War Core, Chapter 29.

Chapter 29.

Hugh had a good understanding of tactics based on his previous Army work, but things with these infantry mechs and combat pods ran a bit differently than live troops did. Captain Tran had Hugh ran through several scenarios, learning what to do with his troops in various terrain and how to counter the mechs of known adversaries. Ambush, advance to contact, static defense, and others were all covered.

Some of the basic concepts had remained the same, such as the difference between cover and concealment. The strange weapons their forces used also required a bit of different thinking when planning a battle. Unlike conventional human weapons, the plasma-based firepower the GCA used meant that even a lowly infantry mech with a rifle could eventually destroy the biggest, meanest mech out there. Combined arms was still key to victory and building a balanced force that could handle a variety of situations was the goal.

They worked out some scenarios and gamed some different battles with all the various military advisors, each one giving him more insight into fielding and fighting a cohesive force. His core allowed for preset groupings to be made. After some tinkering around, Hugh settled on a standard buildout for his infantry forces. Similar conversations were had with the armor and air elements. Admiral Nix was helpful with naval and space warfare, which resembled naval warfare to a large degree, but the battles involving those forces didn’t lend themselves well to cookie cutter builds. When he thought the had the right mix down, Hugh pulled everyone back into the conference room.

“Here’s what I came up with, any objections?” Hugh said, pulling up his display.

Infantry Unit Structure.

Squad. Infantry squads will consist of ten infantry mechs.

Platoon. A platoon consists of four infantry squads supported by a pair of weapons teams when available.

Company. A company consists of four platoons supported by five weapons teams.

Light, Medium, and Heavy Mech Unit Structure.

Platoon. A platoon consists of four mechs.

Company. A company of mechs will consist of four platoons.

Air Mech Unit Structure.

Flight. A flight will consist of four aircraft.

Squadron. A squadron consist of four flights.

“That’s a good framework, we can scale up into larger formations when needed, but for now, based on your typical battles, this should help to keep things organized for you,” Admiral Nix said.

Hugh found he was able to preload these formation sizes into his core, allowing him to order the construction of an entire formation instead of just queuing up individual mechs. He could also set his build priorities to automatically create replacements for active units. While he would want to tinker around a bit in the field, this would make things easier when fighting in larger conflicts.

“Are you guys done with Hugh yet, it’s my turn to fill his mind with stuff,” Maddison said. She had waited impatiently as Hugh went through the training cycles with the other advisors.

“He’s all yours Maddison,” Admiral Nix said. The others left the conference room leaving Hugh alone with his game advisor.

“So, you weren’t a big gamer I take it?” Maddison asked.

“No, I mean, I did play some video games, but wasn’t all that into them,” Hugh admitted. They had already covered this ground before; Maddison knew he wasn’t familiar with the real time strategy games that the battles of a War Core seemed to function like.

“Yeah, we’ll start with some of the easy stuff,” Maddison advised. It wasn’t too easy for Hugh, she pulled up videos of various game competitions, showing him how several tactics worked.

Many of the tactics wouldn’t directly port over to what he was doing, given his units were controlled by real soldiers and his actions per minute didn’t matter since he didn’t need to directly control each unit. There were some easy enough tactics for him to incorporate, like when he rushed the enemy base with large numbers of cheap units early in the fight. There were also options that wouldn’t work because of the way battles took place, like a turret rush type thing where you build defensive turrets near the enemy base to close him off. Hugh had a pair of defense turrets he had purchased on leave, but once those were used up, he couldn’t build more, at least not yet.

There were several methods of harassment that might work, a focus on getting some early units to attack the enemy’s unprotected workers. The downsides to many of these tactics were too big for Hugh to ignore. Most of the ones Maddison told him about led to an early victory or a quick defeat. He would rely on tried-and-true methods of battle, but let Maddison know that he wasn’t afraid to try something out of left field if it might earn them a victory. With lost battles meaning dead soldiers, Hugh wanted to be wise in his choices.

“So, any questions?” Maddison asked, the young girl yawning. A quick check of the clock showed already past midnight. Hugh didn’t get tired but had to remind himself that the humans around him still did.

“Just one, how did you get roped into this? Everyone else is military, so just how did they find and recruit you?” Hugh asked.

“Heh, they got me during a tournament. It seems the military keeps tabs on several RTS tournaments, and they happened across the channel where I discuss game tactics. The government guys gave me an offer I couldn’t say no to. I help them out and after my two-year tour is done, they pay off my student loans, and pay me an annual consulting fee,” Maddison replied.

“Aren’t they going to wipe your memory when they’re done? How do they go about paying for all that stuff when you won’t remember what happened?” Hugh asked.

“They don’t just wipe your memory, they replace it. I’ll remember the last two years as a job helping the Army develop new wargaming opportunities. I’ve always been kind of a loner so other than the few fans of my channel; nobody will notice I’ve been gone,” Maddison said. Hugh could detect something in her demeanor, a sadness lurked just below the surface of this kid.

“I hope they do right by you,” Hugh said, not sure how to respond.

“They’ll do what they agreed to. I may not remember, but at least I’m not stuck in a box like you are,” Maddison said. Her expression changed from one of sadness to one of worry, likely thinking she had offended him in some way.

