. Having waited on-station some distance away, over twenty skimmers now blasted over the army's collective heads, their contrails dissecting the sky like prison bars. No two of them were alike in shape, design, colour or armament, but they flew as one, a wing of coordinated death. Smaller vapour trails stretched ahead of them as they released a synchronised salvo of missiles, the rockets homing in on nearby anti-aircraft guns. The nearest wall's firepower neutered, the defenders could only fire ineffective ground attack guns and watch hopelessly as the flyers made their attack. Laser beams and bullets flashed out, accompanied by air-bombs and more missiles, efficiently wrecking the wall-mounted ordnance and ensuring the army's survival en route to their target. Rather than flying over the city and risking anti-aircraft retaliation, they made an almost physics-defying turn and streaked back towards the army, their role played, for the moment at least...
*Stupid word filter...
Sol and Lunis hung high in the sky, as if watching with bated breath for the situation on the ground to explode. Beneath their seventy-plus-celsius gaze lay the vast expanse that was the Andromeda salt plain, a baking, wheel-swallowing sheet of compacted sodium chloride marred only by two things.
A city, or rather a great metal-walled fortress, stood solid and defiant amid the whiteness. Square and turreted, it bristled with defensive weapons and counterweapons. It was evidently made for one purpose and one purpose only; not mining, not reaping resources of any kind, but simple survival. It resembled the impenetrable hideout of a supervillain, which in fact it was, to an extent. Like many things, the evil quotient of its leader depended on perspective. This was the centre for a movement with many followers among the world's city-dwellers; one which aimed to restrict, administrate and control the mech-riders in the name of peace. The only problem was the uncooperation of the intended subjects...
Facing it was the all-destructive weapon. An army of a kind that never had and probably never would be seen again. Four hundred and seventy-four mechs stood in two blocks of perfectly measured ranks, an eclectically designed collection of heavily armed killing machines. With the smallest at the front and the largest at the rear, each and every pilot could see the unmoving city through their view-windows and optical displays. They had been there for over an hour so far, standing and waiting, safely outside the range of the defence weapons - as the deep craters in the salt plain a few hundred metres ahead attested. Silent, intimidating, the combined hum and throb of nearly five hundred reactors on standby was the only non-visual clue to their presence. That and the heat haze rippling from them, both from their idling engines and the sun steaming from upper armour plates and weapon barrels.
In the gap, and slightly ahead of the rest of their army, stood a machine that possessed an alien, terrible beauty. Black, with a subtle iridescence, its arms bore long, white, elegant cannons. A faint turquoise glow shone from vents and the cracks between armour panels. It was curved and segmented, almost insectoid but for its upright shape and all-too-human stance. A smooth head rose above it, almost featureless but for three bluegreen eyes. Over fifty feet tall and weighing some sixty tons, this was Opal, the world's most feared mech, and commander of an aggressive defence of the mech-riders' freedom to shoot at and steal from one another.
In their c#ckpits*, despite the intimidation Opal wanted (and was getting), most of the riders were otherwise engaged. Chatting, playing computer games on their mech's systems, meditating, praying, communicating with friends or relatives elsewhere, running system checks. But when Opal gave the order, everything was dropped. A tangible pulse of power announced the coming online of an entire army's worth of reactors. And the mechs began to pace forward.
It took a few steps for them to settle into a rhythm, but they did it all right. For every pounding step of the super-heavies at the back, the lighter machines in front took two or three steps - but whenever those giant feet thudded into the ground, the army joined them in perfect synchronicity. The repetitive steps vibrated through the ground, shockwaves burrowing through strata of salt and back up. The top layer began to skitter, as if the landscape was shivering in fear at what was to come. And the earthquakes began. As if the army had managed to summon the earth's wrath, for miles around, slabs of salt cracked and split from one another, breaking up the smooth plain like a bulletholed window. In the city, soldiers and bureaucrats alike glanced down nervously as the ground shuddered - and didn't stop shuddering. Dust - brick and mortar dust - cascaded from the inner buildings, but the walls and the fortifications remained strong and solid.
Opal gave a signal, and the precisely programmed attack began. Specially-made drone missiles detached themselves from some of the largest machines and blasted towards the city. Automated anti-aircraft systems didn't detect them until it was too late. As they neared their target, the guts of each drone fell out, disgorging a huge shell which began a slow, fatal curve to impact on the fortified wall. At the same time, the metal skeleton that remained of each missile folded in on itself, becoming a tiny, darting attack device that punished the defenders with paired machine guns. By the time the soldiers had shot the drones down, another wave was on its way. Again the walls withstood the concussive blasts of the warheads; again more men died to the head-sized balls of metal spite that remained.
Suddenly, as if by magic, the flyers appeared. Having waited on-station some distance away, over twenty skimmers now blasted over the army's collective heads, their contrails dissecting the sky like prison bars. No two of them were alike in shape, design, colour or armament, but they flew as one, a wing of coordinated death. Smaller vapour trails stretched ahead of them as they released a synchronised salvo of missiles, the rockets homing in on nearby anti-aircraft guns. The nearest wall's firepower neutered, the defenders could only fire ineffective ground attack guns and watch hopelessly as the flyers made their attack. Laser beams and bullets flashed out, accompanied by air-bombs and more missiles, efficiently wrecking the wall-mounted ordnance and ensuring the army's survival en route to their target. Rather than flying over the city and risking anti-aircraft retaliation, they made an almost physics-defying turn and streaked back towards the army, their role played, for the moment at least...
*Stupid word filter...