Historical Battles

*"Many of you seek eternal glory. Only on the field of battle may you find it. Sciences are overwritten. Discoveries are forgotten. Arts are lost. But the exploits of those who fell in combat are forever engraved into the fabric of the cosmos. Time will echo your legend for millennia to come. This is the true meaning of immortality."*

> *- Captain Singe of the 2nd Plasma Battalion, delivered to his troops during the Last Stand of Emperor Kal*
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In a region populated by a species that has waged wars against itself since the beginning of time, it is no surprise that the most monumental advancements in technology, society and politics come from conflict. This page details some of the most important skirmishes, invasions and sieges that shaped the Procul region, from its birth to bordering on its death.

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## The Battle of Receding Tides

*"...you'd think the the last wall between destruction and everything we've ever known would be stronger."*

*"Maybe it was meant to be this way."*

*"Face it. We were doomed from the start."*

> *- Intercepted radio chatter between anonymous members of the 11th Covert Jet regiment*
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More often known as '*Lum a Achineweke'*, meaning roughly the same in Vaos folk language, or as the *'Second Battle of Vaos*' by foreign historians, the *'Battle of Receding Tides'* was a two-part engagement between the Vabittam Collective and the Exedetiae Corporation. It was one of the region's most pivotal battles: one of the only recorded major defeats of the callous Exedetiae forces, and the catalyst that not only forced them into exile but also brought around a new era of region-wide peace.

The scenario is one of grave desperation. The Vabittam Collective is on its last legs, exhausted from the war against the ever-encroaching and far superior Exedetiae forces. Now finding themselves pushed back to their core worlds, they prepared for one final all-out battle.

At the beginning of the war, the Vabittam Collective had an abundance of resources and a much larger fleet than the invaders. What gave the Exedetiae Corporation a deadly edge in combat was their advanced technology and unconventional tactics, allowing them to win engagement after engagement and never slow down. However, only a fraction of the Vabittam navy was needed to stomp out the outnumbered Exedetiae fleet. A direct assault on their last bastion would give them more than an opportunity to do so. This line of thought led Exedetiae tacticians to their final battle plan.

The first part of the invasion was a surprise attack by Exedetiae. Not knowing what to expect, all Vabittam forces were on high alert. Even so, they were caught off guard when an Exedetiae detachment arrived on the opposite side of the system, choosing not to launch an assault on the cities of Vaos II which they were closest to, but instead on the poorly-defended forest moon Vaos IIc, also known as Lush. Since Vabittam command were not able to react to such a spontaneous attack, the outpost on the moon and everyone present had to fare on their own. Moreover, the Exedetiae fleet ships began blockading the path from Vaos II to Lush, meaning no reinforcements could be landed to bolster the Vabittam ground defence. During this blockade, several attempts were made by smaller Vabittam fleet detachments stationed on Vaos II to break apart the fleet and force their retreat, but they were defeated by an unknown EMP technology. The outpost on Lush and everything surrounding it was then burnt out by specialist incendiary forces. No survivors (if there were any) remained in contact with command to assess the damage.

When Vabittam intel reported that the intruders were constructing long-range communications equipment on the moon's surface to command, it became quite clear what Exedetiae's plan was: they were constructing a mass-broadcasting device to disrupt fleetwide communications, which would disrupt the fragile order of the Vabittam fleet and allow the significantly smaller Exedetiae navy to steamroll their way through their defences, capturing the system. At first, a head-on invasion of the moon seemed common sense, however, intel later confirmed that Exedetiae had ground-to-space artillery guns stationed on the planet's surface, as well as many specialised anti-air guns. The guns not only would impede their invasion but they were specifically engineered by Exedetiae to punch through the Vabittam navy's heavy shielding. Having experience in facing these guns, command decided an attack with capital ships was out of the question. Similarly, a fighter strike was also impossible under the circumstances. Exedetiae's specially designed AA guns were programmed to shoot in certain unpredictable patterns. Such shooting would be easily evaded by an AI pilot assistant, however, due to the Vabittam Collective's distrust of military-grade AI, their craft did not have this ability. Despite the urgency of the situation, an organised attack was simply not feasible.

What Exedetiae tacticians did not count on was the dangerous ingenuity of the Vabittam command. A plan was hastily put together. At the edge of the moon's atmosphere, there was a blind spot for both the ground-to-space weaponry and the AA guns. While a bomb strike would be wildly inaccurate, a regiment of trained jet-troopers would be able to land between the trees and do what the fighters and fleet could not from the ground. If a handful of troop transports could slip into this blind spot, victory could be a possibility.

The risks of this plan were debated and soon Vabittam command had split in favour of multiple ideas. Vice Admiral Dean Schraw, a man who had been quickly rising the ranks of the navy before the war with the Exedetiae Corporation begun, quelled them and stressed the importance of working together in the face of impending doom. With his insight the original plan was agreed on, flawed as it was. So begun the second part of the conflict.

*"How can we defeat the enemy if we defeat each other first?"*

> *- Vice Admiral Dean Schraw*
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Not long after the plan was decided, a relatively small force of 1,200 covert jet troopers (the largest possible force that could be mustered without raising mass alarm) carried in twelve troop transports were delivered to the moon's proximity by a single fleet carrier. These jet troopers were elites, usually deployed on stealth missions and armed with extremely lightweight gear - a far shot from foot soldiers. Nevertheless, they were the best available for the job.

Immediately disaster struck. As the twelfth transport was departing the carrier, a direct hit by an artillery gun obliterated it and the unfortunate transport in a single shot. Not only were they a regiment down already, but they had no carrier to take them home. To the soldiers, there was no losing now. It was victory or death.

The remaining eleven transports proceeded with the plan, which there was no issue with. They slipped into the blind spot undetected, dropped the troops, and departed for the other side of the planet. All eyes were on the jet troopers as they made their descent, including those of the enemy, who had quickly clocked onto the imminent arrival of their enemy's forces. Despite this, the Vabittam forces were able to land without much trouble between the trees because of the inaccuracy of Exedetiae's anti-air guns up against such small targets. Minimal casualties followed this stage of the assault.

Only on the ground did the real nightmare begin. The general landing zone was a rough kilometre-by-kilometre square in a particularly dense strip of greenery, north-east of the Exedetiae outpost, chosen specifically in the hopes that it would somewhat work to the advantage of the jet troopers who were more used to the terrain. Between the landing zone and outpost was a doughnut-shaped section of forest, a ring of bushes surrounding a gaping clearing. The plan stated that part of the force should meet the Exedetiae defences out in the clearing while the main bulk of troops sprung the outpost, working backwards through the the Exedetiae front and bringing whatever was commanding whatever was commanding the force to their knees.

The Exedetiae Corporation's most barbaric and infamous war strategy was no secret to the entire region by this point: using a clone army to overwhelm enemy land forces with minimal risk to the actual masterminds behind the operation. The one flaw to this (beside the moral issues, which Exedetiae evidently did not care about) was that by being direct copies of the Exedetiae Corporation's original founder Viktor Salem, they also shared a neural bond with the man, meaning they copied his every move. To work around this problem, the clones were fitted with visors that scramble their brainwaves, allowing them to be controlled by one military hive-mind independent of Viktor's actions. If Vabittam were to kill or destroy whatever or whoever was controlling them, the clones had a failsafe that immediately killed them to prevent people from spying on Viktor, resulting in the battle being won.