Story [Issue 20] Birth of a Tank: "Breaking the Silence"

[Fjelstad1678 186]

Birth of a Tank:
"Breaking the Silence"
 

When we finally arrived back at the camp, I immediately started asking Darrel and Easton about everything in the surrounding area that we could possibly use as a tactical advantage.
“Well, its been a while since I have studied proper combat tactics, but it seems like those buildings we were next to at the extent of our patrol would make a great choke point. There is a back route not far from here, but it could easily be defended by a single Freeze.” Darrel said in a quick summary.
“Alright. Rachel, how are you doing on getting some support here?” I asked.
“The higher-ups don’t seem to believe it. We may actually have to do a lot of this by ourselves until they grow a brain and realize what is actually going on.”
“Dang. So, which one of you two is the leader here?” I asked the two nervous Hunters.
“Well…” Easton started with a crack in his voice. “... we really weren’t sent here to fight, and we really don’t have a leader. We kinda figured you were going to be the new leader.”
“Me? Don’t make me laugh. I haven’t even fired a shot in anger yet. Now you expect me to lead you into a full scale battle where we are severely outnumbered? That would never end well.” I said
“This is true.” Darrel popped in. “However, does it look like we have either? Besides, we have heard about your model. Specially designed to be a commanding unit. You are the best one here for the role, and we will only do what you say.”
“Fine! I will be the leader. I just wish we could get some support…” Almost as if by que, Rachel let out a huge sigh and gave me the news.
“I’ve convinced some of the higher-ups that something is going on here. We will be getting a little backup. We’ve got a Shaft and a Freeze coming soon to help.” I relayed the message to Easton and Darrel to get a decent amount of relief.
“Well, lets not all just sit around… There is an enemy tank column rolling this way. We should start preparing plans while we wait for support to arrive.”

 

After very little discussion, we decided to go mainly off of what Darrel had suggested earlier. We would place the Freeze on the back route to guard our flank as the Smokies and I held the choke point at the buildings. The Shaft would be placed on a heavily covered platform to the rear that he could easily snipe on both our and the Freeze’s positions from. He could also retreat back to the main base from it quite easily with the help of cover from some large piping in case of emergency.
“They should be here any minute.” Rachel chimed in.
“Alright you two, be ready for their arrival. Please act calm, as this defensive is going to be very serious. Now, Easton, if you could please take a quick recon mission and report back on the enemy’s current position, it would help.” I told Easton and Darrel who had been staring at me intently for the entire time I had described the plan.
“Yessir.” Easton chanted back.
“Great.”

“Yes, that would probably be a good idea…” said a deep voice behind me. Darrel started backing up very slowly as I turned my turret to face the unknown figure behind me.
“Heh, your little friend there seems like he might need his oil changed.” the new tank chuckled. As I glanced over him, I identified him to be a Tank-I Shaft on a Viking. Being a more recent model, it is also known as a ‘Viking Long Sword’. Behind him was another tank, a Freeze on Dictator. Being an older vehicle, it has no other name.

“Nice to see you two showed up.” I said.
“Yeah, yeah, now just tell us what is going on, we’ll help, and then be back to the REAL war.” the Freeze said, sounding already quite bored with the situation. I told them exactly what the predicament was and what they were to do.
“Doesn’t sound too bad. What are we up against exactly?” the Shaft asked. Just as he said this, he got his answer as Easton came rolling back at full speed.
“Nearly here, sir! Nearly took a shot when I pulled around the corner to take a look. At least 15 of ‘em! They’ll be here in no more than 5 minutes at their current clip.”
“Right, you two! Take your positions. Feel free to give me a chirp on the radio if you need support, especially you Freezy.” I ordered.
“See you on the other side.” the Shaft called as they rolled towards their stations.
“Alright, you two, follow me. Please, don’t get shot up. If you get knocked out, you come all the way back here to base and have to drive all the way back out to the choke point to support whoever is still here. Remember that if we knock them out, they are going all the way back to their base, and it would be a waste to come back here. So, all we need to do is knock each one out once, and it should be a successful day.”

