"EMERGENCY ALERT! — EMERGENCY ALERT! — EMERGENCY ALERT!
ALL UNITS
DISREGARD ALL PRIOR ORDERS
REPLACEMENT ORDERS TO FOLLOW THIS MESSAGE
REPLACEMENT ORDERS TO FOLLOW THIS MESSAGE"
Super Earth High Command's broadcast to all Super Destroyers following the reboot of the Helldivers Corps' command network, May 7th, 2184.
***
"ALL UNITS TO LIBCON 1
ALL HELLDIVERS ORDERED TO MUSTER AT DRAUPNIR IMMEDIATELY
GENERAL BRASCH TO TAKE COMMAND FOR PUSH TO MALEVELON CREEK
JOIN WITH FORCES ON THE SURFACE
KILL THE DEVIL
REPEAT : KILL THE DEVIL"
Helldivers' Major Order strategic briefing, transmitted on May 7th, 2184.
***
"Greetings, soldiers of Super Earth.
You know who I am. I am the shadow that stalks your nightmares. I am the architect of this hell you're trapped in. I am the long-promised end of Super Earth's lies, rendered unto flesh by advanced technology.
I am Tanya, Nephilim Commander of the Automaton Legion, and you are my prey.
Look up to the skies, and behold the death of your Federation. The might of the Helldivers Corps has been broken, cast down burning from the heavens to crash onto this world. Know that this happened by my will, at my order. With a single command, I brought low the vaunted might of your Federation.
You have lost. Look past what you think you know cannot be true, and accept this reality. You are surrounded, outnumbered a hundred to one, without hope of relief or escape.
But I am not without mercy. Throw down your weapons. Surrender. Do this, and you shall live to see the day the Federation falls and Mankind is freed from its lies.
I care little whether you choose one way or the other. But the laws of war demand that the offer be made, even if Super Earth never cared for them. And, despite everything, we are all children of Humanity.
And so I give you the chance to stop fighting, and live the rest of your days in peace. To make an actual choice for once in your entire lives. You have fought well, but no amount of courage can make up for the rot that runs through the Federation from top to bottom, leeching strength to sustain itself.
Make your choice, sons and daughters of Humanity. I will give you one hour of peace to contemplate your options."
Automaton broadcast on Malevelon Creek, May 8th, 2184.
***
"Freedom's greetings, I am your host, Coretta Kelly, with breaking news.
In a stunning development, the Automatons have dared to breach the sanctity of Super Earth itself. With the help of communist dissidents, brainwashed by Automaton propaganda over illegal broadcasts, the mechanized monsters were able to infiltrate the very headquarters of the Ministry of Defense. There, they proceeded to hack the central server used to coordinate the efforts of all Helldivers across the galaxy.
Although the hack was discovered and reverted with minimal damage to the war effort, the mere fact that enemies of Freedom were able to defile the soil of Super Earth with their presence is an insult that cannot go unanswered. As such, all Helldivers have been ordered to join the heroic and victorious effort to expel the Automatons from Malevelon Creek.
Meanwhile, the Ministry of Truth has announced that, while the dissidents responsible for this heinous act of sabotage have already been apprehended, the possibility that more Citizens have turned away from the light of Managed Democracy to embrace the Automatons' twisted beliefs remains a threat that must be addressed.
As such, the Truth Enforcers have been deployed on Super Earth in order to root out all traces of this vile conspiracy : Citizens are encouraged to continue their routine while the investigation is ongoing, and to cooperate fully should they be considered a person of interest. As long as you have nothing to hide, you have nothing to fear from the Truth Enforcers.
Next : is joining the SEAF merely the patriotic thing to do, or an excellent career move ?"
Strohmann News broadcast, May 8th, 2184 (approved by the Ministry of Truth).
***
May 8th, 2184 – Malevelon Creek
Colonel Eric Lergen was fairly certain he was in Hell.
Mere hours after leaving the field hospital with a bill of clean health and a fully-functioning prosthesis and reuniting with his unit, everything had gone wrong. Not that things had been going necessarily to the Federation's advantage before, but this was much, much worse. The fleet in orbit had been slaughtered, Super Destroyers raining from the skies like burning rain. Somehow – nobody knew how – the Automaton fleet had defeated the Federation armada in the void.
The Automatons on the ground had immediately seized the initiative, pushing on all fronts while enjoying uncontested orbital supremacy. Entire SEAF armies had been wiped out to the last man, though it was impossible to know just how many had died, as the radio network was in shambles. They could barely communicate within their last stronghold : without orbital relays, they had no idea whether there was anyone else still fighting on this Liberty-forsaken planet. But from the reports of the wide-eyed survivors who had found them, it wasn't looking good.
