Invasion полностью

The tank charged forward, gunning its engine, every member of the crew knowing that the next second could be his last. There was no way of knowing just how badly the alien orbital bombardment system had been damaged, or even, really, just how it worked. The observatories swore that they’d seen the projectiles launched from the parasite ships and guided in by the orbital radar system, but how could they know for sure? The weapons weren't perfectly accurate, but given how much power even a single KEW possessed, they didn’t have to be perfect. They just had to come down within a few meters of the tanks to destroy them.

But there was no choice. The aliens had massed a few kilometres to the south and the three-prong human force had to break through and destroy their base, and their armoured forces. If they could be destroyed, they could use infantry to continue the assault when dawn rose and the aliens got back into position, but if not…they would probably lose the war. Captain Jim McCoy peered nervously through his sensors, probing the darkness for the first signs of the alien tanks, and waited. It wouldn’t be long before they had what they’d been longing for all along; a direct clash with the alien armour, without their orbital weapons. His tank, Heavy Messing, had been lucky to survive so far, but now…

“There,” he snapped, as the first shape appeared. It was an ominous shape, even though part of him admired the design, and the flexibility it gave the alien leaders. The Americans had knocked down bridges across Texas, but the aliens had just crossed the rivers like hovercraft, which he supposed they were. They were very suitable for intimidating civilians, but against American tanks…they were about to get a surprise. “Load antitank, prepare to fire!”

“Loaded, sir,” the gunner said. The laser targeting system had the enemy tank perfectly targeted. The alien driver was bringing has vehicle around with terrifying speed, far faster than his tank could move, but it wouldn’t save them. “Ready to fire…”

“Fire,” McCoy barked. The tank shook as it fired the shell towards the alien vehicle. A moment later, they were rewarded by a billowing fireball consuming the alien craft and it’s crew. A second alien tank appeared, and then a third, turning to face the Americans. The other tanks in the force were firing now, as well, with the aliens caught out of place. The aliens lost seven tanks before the remainder could start to return fire…

But when they did, it was effective. McCoy had taken part in the invasion of Iraq and he’d come face to face with a group of Iraqi tanks that should have made mincemeat of his entire force, but instead their shells had bounced off the Abrams, while they themselves were ripped apart by the American vehicles. The aliens, on the other hand, were quite capable of destroying the American tanks and when they hit, they destroyed. Losses, now, were going to be about even.

God bless the infantry, he thought, as they engaged the alien tanks with Javelins. The aliens had to know that they’d been caught out of place and that retreat would be the best option, but the tankers had been warned not to allow a single vehicle to survive, if they had a choice. The higher-ups believed that the aliens had no way of getting a resupply from their homeworld, wherever the hell it was, and any destroyed vehicle, they lost permanently. One by one, the alien craft were destroyed and he drove forward, onto what had once been a training camp for scouts or something. A hail of high-explosive shells finished off the remains of the alien positions, leaving the entire camp in flaming ruins…

“Call in,” he ordered. They couldn’t use their radios, but now they’d managed to get a new network of field telephones set up, they could communicate with HQ. “Tell them that…”

Something moved across the sky. He had barely a second to realise what it was before the KEW came down a bare meter from Heavy Messing. There was nothing left of the tank, or of its crew.

“They’re getting slaughtered out there,” the aide said, in growing dismay. The first parts of the assault had worked so well, but now…now, the aliens were counter-attacking and they’d moved up more orbital bombardment platforms. The passive sensors, tuned to detect alien radar sweeps, were warning that they were deploying more space-based radars…and, in slow inevitable motion, the armoured forces were being destroyed. “Sir…”

General Ridgley closed his eyes. “Call them off,” he ordered, and knew that the aliens wouldn’t let it go. They’d known more about their operations than he’d realised; they’d picked off, almost casually, several bases they weren't supposed to know about, including the dummy ones. They hadn’t used dummy weapons either. “Call them all off and terminate the offensive.”