[b]Udena, Collective Fringe Systems.
[/b]
[img]http://vignette2.wikia.nocookie.net/fateoftheworld/images/7/7e/Ruined_city_w.jpg/revision/latest/scale-to-width-down/640?cb=20110329021946[/img]

    Captain Suburov, of the 900th Black Banner Assault regiment, watched as his men finished unloading the small cargo ship they had managed to slip into Collective space. They had but a small shipment of weapons and supplies with them. Only enough to "give the locals a taste" as General Bocanegra had put it. 
    
    The Totalists had landed their craft in an out of the way part of the planet. Amid some ruined township too small and worthless to garner any kind of meaningful attention by the Collective forces. The coordinates had been sent by the local rebels, one of the many cells contacted by the Ministry of Peace in preparation for Operation 093-B/10.
    
    "Sir!" One of his soldiers called through the comm. "We are detecting movement in our sensors. Must be our contacts."
    
    Suburov smiled beneath his mask. As soon as this was done with he could get away from this hellhole of a planet. He would probably return very soon anyway, but then he would be merely another soldier among the billions in the ranks of the army. Much safer in his opinion, he accessed the sensor data on his helmet HUD and moved towards the path of the oncoming contacts.
    
    "Form up troops, let's get this over with already." He ordered, and soon the black armored troops assumed a parade formation behind him.

From the distance a rusted, barely held together heap of an armored truck was on approach to the rendezvous point as it kicked up a trail of sand in its wake, passing through the ruined town's gates, slowly coming to a stop near the center, where the Captain and his men were waiting. 

The armored truck soon came to a halt in front of the cargo ship, several armed aliens stepping out from the truck's hold, and two humans stepping out from the driver and passenger seats. One of the humans was a man in his fifties, and was dressed in fine military attire, and certainly was more finely dressed then his rather ragged and rough compatriots.

The more finely dressed man approached the Captain, hands behind his back. He then extended his left hand towards the captain with a wide smile, despite the rather intimidating armor. "General Walt Tarson of the Epsilon Division."

Captain Suburov lifted the face mask of his helmet, revealing a generic faced man with several vibrant red scars coming from his neck into his cheeks anc chin and a pair of cybernetic eyes, rather tame by Black Banner standards. 

"Captain Astanas Suburov, Totalist Army." He smiled back in a passable English, shaking the General's hand. "A pleasure to make your acquaintance. I belie you must be eager to get this business over with."

The General nodded with a slight chuckle. "Correct, my friend, won't be too soon before they know." he paused as he loosened his grip. "I'm rather surprised you managed to bypass the Collective's Sensor Network, very impressed."

"The Directorate of Sciences has been working on ways to fight the Collective ever since they first hit us." Suburov replied as he turned towards the ship, motioning for the rebels to follow him. "From what I've heard they've got a couple more surprises in store for the big push."

The Captain led them to one of the metal crates, shouting for a nearby soldier to open in in Newspeak.

"Unfortunately the ship couldn't carry a lot of cargo.  "So you will have to make this count." He turned to the General, handing him a pistol from the crate. "We got several more of these ships equipped to evade their sensors, but you shouldn't expect enough supplies to take on the Collective yourself. Though we will try to bring the things your personnel asked for during our talks."

The General observed the pistol, and couldn't help be grin like an idiot, enjoying every detail. "Haven't seen such a fine weapon in years, we often had to loot or craft our own crudely made weaponry." General Tarson continued to observe every detail. After he was done enjoying himself, he handed the weapon to one of his subordinates, he turned his attention back to Captain Suburov. "You're right, the Collective has some nasty surprises in store for you." he paused for a moment and then continued. "The Collective have all sorts of expriements going on on Agnois, we once kept tabs on such projects, but...they set loose their abominations on us, nothing like what we previously fought."

Tarson sighed deeply, and looked to the captain once more. "All I can say is this, the Collective have been holding out on us, the deeper you go in their domain, the more experimental the Machines will get."

"We aren't exactly holding back either, General." Suburov smiled at him. "And we got a trick or two in our sleeve. Besides, from what I've heard, the vultures around the Collective have finally smelled the stink and are moving in to get their share of these planets while the robots are distracted. Every day that passes is a day that the Collective gains a new enemy." He chuckled. "We will win this, with your help. Even though some within the State would prefer to fight the Collective alone."