As we arrived at the defensive positions for the soon-to-be killzone, we could hear a rumble from a short distance away.
“You two stay back, I am going to poke the corner to see what we have coming.” I told the smokies who were glued to their cover. They nodded with their guns and I proceeded forward. When I poked the corner, it took less than 2 seconds to take a fairly large hit to the side. I very quickly glanced at the small army of tanks as I pulled back around the corner and headed back.
“Be careful!” Rachel pleaded. “You know they aren’t going to make this easy on you! Just… please win the fight.” Had her voice always sounded this soothing? Maybe it was just the situation I was facing. I snapped out of it and realized I had to tell the others what I had seen. I cracked on my radio.
“Alright. First round of the fight has officially and rather violently met its target. There are at least 2 dozen of them, and I saw at least 5 going ‘round to the back route.”
“Roger that.” the Freeze called. “I hear them coming up.”
“You think you can take ‘em?” I quickly asked.
“Yeah, never had trouble with any less than 8 before.” he said with a decent amount of concern detectable from his voice. Suddenly, an enemy tank appeared from behind one of sides of the gap. Before I could even react, there was a chirp and the enemy was a burning wreck.
“First blood…” the Shaft mumbled. Before I could even comprehend how much he had just done in an instant, the next couple tanks were rounding the corner. I shot a round directly underneath the front tank, blowing both of it’s tracks apart with the shrapnel. Being immobile, it began serving as a roadblock for it’s allies trying to round the corner.
“Gonna start helping us out, Smokies?” the Shaft asked as I blew straight through the lower frontal plate of an enemy Titan. I hadn’t even realized that neither Darrel or Easton had fired a single shot so far.

“C’mon, guys. Your rate of fire is amazing and with two of you, you will annihilate these enemies. You can even use me as a meat shield if you need to.” As another enemy tank burst into flames as a chirp echoed overhead, I heard Easton creep out from behind cover and take a shot. The round flew straight into the tracks of a vehicle rushing straight towards me. As the tracks locked up on the damaged side, it’s pure momentum turned the tank side on to my gun, which made quick work of it, planting one straight into the engine block.
“Freeze, you doing alright?” I quickly asked, jamming a turret ring as I did so.
“Getting kinda hot up here… One of you Smokies mind helping a bit?” the Freeze said back, with much strain in his voice.
“Darrel, you’re on the correct side of the gap. Go help him out.” I ordered him.
“Yes, sir.” he replied with a crack in his voice as he began roaring back to the base to help.

“How many you got there, Freeze?” I asked.
“Uhh, too many and too stressed to count. More than 5 for sure. Can you get your little buddy to hurry?” he said. I could almost sense true fear in his voice. I quickly realized how desperate the situation was.
“Darrel, get there NOW. Shaft, please get some covering fire on him, I think Easton and I have got it covered here.” For a few minutes, the situation began to seem a little more under control. Meanwhile, my kill count was soaring. I began to find that blowing apart the tracks of the first tank of line, causing a blockade, and then lobbing my High-Explosive shells into the group of tanks proved very effective. The blast would damage all tanks near the explosion, not always for damage to the hull of the machine itself, but blowing apart things like the tracks, guns, and engines, rendering them mostly useless. My tracks had been almost vaporized by this point, but I didn’t need them. My armor was holding up.

“How is the situation on the back road?” I asked as Easton got his 5th ever kill. He was starting to get into this.
“Better than it was…” the Freeze answered. “Both me and Darrel have been knocked out once though. Darrel fought well when I was gone. Really a true he… wait.”
“What is it?” I asked.
“We’ve got a Mammoth rolling up the ramp. Shaft, keep him pinned. I’ll freeze him up.” Freeze suggested.
“Sorry, I’m pretty much useless at the moment.” the Shaft popped in. “My turret is jammed up pretty well. Trying to get it fixed, but its not budging.”
“Well, is there another gun I can get down here? I’m gonna need it.” Freeze asked.
“I’m stuck here until its all over. But I suppose you can borrow Easton.” I said. “Just please get him back soon enough. Really work on that turret ring, Shaft. I think I might need you soon. If they have a Mammoth over there, I bet there will be one on this side too.”
“Trying sir. Will let you know when it happens.” the Shaft said as Easton quickly darted across the killzone to head back to support.

