I just gotta say: WOW! I’m a SD vet (disregard the low post count), and this just takes the cake in a walk. I gotto get outta GD more often…
My paltry contribution, in the style of Keith Laumer (needless to say, I also need to expand my reading selection):
SitRep exerpt from Combat Unit AGN-0916 mk. XXXII to Allied Central Command
:Begin Transmission:
*This is Combat Unit D 0916-AGN “Aragorn”, BOLO mk. XXXII of the 1st Battalion, 5th Regiment, DinoChrome Brigade. I and my fellow units Legolas, Gimli and Gandalf are currently engaged in defense of Helm’s Deep, as a decoy maneuver to draw the forces of the Wizard Saruman into open battle while Combat Units 4264-SAM “Sam” and 6921-FRD “Frodo,” both mk. XXI specials, attempt to bypass enemy patrols in Mordor to the south, with the ultimate objective of placing the so-called “Ring of Power” into the volcano at Mount Doom, thus breaking the power of the Dark Lord Sauron.
The forces arrayed before us are considerable. I take .023 seconds to compare their formation with those of other notable battles throughout the long and contentuous course of human history; the Confederate General George Edward Pickett’s disposition prior to his doomed attempt to force Cemetary Ridge at the Battle of Gettysburgh is the most obvious comparison.
Like General Picket, the forces of Saruman are about to meet a similar demise.
Unit Gimli opens the engagement at 100 km, firing ICM-DP rocket mortars in rapid-fire mode; the projectiles, which I track on angstrom-band radar, are spaced for maximum area effect and time-on-target detonation. As one, the 300 mortar shells split open, raining anti-personnel bomblets upon the enemy, scything down thousands as if the Hammer of God had descended upon them. But it is a mere scratch upon the Army of Darkness arrayed before us.
Gimli moves closer, reaching speeds of 300 km/hr, and engages in them line-of-sight with his banks of Infinite Repeaters, bleeding the enemy of thousands upon thousands more before his ammo runs dry. Finally, he unleashes his Hell Bore, and the power of a miniature sun erupts with the enemy’s ranks. Again and again he fires, but he is inevitably forced back before the onslaught, lest he become enveloped. He paces them as they advance, obliterating thousands with each blast of hellacious sun-fire.
Yet they come, undaunted by the horrendous losses they have yet sustained.
Suddenly, my sensors are confused; the fabric of reality itself distorts, and a field of power is unleashed from the north upon Gimli. I fear the Saruman has finally decided to join the fray, and has chosen Gimli in retribution for the damage he has done.
Gimli is off the air; I cannot raise him on any datalink, not even ground cunducted infra-band. I spare .001 seconds memorializing Gimli in the Regimental Hall of Fame for his actions. Upload to Regiment complete.
Legolas next engages the enemy. As a sophisticated AI, Legolas has developed a taste for indirect fire, and directs his rockets and mortars against the enemy. His rate of fire is slow, as he is also playing the role of Fire Direction Center for the artillery units of the defenders of Helm’s Deep. The processing capacity he has dedicated to this task has diminished his combat capability 1.0923%.
Backed against the curtain walls of Helm’s Deep, he is soon swarmed by the enemy, and in their brute strength and arcane arts (which are not contained in my database, or that of any other Combat Unit in the long history of the DinoChrome Brigade), Legolas begins to falter. His infinite repeater mow down rank upon rank of the enemy in a desparate attempt to keep the enemy at bay, and he is largely succesfull at keeping the breech in the walls plugged by his own mass.
Yet the eemy is too many.
Gandalf joins in next, with the veteran Armored Cavalry units of the Kingdom of Roha; they flank the enemy and take them in the oblique, penetrating their ranks and actually severing their lines. This buys Legolas time to rally defending infantry untis, and they begin pushing the enemy out of the breech.
Again, the pulse of world-distorting force from the north; this time, directed against Legolas. Over our Combat Net, I feel Legolas’ mind falter. His CPU, damaged and/or disrupted beyond the ability to continue functioning, retreats to the thick, armored vault at the center of his battle chassis. He is combat ineffective as a BOLO unit, but his unique AI algorithm is safe.
I reasses our tactical situation, and see only one solution. Our enemy are too numerous; for all of our firepower, we cannot slay them fast enough to prevent the fall of Helm’s Deep. An alternate plan is required, and I take 2.717 seconds to run through thousands of scenarios and possibilities. Only one plan yields a 91.398%, +/- 3.521% chance of success.
I relay my plan to Gandalf over our encrypted data net, as well as to our defending allies. They are aghast, but Gandalf approves immensely. It is the sort of grand gesture he admires.
In preparation for my plan, our allies begin retreating into the deep mountain, as I cover their retreat. I am firing everything in my arsenal as fast as it will cycle to hold the enemy at bay. Gandalf gather’s up the Armored Cavalry forces outside the wall, and leads them to a safe distance, bidding me “luck.”
Finally, our allies are safely deep into the mountain, and I spare two infinite repeaters to bring the cliff face down over the opening to their safety, and park myself atop the rubble. I am king of this mountain, and will not budge! Yet I cease firing.
Activating my external loudspeakers, I mock and insult the enemy, challenging them to move me, daring them to try. They swarm me in their multitudes, and my battlescrens flare and collapse as their weapons beat upon my armored battle hull, tearing at my external sensors, rending my weapons from their emplacements. For the first time in my service life, I feel pain, as circuits short and relays malfunction. My articulated treads are rendered from my roadwheels, and I think I now understand the emotions humans know as fear.
On the plain, Gandalf avtivates an ICBM and launches it, shepharding his charges further away from Helm’s Deep. The missile streaks up into its sub-orbital ballistic arc, before returning back to Middle Earth at hypersonic velocity. The missile plunges into the ground, and detonates at a sub-surface depth of 127 meters. The Tower of Saruman is no more; his power is gone, rapidly dispersing downwind in a mushroom cloud of fire and glazed earth. The crater where it once stood is 23.67 kilometers wide and 5.48 kilometers deep.
And now the task before me. I calculate that I now have the great bulk of the enemy arrayed before me. I cannot fire fast enough, or traverse quickly enough, to obliterate them all. Our charges are safe, either deep within the mountain behind me, or out upon the plain at minimum safe distance. My duty is clear.
I deactivate the safety interlocks of my fusion reactor, and prepare to disable the magnetic containment bottle even as I send the reactor into overload status.
This is Unit-of-The-Line D 0916-AGN “Aragorn”, BOLO mk. XXXII of the 1st Battalion, 5th Regiment, DinoChrome Brigade, signing off.
Black Knights!*
:Transmission Ends:
