From cannon fodder to sweeping across thousands of stars.

Chapter 434: Attack and Defense of A.Bawa.Ku Fortress (Part )

The two fully-equipped federal naval fleets are indeed a rather troublesome existence for Atlas's outer space defense force at the moment.

Although Atlas's defense forces were much superior in quality and overall combat effectiveness to the combined fleet of the military-industrial complex, they were still no match for the enemy's excessively large number of ships.

Just like the classic story of "more than 50,000 pigs", such a large number of enemy troops cannot be dealt with in a short period of time even if they are being used as targets.

Therefore, after the two federal fleets entered the battlefield, Atlas was unable to spare any extra forces to fight. The small number of fortress garrison fleets could only maneuver near the fortress, relying on the fortress's own defensive weapons to intercept the assault of the federal navy fleet.

But this level of defense could not stop the offensive of the two fleets, and they soon broke into the 3000-kilometer red line zone.

Immediately, the 23rd and 24th fleets released a large number of ship-borne HCPs and swooped down on the fortress, followed by more than 600 assault boats full of marines. Dr. Mephisto and the special task force were also on one of the landing craft.

Guterres in the core command room saw this scene and immediately realized that he might not be able to stop it. He immediately asked other Atlas employees around him: "Where is the 'decomposition ray' just now? Can it be fired again?!"

"The mining operations department replied that they had just completed the self-test and are now restarting the charging process. The full-power irradiation just now used up all the energy stored in the device, so it is expected to take at least another hour and a half."

"No, it's too late"

Guterres tightly gripped the handrail in front of him. On the battlefield monitoring screens on several large screens in front of him, the fortress defense firepower and the garrison fleet were now switching fire in accordance with his previous instructions.

However, the morale, organization and fighting spirit of the ship-borne HCP released by the Federation Fleet are obviously not comparable to the "private soldiers" of the military-industrial complex.

Moreover, the opponent's HCP combat commander was obviously very clear about the goal of this mission and the positioning of the HCP combat force in this mission.

Therefore, most of the ship-borne HCPs attacked with heavy laminated armor shields, and formed a large number of "meat shields" in a dense formation of multiple people, taking a large number of attacks and allowing the assault boats in the rear to hide behind them and approach the fortress safely.

"Van Fleet, I may not be able to stop the federal assault force from landing by force. You need to be prepared."

"Humph, I knew you were unreliable. The internal defense forces of the fortress are ready, but the problem now is that the defense area we need to deal with is too large, and we may not have enough manpower."

Under Osana's guidance, Van Fleet, wearing the 'Crazy Crocodile A3-C' command-specific heavy power armor, responded while checking the electromagnetic machine gun in his hand.

"Moreover, the intensity of the firefight inside the fortress is strictly limited. I don't know what the federal assault force is planning, but we definitely don't want the fortress to be blown up during the battle."

"What are you going to do?"

"I have just discussed this with the commander of the fortress defense force."

Van Vliet glanced at Osana, who was holding a heavy shield and a plasma halberd not far away. The latter was checking the defense equipment in the area at a terminal.

"We are going to drain the air from all areas of the fortress except the living area and the core control area, and inject inert gas and anaerobic molecules to minimize the effectiveness of the weapon oxidizer. At the same time, we will shut down the gravity control units in these areas to slow down the attack speed of the federal assault force until the next attack of the fortress's main weapon."

At this point, Van Fleet reacted and asked another question: "How long will it take for the fortress's main weapon to launch its next round of attack?"

“At least an hour and a half”

"Fuck, why is it taking so long?!"

Van Vleet was stunned for a moment. Obviously, this time exceeded his previous expectations, but he quickly calmed down and finally said:
"One and a half hours is fine. Anyway, we will do our best to stop the attack of the Federation assault force. I believe that the Federation will not let these two newly formed fleets be lost here, so as long as the threat or casualties exceed the threshold, these two fleets will definitely withdraw."

"I think so too"

Guterres looked at Van Fleet on the communication interface with deep emotion in his heart. Ever since the conflict on Pella IV ended, he never thought that he would fight alongside Van Fleet again.

And under the 'flag' of Atlas
"Good luck, Admiral."

"You too, don't die."
-
"Approaching the target fortress! Distance 1100, all troops maintain formation!"

In the dim crew cabin of the assault boat, Dr. Mephisto, who was wearing a full combat exoskeleton like the people around him, suppressed the fear in his heart and the physical nausea as the assault boat kept making irregular maneuvers during the breakthrough.

After the combat exoskeleton detected that various indicators of his body were somewhat beyond the standard values, it automatically released some stabilizing gas through the oxygen supply unit - this is also a release method used in special circumstances. If it was on stable ground, it would be a more efficient and quick intramuscular injection.

The other people in the crew cabin, including the Marine Special Tasks Team, felt that Dr. Mephisto's personal participation in the assault was a bit of a "burden", but they still admired the fact that he dared to do such a thing.

So after the captain noticed that Dr. Mephisto was a little nervous through the command interface, he took the initiative to comfort him:

"Doctor, don't worry! Just hold on a little longer, we will reach the fortress soon! Our assault force has obviously exceeded the enemy's defensive firepower threshold, so there is no need to worry about being intercepted."

However, before the captain could finish his words of comfort, the assault boat suddenly made a swift evasive maneuver, and the voice of the assault boat driver was heard over the cabin broadcast.

"Ladies and gentlemen, this flight is about to reach its destination, but unfortunately some 'guests' have come to visit us, so there will be some turbulence during the final stage of the breakthrough, please pay attention to it~"

"grass"

"Captain, your bad words have come true so many times. Please don't say them again next time. Thank you!"

"That's right. If you hadn't said it just now, I might have already made a breakthrough."

The team members were complaining to each other, and there was no sign of nervousness in their laughter.

The effect of Dr. Mephisto's sedative gas and the Marines' relaxed words also slightly alleviated some of the tension and fear.

He turned his head to look at the two seats at the end of the crew cabin. The passengers in these two seats did not say a word from beginning to end, just like two dummies, but Dr. Mephisto knew that they were actually two psychic agents specially transferred to participate in the assault operation.

At the same time, the entire assault boat made a large evasive maneuver. Under the violent shaking and the sudden increase in G-force, Dr. Mephisto looked at the panoramic display in front of the crew cabin with some difficulty. It was playing the real-time image of the optical sensor in the front of the assault boat. At this moment, even he could clearly see a large number of light spots flying out of the A-Bava-Ku Fortress on the screen - those were the HCP troops coming for the terminal interception.

At the same time, the voice of the captain of the HCP squadron responsible for covering them was heard in the assault boat driver's headset.

"I will lead the others to find a way to hold back these enemies, and you guys will rush over when you get the chance."

As soon as the squadron leader finished speaking, everyone in the assault boat saw at the same time that the HCPs in front of them, who were acting as "meat shields", fired a volley of shots, and then they used almost all of their long-range weapons.

While opening a passage for the assault boats through long-range attacks, these HCPs quickly dispersed and collectively removed the heavy swords mounted on their backs.

"321! Now! Go over there quickly!"

Amid the squadron leader's roar, he, as the leader of the entire squadron, took the lead and rushed towards the approaching Atlas HCP in the blue light bursting from the back propulsion array.

The other HCPs in the squadron also accelerated forward and quickly engaged in a fight with the Atlas HCPs that came to intercept them.

The remaining assault boats did not dare to delay at this time. Under the exquisite control of the assault boat drivers, they smoothly broke through the area where the melee quickly broke out and made a final sprint towards the A.Bava.Ku asteroid fortress in front of them.

"Rush into the target in ten seconds! Everyone prepare for impact!"

While alerting the Marines, the assault boat driver also simultaneously turned on the assault boat's reverse thrust unit to begin slowing down, and activated the twin-mounted melta ray components at the front of the assault boat.

Nine seconds later, two blazing dark red rays shot out from the front of the assault boat. After hitting the external hatch of a deployment bay that was targeted, they quickly melted and pierced through it, and then successfully crashed the assault boat carrying the 'VIP' into the deployment bay.

The Marine special task force that escorted Dr. Mephisto and other technicians had a total strength of about one company, or 1 people in total, including Dr. Mephisto and others, scattered across six assault boats.

In the end, only four assault boats crashed into the deployment bay. The other two were attacked by the automatic defense weapons outside the A.Bava.Ku fortress at the last moment. They lost balance and rolled over, crashing directly into the external rock wall, killing all the crew members.