General Tarson smiled once more, and once again extended his hand. "Some of my people aren't exactly trusting of you folk, but whatever happens, I'm glad to have you to fight by our side, we'll finally be free of those infernal machines once and for all. So we'll take whatever help we'll get."

You don't have any other choice went unsaid as Suburov ordered his men to help the rebels load up the truck.

"We will enter in contact with you soon General." He said. "As soon as we secure another safe channel we will be able to maintain regular contact." Suburov then handed the General a small book. "This has been specially developed for this campaign. It's a book filled with codes and cryptography information. Our people will start using these codes from now on and I suggest you do the same."

"Much appreciated, Captain." The General said as he took the book. "We'll have our forces adapt to the book's instructions, by the time you arrive, we'll be ready."

--------------------------------

[b][u]
Udena
High Orbit
One Month Later[/u][/b]

[img]http://vignette1.wikia.nocookie.net/killzone/images/d/da/Refugees.png/revision/latest?cb=20131228230556[/img]

The Day has finally arrived, after weeks of preparations, the Udenan Rebels were bracing themselves for the arirval of the Totalist Invasion Fleet, thw fleet jumping in the system had caught the attenion of the Collective as they had amassed their own fleet to repeal the totalists. Over a thousand Collective Ships sat in orbit of Udena, ready to begin the first battle of the campaign.

The massive Totalist Armada, outnumbering the Collective defenders by a margin of 1.5, assumed battle formations quickly. Concentrating their forces around the two Floating Fortresses that acted as command centers of the fleet. In several other of the Fringe Systems, Totalist fleets of varied sizes were also launching their own attack. The plan called for the Collective forces to be overwhelmed by multiple attacks all through the front, not all of them would succeed. But as far as Totalist doctrine was concerned, one or two breakthroughs would be enough to seize the initiative in the sector.

The Collective Ships in orbit moved into defense formations, the numerous corvette and frigate class ships forming into square formations, protection the templeships, carriers and the lone Command Ship. All the while, said ships unleash swarms of thousands upon thousands of fighter drones, all of whom formed a hollow sphere around the entirety of the defense fleet.

The Totalist fleet unleashed its own strike craft as the ships moved closer to the Collective fleet. While they closed in, a smaller section of the fleet moved out of the larger formation, heading along the edges of the system to outmaneuver the Collective forces while the bulk of the Totalist ships drove on to catch their attention.

Reacting to the closely approaching Totalist ships, the Collective fighter drones scattered, all converging on the large gathering of Totalist vessels, soon the rest of the fleet soon followed.

The Totalist strike craft did not take the bait, instead remaining around their fleet and the cover of their guns and point defense weapons. Meanwhile, the second force continued to move around the edges of the system. Changing their course slightly to take the Collective from the rear.

The Collective Fleet, within visual range of the Totalist ships, begun their attack, the drone strike craft making their advanced towards the enemy fleet, pressing on despite thousands of them were destroyed in droves by PD turrets and enemy fighters, the first screen wave soon followed afterward, the smaller capital ships scattering and had attempted to to encircle the enemy fleet, all the while, the main group provided fire ship via missiles and long range plasma beams.

The Totalist formation shifted and grew more scattered as the ships engaged the first enemy wave to stop their encirclement. Fighters shifted their focus solely to the enemy drone fighters while bombers targeted the enemy ships closest to them. The two Floating Fortresses focused their fire on taking down enemy capital ships with their long range guns while the rest of the main fleet engaged the first wave. Then the rest of the Totalist fleet struck from the rear.

Hundreds of ship were lost in the encirclement, those few that had survived, had begun to fire everything they had against the Totalist fleet, missiles, directed energy weapons, all of it. The drone fighters, bombers and interceptors proceeded to fight their organic counterparts within the totalist fleet itself, a dangerous game of survival for the pilots of the Totalist strike craft, as they both had to contend with relentless collective drone craft, and avoid any deadly collisions with friendly capital ships. 

However, the battle was turning in their favor as the Totalists sprung their trap upon the Collective. As their second battle group assault the main command group from the rear, the Command Ship and its escort now under heavy fire on both sides.