“I think you’re right, you know, about what you said earlier. This is likely all a big game for the GCA. Just look at the RTS games you showed me, and how similar some of those are to the battles I fight. The limited battlefield space and the strange parameters for each fight make me think we’re doing this not to settle differences, but for someone else’s amusement,” Hugh said.

“Bingo, Hugh, you’re catching on,” Maddison said, giving him a thumbs up.

“Don’t count me out yet, I’m going to beat this thing, but to do so, I’ll need your help and advice. Now, before you dig back into gaming tactics, go get some sleep. We can finish up tomorrow,” Hugh said.

“Sure, thanks Hugh, I hope you do beat this game somehow,”

Hugh watched her leave, realizing that there weren’t any of his advisors still around. They had been going at it all day and late into the night. Hugh didn’t quite know what to do with himself. He worked for a while, reviewing footage of his previous battles as well as some of the gaming information that Maddison had shown him. He also tweaked some of his unit builds, preselecting several different ones that he could fit into various scenarios. The work he had done with the advisors helping to fine tune his choices. The base got quiet at this time of the night, but there was always some activity. A soldier along with one of the technicians was working on a combat pod, drawing Hugh’s attention to their task.

“Hey, it’s late, don’t you need to get some rest? What if a new fight starts tomorrow,” the tech said to the soldier, the man not at all interested in doing whatever the soldier was trying to get him to accomplish.

“No way, Admiral Nix says that this war core looks like he’s going to stick around a while. Because there’s not going to be much changeover, we can all get a specific combat pod assigned to us. I want this one, and I want everyone to know it’s mine,” the soldier said. With a sigh the technician got back to work. Hugh could see the tech was securing a name tape along with a unit patch.

Corporal Duncan Blix, 1st Armored Division, Old Ironsides.

Combat pod z144, Thunder Chucker

“Nice, thanks dude, I’m totally going to get some nose art for my pod painted up, like the Air Force guys like to do on their planes. I’m thinking a picture of a totally ripped Zeus throwing a lightning bolt,” the soldier said.

“That would be pretty cool. Specialist Martin is a pretty good artist, you should see if she can paint it for you,” the tech replied. The pair finished up and left the combat pod area, working out the details. So, based on what he had overheard, the admiral figured he would stick around for a while. It was a vote of confidence he sorely needed. Hugh had resisted the urge to talk to the soldiers working on the pod, not sure if he would freak them out and not quite sure if he wanted to get too close to any of them. Inevitably, not matter how good he was, some of them wouldn’t make it, and becoming close friends would make that loss even worse.

The Krixnas have initiated hostilities on system es1423. Pre-battle negotiations will begin in thirty minutes.

The prompt flashed into view, startling Hugh. It had happened, the Krixnas were invading another system. Pulling up his star chart, Hugh could see the system was directly next to the previous one they had tried to invade. It didn’t hold anything critical like a habitable planet, but like every other system, the path it was on eventually would lead to earth.

All command staff report to the briefing room.

The announcement sounded out over the base speakers. Someone besides himself had gotten the message. So at least Hugh didn’t have to try and hunt anyone down. Within five minutes, everyone had assembled, most looking like they had just rolled out of bed. Hugh could also make out activity near the main barracks, the officers there rousing their troops in case they were immediately needed for the fight.

“Are you with us Hugh?” The admiral asked.

“Yes, sir, I’m here. Is there any additional information you can give me?” Hugh asked.

“No, nothing new. Intel is still doing a workup on the Krixnas, trying to put together some cultural information and a psych profile on how they operate,” the admiral said.

“Can they do that?” Hugh asked, not sure how the intel section would figure out cultural information based on a few battles.

“The war core isn’t the only one connected to the GCA. Civilian leadership gets some interaction and when we win battles, they can even earn rewards. Some of our biggest tech leaps have been due to those rewards. They call the rewards influence points, and the leaders of our world can spend in on various things. One of those things we can purchase happens to be intel directly from the GCA. It’s not cheap, so they weren’t going to use it until they were sure you were totally committed to the fight,” the admiral advised.

“Do we really need to spend points on Krixnas intel? I mean, can’t we save them up and like find a cure for cancer or something?” Hugh asked. Sure, he would love any advantage he could get over the foe but being able to buy tech upgrades for earth was huge.

“No, stuff like intelligence on another race, or recon information on other sectors of space are easy enough to get. Other things, like the tech advancements are a bit of a crap shoot. You can only purchase a ransom advancement and never know for sure what you’re going to get. I could be that cure for cancer you mentioned, or something minor like a better syringe design. It’s a gamble, but the leadership still sees a need to dump influence into purchasing tech rewards when they get the chance,” the admiral said.

“Fine, none of that helps us with the coming fight. Any thoughts on what we should do?” Hugh asked.

“We’ve done what we can, there’s not much we can do until you see the battlefield type and parameters. By then, it’ll be too late for us to give input,” Maddison replied.

“You’ve done a lot of work in a short time, Hugh, the training and organization we’ve developed over the last few days should give you an edge in the coming fight,” the admiral said. Hugh could tell they were all wracking their brains to come up with some sage like advice to give him. Their time to help was over. They had given him the basic tools he needed to fight more effectively, now it was up to him to execute. Earth needed another win, and Hugh was determined to get it.

The Krixnas invasion of system es1423 is initiated.