The tip of my barrel was red. I was firing as soon as the rounds were loaded. My kill count was approaching 37, with 8 more critically damaged. I was really getting surprised at how easily we were defending the base. We had only suffered 2 ‘casualties’ and some critical damage, while we must have hit at least 75 kills total at this point. I was beginning to wonder how long this was going to last.
“How are we looking, Rachel?” I asked her.
“Tracks are gone, frontal plate is caving in, turret ring is damaged, and you have taken some engine damage on top of it all. Not really like you would need it anyways without any tracks.”
“Ah, simply a scratch.” I joked. Suddenly, my tank jolted a fair amount as my left side began to sting.
“OUCH. What hit me?” I asked her with some tension in my voice.
“Shoot, its a Railgun, and to make matters worse, its a Mammoth. I would suggest that now would be a great time to call for help.”
“Shaft, you up yet?” I called. “I’ve got myself a friend thats beating me up pretty bad. Need help NOW.”
“Just fixed, coming.” he called back.
Another beam hit me with just as much force. It seemed to sting twice as much. I was planting everything I had into it, but the damage it did just didn’t seem like it was going down first.
“Here! Oh my… Lining up!” the Shaft yelled. I planted another shot into the Railgun. It’s barrel began glowing as it turned the turret back to line up the shot.
“FIRE NOW!” I yelled. I could hear Rachel biting her fist to stop from screaming.
The beam from the Rail came straight towards me just as I saw the flash of the Shaft’s round pierce it. It was too late. There was a loud hiss and everything went black.

-To Be Continued-

~Fjelstad1678~

[doduobird 315]

First :D NICE !

[Theawesomecooldude 108]

Dang. Nice work, my friend. Still good as ever. Keep it up!

[GoldRock 6,165]

Awesome stuff, and a really involving series - can't wait to read what happens next, nice cliffhanger there ^_^

[ExtremeKiller26 443]

Aww damn he died. :c Get him back soon.

[TankCommando33 33]

EPIC!!! Waited forever for you slow writers....

[Fjelstad1678 186]

EPIC!!! Waited forever for you slow writers....

We're not really slow writers, we just publish once a month (for now). Anyways, I'm glad you liked it. :D

[superninjatanker 1]

holy cow! another amazing story! keep them coming!

[Fjelstad1678 186]

^ Will do.  ^_^

[donut70 97]

ok great story and good job on the excitement, but I have 2 things to say.

1st, Easton said he saw at least 15, and later the main character said he saw about 2 dozen on the left and 5 going right (29-30 total), but even later the main character speculated that they had killed at least 75 tanks by now. When did the tanks triple in amount? And how did 5 hold off that many with only 2 deaths total? My suggestion is that you should have given them an isida.

2nd, I am having a hard time expanding the size of my mental picture of silence to the amount you alluded to.

Otherwise great job :D.

[MrAmazingKiller 9]

Shafts seem praised in this storyline...... Still love it though ;)

[Fjelstad1678 186]

ok great story and good job on the excitement, but I have 2 things to say.

1st, Easton said he saw at least 15, and later the main character said he saw about 2 dozen on the left and 5 going right (29-30 total), but even later the main character speculated that they had killed at least 75 tanks by now. When did the tanks triple in amount? And how did 5 hold off that many with only 2 deaths total? My suggestion is that you should have given them an isida.

2nd, I am having a hard time expanding the size of my mental picture of silence to the amount you alluded to.

Otherwise great job :D.

Okay, first one. Simple, they have a great defensive position. In a real silence game, it can be hard to pass the point I am trying to replicate in the story with any competent enemy players. 

Also, its easy to underestimate the amount of tanks. They simply hadn't spotted them all. Plus, you must remember there is respawning.

 

2. I just tried to expand the boundaries of the in game map, and am not following entirely. Just opens up more opportunities for future episodes.

 

 

Shafts seem praised in this storyline...... Still love it though ;)

Not really, just wrote 'em like they are. 

[MrAmazingKiller 9]

The Viking-Shaft Seemed to be a pro shaft in the story ;)

Edited February 22, 2014 by MrAmazingKiller

[donut70 97]

Fjelstad1678,you mentioned the respawning. Well, what about this line? "Alright, you two, follow me. Please, don't get shot up. If you get knocked out, you come all the way back here to base and have to drive all the way back out to the choke point to support whoever is still here. Remember that if we knock them out, they are going all the way back to their base, and it would be a waste to come back here. So, all we need to do is knock each one out once, and it should be a successful day". Was he wrong about them not wasting time coming back from their "far off" base?

 

Secondly, I still say that unless they had health packs they couldn't have beaten that many with only 2 respawns. Even though Dan had a mammoth it still takes less then 6-7 shots from an equal M thunder to destroy it, and I think it is safe to assume that each enemy probably had enough time to get 1 shot off before dying , even if the shaft was hitting them instantly I doubt the enemy would give him time to reload for each.

 

Like I said before, great story, my problems are only small inconsistencies that reduces the realism of the story for me.

Edited March 5, 2014 by donut70