The battle had taken its toll on the Totalist fleet, though not as bad as the Collective's. And as the most damaged ships withdrew from the battle to the relative safety of the edge of the system, the Totalist fleet unleashed its full might against the Collective command ship. From the smallest fighter cannon to the largest caliber railgun of the Floating Fortresses.

Before long, the Command ship's shields gave in from the unrelenting assault, the ship breaking apart from the continued barrage. The AI aboard retreating back to Udena to prepare for the ground war. Soon the Collective fleet was in chaos, some in retreat, while others power down.

With the battle in space won the Totalists pressed forward. Making emergency repairs and clearing up the bodies from their battle stations, the Totalist ships moved on into Udena's orbit as smaller squadrons were detached to hunt down the remaining Collective ships and destroy the powerless husks just in case.

It was then that the Totalist transport ships warped into the system and as they did so, the Totalists sent the signal for the rebels to act. Striking against Collective positions all across the planet just as the fleet in orbit did the same, obliterating targets wherever the rebels couldn't strike or simply weren't worth capturing. Several more ships were damaged or destroyed by planet-bound weapons, but without the support of their own fleet these installations were quickly dealt with by the combined Totalist firepower and rebel forces.

With the Floating Fortresses in position, the first wave of the Totalist vanguard was unleashed as thousands of dropships carrying the Black Banner divisions streamed into the planet. Landing in pre-planned positions either under rebel control or cleared by orbital bombardment.

The AI who had been given command over the Ude System had fled back to his fortress situated in the Northern Polar regions on the planet, a structure similar in design of the Divine Citadel on Agonis, if a bit smaller in size. Deep in the core, the AI manifested in his physical form, a generic-looking humanoid shell emerging from a wall, hooked to a large devise, the body soon sparked with life as it leapt down to the ground. The once dark circular room was lit ablaze as a large holo-map of the planet formed in the center. "Lord Magnus will not be pleased..." the Machine spoke. "No matter, I will deal with these pests before word spreads."

Meanwhile, the Totalist forces on the ground continued to expand their areas of control with support from the fleet as the Floating Fortresses shifted some of their fire to the assumed location of the enemy headquarters. Based on intel from the rebels and sensor and transmission readings coming from the northern pole. Meanwhile, the troop transports carrying the bulk of the Totalist forces designated to the operation in Ude had now finally received clearance to land on the planet. Mostly inside whatever strip of land was suitable for landing and wasn't under Collective control.

The Udena Citadel came under heavy fire as the orbiting Totalist fleet bombarded the Northern Polar Regions, the shields protecting the large structure giving in as the salvos penetrated the structure itself, walls and cellings came crashing down all around the AI Commander.

As the bombardment of the Citadel intensified, the first Totalist units disembarked in the area, just outside of the Citadel's range. These troops would start to prepare the groundwork for the planned assault, establishing the necessary logistical and support infrastructure.

Meanwhile all across the planet, Totalist and rebel forces with generous orbital support overcame the Collective defenders. And as the weeks passed and more and more of Udena was liberated, the Totalist build-up in the North Pole was going at full steam.

Finally, after almost a month of constant bombardment and preparation the Totalists launched their assault on the Citadel. Conventional doctrine would suggest simply destroying the facility. But General Bocanegra was under direct orders from the Generalissimo himself to make sure to salvage whatever technology and intel she could from the Collectivists. The fact that she had opted to precede her assault on the enemy hq, which intelligence assumed would be a treasure trove for the Totalists, with a month long orbital bombardment would not earn her points with High Command. But she was willing to bet that her performance in the rest of the battle would make up for it.

Even after all the preparation, the Collectivists still managed to put up an admirable fight considering their circumstances. Shredding the penal battalions and rebel troops used as the first wave. Nevertheless, the correlation of forces was simply too lopsided for the battle to end in any other way. And after a week and half fighting amid half-ruined buildings, Captain Suburov raised the battle flag of the 900th regiment alongside the Totalist White Arrows in Black at the top of the last remaining tower. 

Mop up operations would last a few more weeks, but for all intents and purposes the system was in Totalist hands..


[hider=Summary]

-Totalist offensive starts. Ude falls but the rest of the front stalemates

[/hider]