Wolf Smile

Whiteout at night. As far as cold goes, -42 centigrade isn’t the worst.

But the snowfall is. It falls as heavy and as hard as feathered bricks. Thermals are useless when it’s this dense. Optical visibility shrinks to feet, radar returns a solid wall, and walking through the drifts and slopes makes every single step trigger the animal fear of tripping into an abyss.

An assault in these conditions is impossible.

So, the soldiers of expeditionary battalion 97, 10th fleet, of the Auric Republic interstellar peacekeepers, tuck themselves in behind the sealed bulkheads of Listening Post Waterson. Some sleep under thick blankets that barely keep out the cold, others upright in their environment suits so they can take advantage of the climate control systems weaved into the composites.

Squads on night shift take turns playing cards and gazing out into the gray feet of view outside the portholes. Comms and sensor staff drink from steaming mugs and stare at static filled monitors, finding no signals puncturing the noise.

This formation’s and base’s commander, Colonel Atte Foivu, sits in his quarters and reads real estate listings on his slate. The abundant heaters in his room blow enough hot air at him that he’s stripped down to a tank top, which clings to his muscles. He coos as he looks over the details for a small house on Aria, one with plenty of horizontal windows and a massive sourgrass lawn.

When a ferrous slug cuts through his base’s primary comms array, the noise is deafened to the point that he just thinks his kettle is starting to whisper.

It’s the two-stage smoothbore puncturing the outpost’s walls, sending a quake conducting through the earth and metal, that shocks him out of his daydreams of property ownership. He grabs his pistol and his armored jacket.

He can’t be blamed. Not even the poor bastards in hardsuits stomping around out on the perimeter see that first shot either. They just feel the following salvo, slugs pinging against their armor until the anti-materiel rounds puncture.

The first of their flatlines confirms the base alert. Klaxons flash, sirens cry, everyone wakes and seals their battle dress and grabs their kinetics.

An assault in these conditions should be impossible.

But for the Omnistellar Union’s 55th Company, miracles can be pulled from accelerometers, clocks, and compasses.

Anavel pattern drift tanks shell the array post’s outer perimeter, sending sheets of permafrost and liquefied steel splashing into the base and leaving nothing but craters. They tick up the degrees of their turret’s firing solutions as soldiers advance. Those infantry, their camoflauge white on white, dial in the frequency and optimal focus on their laser carbines as the alarms sound. They bite through the cold and lift the ironsights in front of their visors.

When the first wave of Waterson’s defenders hit the snow, they are cut down by x-rays and tungsten penetrators. The second wave, in heavier armor and equipped with flash capacitor railguns, put in the fight. Ozone mixes with ice, as ferrous slug and photon beam passes by each other shot for shot, crisscrossing over a deadzone that creeps inch by inch closer to the sealed doors of Waterson.

Colonel Foivu orders the firing of the nano-mortars, in a tight ring around the base walls. He shouts over his captain, telling him that if anyone leaves the perimeter they’re dead anyway.

The mortars pop out of turrets on the top of the buildings, arc with a struggle through the wind, and land into the OSU force’s current lines. The shrapnel that tears through the assaulting unit’s suits, into muscle and bone, is the least dangerous payload. Nano-demolishers dispersed in a radius around the shells tear the attackers apart molecule by molecule. Puddles of malignant slurry, red and iridescent metallic gray, spread from the impact zones. Screams fill the LOS comms.

“Prepare the second salvo,” colonel Foivu says. “Let’s take care of those tanks too. They will likely be positioned on the ridge here,” he tells the mortar operator, pointing at the area on the satmap.

His tactical analysis is correct, and the attacking tanks are positioned on that ridge.

But it will not save him.

High caliber autoncannon shots slam against the command building’s armored plating like a hammer on sheet metal before finally cutting through, shearing a hole of slugs into the center of the room. Comms officers and tactical staff are turned into physics problems, some of their blood splashing against Foivu’s chest and face. He grabs his pistol and ducks towards a hall to escape.

A massive armored shape crashes into the cavernous command center, followed by furious snowfall. This machine, this Flow Lion-pattern mech, its optics glare furious crimson as it stands. Its targeting lasers sweep for new targets, and its weapons spool into a roar for a new salvo as Foivu pants and howls down an escape passage.

Outside, at the perimeter of post Waterson, 55th Company combat engineers unleash waves of halogen pyretics to push the nano-destroyers to the point of entropic breakdown. Gouts of chemical flame scour the earth of nanotechnological contamination, flashmelting slow into puddles and creeks of flowing water mixed with blood.

Flow Lion mechs lead the vanguard ahead, pushing deeper into the outpost, firing thunder and leaving glowing hot brass behind in their footsteps. Their autocannon barrels scream over the alarms.

The vehicles in Waterson’s motor pools are shelled by the OSU tanks. The few wide-tracked chassis that pull out are pulverized by mech fire. The third platoon’s infantry advances over the flowing water of the burn zone, advancing from cover to cover, eliminating resistance one volley of kinetic shot at a time.

Among third company, in their white on white camoflauge but with a red robotic hand and a massive red revolver, strides Lieutenant Aino Kasslin. She walks into the line of fire, bullet streaks cutting the air beside her. Her squad dashes forward and lays down suppressive fire, with her secondary squad flanking the troopers her first pin down.

Lieutenant Kasslin glances left during her walk, and makes sure that the base’s secondary comms array is still intact.

The rest of Kasslin’s operation unfolds as she expected, at this point. Flow Tiger mechs shred apart the hab sections, exposing the interiors to the blizzard chill and shocking the infantry within. The squad with the halogen burners start their fires. Infantry squads of platoons 2 and 3 clear the facility one bloody section at a time under the rapid crack din of coilgun fire.

Convection currents from the battle has already pushed snowfall away from the facility courtyard. Snow has melted into water, flowing around her boot’s ankles. She splashes forwards.

Flow Tiger 4 has already cornered her quarry, helmetless at the auxiliary exit, holding his pistol up and pointing at one of the machine’s scanners. He hasn’t fired yet. Kasslin strides to meet him.

She finds Foivu standing in front of the anthroform warmachine, his back turned to her, shin-deep in mud and blood, shaking.

Lieutenant Kasslin’s helmet’s visor and faceplate click and fold away. “Atte. Funny finding you here.” She holds her magnum against the small of her back.

Atte Foivu stops shaking and lowers his pistol. He doesn’t turn around, though. “… Aino. So this is what mercy gets me.”

“Mercy can be repaid with mercy in kind,” Kasslin says. “But I am here for a reason.”

Atte Foivu turns his head to glare at her, frost melting on his beard. He says nothing. He killed their comrade, in return for his current position, for a path to citizenship in the Auric empire, for servants and a manor all his own. For, someday, total and perfect comfort. He knows she will not forgive him no matter what he gives her.

Because Foivu looks back at Aino and sees that she has not changed. She still finds home in frost. Her skin is smooth, she trembles not a micrometer in this damned world’s storms. In his service to the Auric Empire, he had forgotten how to live without the warmth the empire paid him with.

“Your laser transceiver is still up,” she says, moving her magnum from the small of her back to in front of her waist. “We will clean up this mess. Soon enough for the storm to cover up the worst of the damage. We just need you to call your fleet commander down. Get his shuttle to land here when the storm clears, and you can count your debt to me repaid.”

Aino gives him the susi smile, the wolf smile.

The Flow Tiger mech traces his cheek with its targeting lasers.