Hakon
Hakon ate his food in silence with the rest of the Retinue. It had been weeks since he had anything that tasted that good. Ready to eat meals had their place, and he liked most of the stock they kept on hand, but even he could have his fill of them.
The rebels had largely been defeated but there were still hit and run attacks from the hills. Hakon had to give the crazy bastards credit for at least their determination. The attacks on the small outposts of the divisions was their best hope against the deployed forces, but even that was a long shot which had ended in failure.
The division had suffered hundreds of casualties all over the planet in the first day of the attack. Hundreds of m members of the crew of the Space Dragon class carrier ‘Axetooth’. The massive warship in orbit of the world of Starcrown, and home to the division of more than thirteen thousands members of the Imperial Guard of Jom, and all members of the 113th Legion.
It still gave Hakon a sour taste in his mouth. Over three hundred casualties on that day when they were caught off guard. They had been fools. The only comfort he and others like him had found were the losses that they had inflicted on the rebels that day, and worse in the days and weeks after.
It had been estimated that more than thirty thousand rebels had been killed on the first day. That was almost half the population of the world. The ‘Axetooth’ had later learned that thousands of rebel troops had been shipped to the world months in advance. They had hidden in the mountains and caves across the world. Not even the locals knew of them if they were to be believed.
“You know,” Frea said as she ate her own hot food. “I still don’t understand.”
It had made no sense to Hakon either. Make no sense to anyone he had spoken to in the weeks since the attack. The ‘Axetooth’ had split from the Legion before they reached the world of Starcrown. The other three warships of the 113th Legion made for their own target worlds in the Gorbina Sector of Barta Space. ‘The Axetooth’ had deployed forces across Starcrown but remained in orbit since their arrival, and that alone should have deterred an attack from anyone with even half a brain cell.
“I don’t know, hopefully the intelligence that has been gathered will shed some light,” the retinue's First Companion said from his own seat next to them.
The rebels might have had the edge in numbers. They had more than four to five times the numbers of the division as a whole in that first attack. The ‘Axetooth’ might have fielded a full division of thirteen thousand, but most had remained on the ‘Axetooth’ in orbit.
“Maybe the rebels had relied on faulty intelligence,” Hakon countered between bites of food. He was as lost as anyone. “Maybe they thought that our regiment was all the ‘Axetooth’ could deploy and that it had withdrawn after the deployment?” he said but even he doubted that. Shuttles had been landing and supplying them since their arrival. Starfighters had provided air support and they had made no secret of them.
There was only a series of low grunts. “Possible, but doubt it,” Ragnor responded.
Their regiment was the lone combat battalion of ground forces and marines on the warship. Almost thirty five hundred troops deployed across the surface of the planet of more than seventy thousand people. The other three regiments of the division remained on ship. A regiment of starfighter pilots and their support staff patrolled the planet and system. The regiment of fleet personal and support staff kept the ‘Axetooth’ running and in combat shape while the last regiment was geared to support. Most of those had been deployed after the first attack.
Even if the ‘Axetooth’ had left orbit and abandoned them on Starcrown, Hakon still couldn’t understand the attack. The Furse had always held a commanding lead over the Bolgar worlds in regards to technology. Several bases had survived that day without a single attack, and their counter attacks had been quick and deadly against the lightly armed and armored rebels. The regiment had largely pushed the rebels back and regained lost outposts by the time the second regiment had been deployed from the ‘Axetooth’.
Sixty thousand rebels had tried to overwhelm them, and maybe that had been their goal. Hope to take prisoners and that the ‘Axetooth’ wouldn’t fire on their own. That they could take them all out at once, but if that had been their plan, it was badly attempted, and did not go well.
“I heard rumors that the rebels had ships. Maybe they thought there had been a fleet coming to rescue them?” Frea said and took another mouth full of food.
“The rebels couldn’t stand a chance against the Barta king’s royal guard, much less members of the Imperial Guard of Jom. Their tech is decades old compared to the rest of Bolgar Space. They just wished for death,” third Companion Bull said.
Hakon knew the technology gap in military equipment and gear played a large role in not just saving his life, but that of his brothers and sisters in the 113th legion. He also hoped that the other divisions of the Legion did not face their own attacks on their own target worlds.
The rebels on Starcrown had few means to take down a power armor clad warrior. Most deaths in the legion had happened in the opening attacks, but once their armor had been equipped, they had turned the battlefields red with blood. Fabian and Furse weapons had been found scattered with the rebels, much of it was outdated and their supplies of ammunition limited. After the first few days, the rebel forces which survived avoided direct battle with armored units which meant that they had avoided the Jom and targeted the local militia and civilians.
“I noticed a lack of food stock in the tunnels before we withdrew,” Thane Longreach told them. “People will do dumb shit once hunger sets in.”
Hakon didn’t know. Maybe they had run out of food, but maybe they just feared being caught, and thought that moment was their best chance. He didn’t know. What he did know is that the attacks were less often now. Hit and run attacks designed to keep them out of the very hills they had chased them to, and where they had learned they had been hiding for months.
The rebels were welcome to the hills and caves for all Hakon cared. There was little there, and what the rebels lacked in direct weapons, they made up for with ambushes, and traps. Several members had fallen to such attacks.
Both regiments were posted on the ground side now. Starfighter patrols cut into the atmosphere often and they rarely refused their power armor. Larger mechs and other gear had been transported to the planet side.
Arrests across the several small towns on the planet were made. Civilians were killed and often the target of rebel attacks. When they spent time outside the wire, they would hit rocks and other junk from kids and locals.
“Let them starve,” Hakon finally said and he took another bite of his own food. The rebels were a defeated force, and a defeated force was a deadly desperate force which was better let to destroy itself from within. Besides, the starfighters which patrolled the skies launched attacks on them day and night, and that was another thing the rebels could not take out.
One starfighter had fallen since the attack, and that had been from failures and not Rebel attack. The pilot had been quickly rescued, and the other squadrons had continued to target any rebel force caught in the open.
“Fuck this shit hole of a world,” Frea said.
Their welcome had come and gone. Any of the peace and calm in the first couple of weeks were gone and just a memory. The locals and the rebels might have little they could do to remove the forces of the ‘Axetooth’ but deaths still happened, and Hakon was ready to leave the world.
Taxes, and tribute had largely been gathered for the Barta King that hired them, and the sooner it could be loaded and taken off world, and them along with it, the better as far as Hakon was concerned.