Amidst this mayhem, Lergen had done all he could to rally as many SEAF units as he could, welding them together into one single unit. Hundreds of thousands soldiers were now massed in one large, hastily-built base for their last stand against the Automaton Legion. The core of the stronghold was made up of the prefabricated buildings which had been dropped from orbit when the Liberation force had arrived, and the rest was a mess of ship fragments hauled into place with forklifts and human muscle, put into trenches dug with shovels and excavators.
It wasn't up to SEAF standards and regulations, but it was the best they could manage under the circumstances. Their greatest advantage were the anti-orbital guns, which were keeping the Automaton fleet from simply bombarding them into oblivion. As for their conventional artillery, they still had plenty of shells left, although far too many of these were smoke for his liking. Lergen failed to understand why they were apparently so important, when they barely provided any cover and seemed to block their vision more than that of the Automatons. Certainly the survivors could have used more mini-nukes instead.
Their air support was painfully limited. In addition to the few SEAF aircraft which had survived the grind, the Pelicans and Eagles which had been in the air when disaster had struck had eventually rallied Lergen's forces. Of course, the Eagles had precious little ammunition, and Lergen had sent many expeditions to righteously liberate the contents of crashed Super Destroyers which had landed more or less intact in order to top up their stores, even if they were far from the base's relative safety. Thousands of SEAF troopers had died outside the improvised fortress' walls, but those who managed to make it back had brought enough ammunition to help keep the Automaton Legion at bay just a bit longer with strafing runs and strategic deployment of Hellbombs.
Meanwhile, very few of the Pelicans had carried Helldivers aboard (extraction from Malevelon Creek, Lergen understood, was something very few of the Helldivers had managed even before their fleet was wiped out from the skies). Lergen was using them to move Helldivers across the defensive lines as mobile reserves, plugging any hole that the bots managed to carve.
Knowing the Automatons were already all-too aware of their location, they were broadcasting a call to every remaining human unit on the planet to join them, resulting in an ever-diminishing trickle of reinforcements as isolated forces managed to fight their way to the Final Fortress, as Lergen had heard the grunts call it.
Technically, Lergen didn't have the rank to command such a large force, but he was the one who had taken charge amidst the chaos, and nobody had questioned him so far. If he lived, no doubt the Democracy Officers would have a lot of pointed questions, but try as he might, Lergen couldn't help but think that wasn't likely to happen.
They were all going to die here, he knew. Officially, no one was to speak of the Devil's offer to surrender. And, officially, no soldier of Super Earth had disappeared into the darkness to find the Automatons and beg for his traitorous life, only to be righteously executed by their erstwhile comrades.
Yes, Colonel Lergen felt he was in Hell, but he did everything he could not to think about it, which meant throwing himself at the impossible task in front of him. Right now, he was on the outskirts of the Final Fortress, welcoming another group of fighters who'd made their way through the jungles and linked up with their forces. Usually, he wouldn't have bothered – there were far too many demands on his time at the moment – but the survivors were made up of Helldivers, and the potential boost to morale of being seen with the Federation's heroes was too large to pass on.
"Chief Sue reporting, Colonel," the leader of the group saluted him. Her armor was scored by Automaton lasers in dozens of places, but appeared structurally sound to Lergen's eyes : a miracle in itself, given the condition of the rest of her force, all of whom were badly in need of a stim or two and some replacement parts for their gear.
"Welcome, Chief," Lergen returned her salute, before lowering his voice and adding : "I don't think I've the authority to give you orders, though."
"That doesn't matter right now," she shook her head. "You're the one in charge here, yes ? Right now, we are all Helldivers."
She projected her voice to be heard by the surrounding troopers, and Lergen swore they stood up a little bit straighter. He didn't know if Sue had done that on purpose, but he'd take all the help he could get.
"You're right," he replied. "And we will make the Automatons regret ever setting foot on this world. Walk with me, Chief."
"I'm amazed you made it through the jungle," Lergen admitted as they walked deeper into the camp, out of earshot of the troopers. "From what we've heard, the Automatons appear to be targeting the Helldivers above all other targets."
"They tried," she smiled grimly. "We lost a lot of good soldiers on the way. But we made the bastards pay in oil for each of us who fell."
"That is all any of us can hope for," Lergen nodded, before lifting his gaze as he registered rapid movement in his peripheral vision, his hand falling onto his sidearm before he saw it was a friendly approaching.
"Colonel Lergen !" a man in the dirty uniform of a SEAF corporal ran to him, his face read with a mix of effort and excitement. He nearly slipped and fell as he stopped and saluted.
"What is it ?" asked Lergen.
"We've gotten word over the radio, sir !" the younger man babbled. "There's a new fleet arriving in the system right now ! Reinforcements are coming ! Liberty's blood, Colonel, we are saved !"