The four assault boats that successfully broke in, when they crashed into the deployment bay, the explosive shotgun shells arranged in a circle around the bow of the boats exploded, turning everything around them, including the walls, into sieves.

Immediately afterwards, a large number of anti-infrared thermal smoke bombs were fired, which quickly formed a wall of smoke in front of the assault boat and eventually became one.

After completing these steps, the perception unit sent out several consecutive pulse waves for detection and quickly synchronized the results to the Marines' combat terminals.

At the same time, several carbon fiber cables were shot out and used rocket-assisted drills to drive into the surrounding bulkheads, securing the assault boat in a zero-gravity environment.

"Remember the intrusion process. Find a good cover and determine the enemy's position before opening fire. Move quickly. We Marines are not paid by the hour. Just follow behind us and hide yourself."

The team leader was still making final arrangements, but the sudden attack interrupted him again.

"Bang bang bang bang!"

A large number of high-speed piercing rods hit the sturdy front structure of the assault boat. These parts that were specially used as "hammer heads" were naturally not so easy to be penetrated by electromagnetic rifles, so the commandos were not in a hurry to get out.

The assault boat once again ejected several tire-sized disposable deflection force field generators, and fixed them to the ground of the deployment bay with the help of electromagnetic adsorption devices, and then quickly erected several deflection force fields in front of the assault boat.

At this time, the Marine Corps special task force activated the electromagnetic adsorption device on the soles of their feet and rushed out of the open hatch one after another.

"Each squad is deployed in a 'V' formation, and keeps moving along axis 664!

Tech Sergeant! Turn on the motion detector and mark the enemy's approximate location!
The fire team is ready to conduct counter-suppression based on directional feedback!

Everyone, pay attention to setting the communication gain and filtering the RF environment. The electronic warfare team begins to try electronic interference! "

Deep in the deployment bay, in a position obscured by smoke, orange-red lines of fire continued to sweep out through the smoke, but the deflection force field that was propped up twisted away most of the electromagnetic rifle firing rods, and several charged particle beams were also intercepted and split.

However, this disposable equipment without continuous power supply obviously could not last for too long. After only 1 minute, these disposable deflection force field generators stopped working one after another.

However, at this time, the commandos who had entered the deployment bay had also found their own cover and began to counterattack in the direction marked by the technical sergeant.

The members of the commando's fire group were all equipped with heavy power armor. They would stick half of their bodies out from behind the bunkers, and then control the 25mm chain guns and cruise missile launchers mounted on their shoulders to begin suppressing fire in the direction of the enemy.

In a zero-gravity environment where indirect fire such as mortars cannot be used, ballistic, directed energy and weapons with built-in propulsion become the only options left.

Using 25mm programmed high-explosive bombs, "fireworks" were quickly set off in the direction of the shooting, and several cruise missiles crashed into it after barely adjusting the angle - in a zero-gravity environment, the individual cruise missiles lacked vector nozzles and mainly relied on pneumatic control surfaces to control their posture, so they seemed a bit clumsy in control.

However, the team members who were carrying out fire suppression soon discovered that no matter whether it was the high-explosive warhead or the cruise missile, the final attack effect seemed a little "not powerful" enough, just like a punch that ran out of power halfway through.

"Captain, the enemy has filled this area with a large amount of inert gas and anaerobic molecules. The explosion effect is a bit limited. We may only be able to rely on pure kinetic energy attacks."

As the leader of the firepower team spoke, he directed his men to replace the chain gun's ammunition belt with PELE bullets (PELE bullets) and then started shooting again.

However, this time, the Atlas defense force also responded with a counterattack. As the anti-infrared thermal smoke slowly dissipated in the zero-gravity environment, several high-energy lasers immediately swept in the direction of the commandos.

No matter whether it was the different team members or the firepower team equipped with heavy power armor, after seeing the colors of these high-energy lasers, they knew that they could not withstand this thing head-on, and immediately gave up the attack and hid in the bunker.

But there were still a few unlucky guys and team members who were slow to react and were cut in two by the high-energy laser.

Seeing that the commando team was suppressed here, the captain looked anxiously at the rear of the assault boat and shouted in the communication channel:
"Damn it! Isn't the Wolfhound ready yet?! If you don't come over, you'll have to wait for us to collect your body!"

"Here they come! Prepare for a coordinated attack!"

(End of this chapter)