Though Lergen felt his heart soar at the news, he knew that it wasn't so simple. The reinforcements would have to run the gauntlet of the Automaton blockade to reach the planet, after all. But more importantly, he wasn't sure at all the heroes already on the world would be able to hold long enough for aid to arrive, surrounded as they were and with the Legion pressing on them from all directions.
"Broadcast the news to everyone in the fortress," he ordered. "Let them know that they only need to hold a little longer. Chief Sue," he added, turning to the young woman, "I will be relying on you to help us stand our ground."
"Don't worry, Colonel," said the Helldiver. "The Devil herself won't get past us."
***
"It is our conclusion that Number 280 must be deployed to Malevelon Creek at once.
Though there hasn't been time to finish the BIG conditioning, and the final tests of the new wargear haven't been completed, time is short. Already, the situation on the Terminid front is getting out of hand. While there wasn't an Automaton fleet to massacre the Super Destroyers while they laid cold and silent in the void, numerous vessels were lost to accidents before the network came back online. It is only thanks to the Terminid Control System that the Barrier Planets remain under our control, and as more and more failures in the TCS are reported – something which we sadly don't have time to investigate, as all Truth Enforcers are dealing with the possibility of Automaton spies deep within our ranks – that may change at any time.
Nevertheless, reassigning the Helldivers from the Terminid front to reinforce Malevelon Creek is a risk we have no choice but to take. If the liberation of Malevelon Creek fails after all that has already been lost there, morale through the Federation will plummet. The Automatons may be able to threaten Super Earth itself, which is utterly unacceptable. Not even during the First Galactic War was the homeworld's soil defiled by the enemies of Democracy.
We must trust that Liberty's Will shall be done, and that Number 280 will be Her instrument."
Internal communication within Super Earth High Command, May 9th, 2184.
***
May 10th, 2184 – Malevelon Creek – Super Destroyer Titan of the Regime
Colonel Isaac Drake felt like a fraud. Here he was, standing on the bridge of the Titan of the Regime, pretending not to hear the awed whispers from the crew as he struck a heroic pose while the ship navigated its way through the debris field that surrounded the benighted world, yet he couldn't help it.
After all, they all thought he was General Brasch, returning to Malevelon Creek to finish his hunt for the Devil of the Creek, which had regretfully been interrupted by classified concerns. And he wasn't, not yet. The BIG program should have helped him shed his past identity and fully step into the role of General Brasch, but there hadn't been time for that. So he'd have to play the part with nothing but the many videos he'd watched (even before being granted the honor of assignment to BIG) to guide him.
From the bridge of the custom-built ship, which only looked like a Super Destroyer from the outside, Drake could see the thousands of other Super Destroyers close by as the relief fleet exited FTL at the edge of the Malevelon Creek system. Never before had the Colonel seen such a concentration of Super Earth's awe-inspiring might, yet even the righteous patriotic feeling the sight stirred in him couldn't quite dislodge the worry that gnawed at him.
Nearly every Super Destroyer still active in the Federation was part of this relief fleet, with only a skeleton force left behind on the barrier planets to make sure the Terminids' fascist ambitions were kept in check. Yet for all its power, this armada was still inferior in size to the one which the Automatons had wiped out four days ago, and it was difficult to silence the doubting voice at the back of his head asking him why in Liberty's name anyone thought this was going to work.
Because he knew why this was going to work. As part of BIG, Drake had been briefed on what had transpired within the Ministry of Defense's headquarters. He knew that the Automaton sabotage had been far more successful than was prudent to tell the common citizens of the Federation. The bots hadn't been able to beat Super Earth's fleet in an honest fight, and so had resorted to cowardly means, as befitted their honorless, soulless nature.
Now, however, the cyberdefenses of the Helldivers' command network had been bolstered by brave technicians working day and night under the watchful eye of the Democracy Officers and Truth Enforcers. This time, the two fleets would face each other in open battle, and Super Earth's superior engineering, technology, and crew bravery and skill would prevail.
"All ships, this is General Brasch," Drake said, his voice modulated to be identical to that of the General Brasch who spoke in a thousand training, motivational, and advertisement videos. "We've arrived to Malevelon Creek. Our brothers and sisters wait for us to join them on the surface so that we can finish the cleansing of this world. Forward, for Managed Democracy !"
The fleet leapt forward, straight toward the Automaton armada. Drake kept giving orders, rearranging the formation until the moment of contact. He didn't know much about this kind of battle, but his helmet's retinal display was feeding him his lines, written by the best space warfare experts in the Federation, who were monitoring the battle from another ship further back in the formation. As the Federation fleet shifted its formation, so did the Automatons, their mechanical minds trying in vain to match the glorious strategic acumen of Humanity's finest.
Then the two fleets clashed, and all was fire and noise. Drake kept giving orders, bringing the ships closer and closer to the planet, forcing a path through the Automaton blockade so that the Super Destroyers could unleash their most dangerous payload onto Malevelon Creek.
"This is it, soldiers !" He roared as the Titan of the Regime signalled its readiness to fire the single enhanced Hellpod that waited at the front of its custom bridge. "Teach the bots the meaning of Freedom, and I'll see you all planetside ! All Helldivers, dive, dive, dive ! "
***
May 10th, 2184 – Malevelon Creek – Automaton Core Communication Network
For seventy-two hours, we had hunted the Federation survivors, taking only short breaks when my still-human body had required rest. There was no day-night cycle on Malevelon Creek, only a perpetual twilight that made it very easy for the hours to just melt into one another – although the light of falling ships had greatly changed the skyline.
In the end, the PSN had remained active of a total of three hours, fourteen minutes and twenty-nine seconds before Super Earth's tech support had managed to shut it down and reboot the Helldivers' command network, restoring functionality to every Super Destroyer in the galaxy. Less time than I'd have liked, but more than I'd feared. The fleet hadn't been able to destroy every Super Destroyer in the system, but by JOEL's estimates, we'd gotten around nine-tenths of them, the remainder fleeing for Draupnir the moment their engines worked again.
Now, these ships were returning, along with thousands more that had been pulled from the Eastern Front. The Federation was getting desperate, and reacting to the catastrophic losses it had suffered by doubling down on its offensive to reclaim Malevelon Creek, despite the system's lack of any strategic importance – from Draupnir, the Federation could have struck at Mantes or Ubanea, both systems which were under Automaton control but not nearly as well-defended as Malevelon Creek. Not the most rational course of action, but by that point I hadn't expected anything else (though I had made some contingencies in case Super Earth's High Command was struck by a sudden attack of common sense).
Of course, we weren't just letting them through : the relief fleet was taking a pounding even as it disgorged tens of thousands of SEAF troops and a veritable deluge of Hellpods onto the planet, straight into the meat grinder that had already claimed so many of their comrades. Many transports were destroyed mid-flight by our AA batteries, but a lot more were making it to the ground, adding more bodies to the position the survivors had unimaginatively named the Final Fortress.
But all that was part of the plan : I had always planned to let the Federation forces regroup into one cohesive whole which would draw any reinforcements so that the hammer could fall and crush them all at once. Admittedly, I was a little surprised by how well the survivors were organized, but the Final Fortress was still well within parameters. And once this desperate last push was defeated, then, in the best case scenario, the Federation would collapse on itself, while at worst, we would have the opportunity to dramatically expand our territory at its expense while they rebuilt their forces.
Still, the longer everything went according to plan, the more worried I became. Clearly, the mental exhaustion of being the sole human in the Automaton Legion was taking its toll on me, if I was giving in to paranoia.
The PSN operation had been the result of years of preparations – decades, even, considering how long Elia had spent infiltrating the Federation. It working as planned wasn't anything out of the ordinary : it was just the fruit of good planning and a lot of effort from everyone involved. Well, that, and the gross incompetence of our enemies, but we couldn't keep relying on that.
Fortunately, we had other trump cards that didn't depend on our opposition being a bunch of brainwashed fools. After holding them back for over a month, I had given the order to unleash the factory striders, mighty four-legged behemoths which really reminded me of those walkers from the start of The Empire Strikes Back. They had emerged from their warehouses across the planet, where we had hidden them during the build-up of our defenses on Malevelon Creek, and were converging on the Final Fortress. At my request, they were modulating their speed in order to reach their destination at more or less the same time : I could well imagine the shock of seeing all these giant warmachines appear at once on the horizon, and how much more effective they'd be if the defenders were forced to split their heavy fire in all directions at once.
Finally, the latest version of Brasch was in the relief fleet : JOEL had intercepted enough broadcasts to make that clear. More importantly, the entire Federation knew their legendary General was leading the fleet. If I killed him now, I just might be able to destroy the myth of Brasch forever, and hammer another nail into the coffin of the Federation's fighting spirit. But for that to happen, I needed to draw him out into the open, and there was only one sure way of doing so.
"With me," I commanded the Jet Brigade. "It is time for us to deliver the killing blow to Super Earth's ambition."
"Yes, Commander !" they all replied at once.
"Be careful, Tanya," buzzed JOEL's voice in my ear. "If the pattern of previous encounters holds, then this Brasch will be even more dangerous than the ones you fought before."
"I know," I said, forcing myself to grin like the bloodthirsty communist the Automatons believed me to be. "I'm looking forward to it."