The Tanysiran Revolt

As the Flutt made its way to the coast, fires could be seen burning on the shore. Recognising the situation as an unstable one, the fleet kept station clearly within sight of the shore and with their guns pointed rather assuredly at the port city they were now about to invade. Some smaller boats were dispatched and a team of officers were met by a party of armed natives when they approached the shore.

The leading Stadhaldja raised his speaking-trumpet and began delivering his ultimatum:

'This is a warning for the irregular combatants of the armed revolt. In accordance with Chapter III, Article Ic, of the St. Helena Accords, I demand someone meet with our representative to discuss the subjects of the Raikh you so unjustly imprison, as it is stated that the subjects of the Raikh are subject only to the Raikh's laws and mixed disputes are to be settled under the Raikh's laws and they are to be free to settle and own property in your lands.'

A clamour could be seen amongst the natives, as they did not seem sure as to how to respond to this. Then from amongst them, a big man with a bald head stepped out and bellowed back 'The constabulary were killed, they tried shooting at us. We have no one to give you!'

The Stadhaldja grimaced, knowing that this was not anything even approaching an 'official' representative of the local government.

'Release unaffiliated members of the general population immediately. We can't allow your slaughter to continue. We demand the release of imperial subjects according to the settlement agreed to in Chapter III, Article Ic, of the St. Helena Accords.'

'We are the citizens of Antsirabe. There are no prisoners. We are just people asking to be free.' replied back the big man.

With this exchange done, the Stadhaldja turned to his fellows and concluded 'There are no prisoners and no imperial subjects among the irregular combatants occupying the city, we should return.' and the boats were in turn rowed back to their ships.

Upon returning to so Andanding Fero, the Stadhaldja went straight to the Fluttfads. 'The insurrectionists hold the city, there are no prisoners in their custody according to them, all subjects of the Raikh have been killed.' 'That simplifies matters then.' The Fluttfads spared no time and ordered that throughout the fleet, high explosive shells be loaded. Before them lay a city of half a million, by far one of the most populous cities in this backwater country, though it was made mostly of mud, wood, and straw.

'The Flutt reports ready, my Lord' 'Commence bombardment.' 

Over the next two hours, the city was levelled. The explosive shockwaves of the shells causing buildings to collapse in on themselves and spreading fire to the rubble. The only areas spread were near the port itself, so as to not destroy the foreign residents, warehouses, and facilities there. Once the place had been truly flattened, the Kregjen were loaded on to boats and made an unopposed landing in the now ruined city. As they cleared through, they were met by sporadic resistance, but nothing organised enough to stop them. In total, around seventy-thousand prisoners were taken from the city.

'Should we fail here, let us recall that the suffering of many will go unavenged. Should we fail here, let us recall that our ancestors faced worse. Should we fail here, let us recall that we were asked to do this task by none other than the Hauhkuno himself!'

Within the protective confines of a Laager, some Fluttskregjen were trapped. The initial landings had gone swimmingly for them, with town after town throwing open the gates and declaring themselves open. The issue had been the interior... While only a few of the cities on the coast had been truly hostile, once you got away from the places where civilisation had been recently so kind to grace them, the resistance grew stiffer. The insurrectionists had opted rather wisely to retreat from the coastal regions (where naval artillery abound) and had taken to the veldt and high desert, which had complicated things.

The detachment had been sent out specifically to establish some new Baurgs along the Oost-Trek, a barely defined path between watering holes that was favoured by merchant caravans and various herdsmen, and which had been quite obviously very closely watched by the enemy. Camel mounted scouts had been shadowing the movements of the convoy for a good four days before the attack finally struck. The men who had noticed them having mistaken them for some of the more friendly nomadic tribes. The attack that came was savage, with the locals using their mounts to great effect to carry out hit and run attacks against the convoy after they had forded a river and started preparing to set up shop on a nice little hillock.

While the guns they had brought with them had not been damaged, the main powder wagon had gone up in a truly impressive column of explosive fire and smoke, injuring quite a few men in the process. Thankfully, the explosion had not been expected by the attackers, as it had also startled them and their mounts quite badly, giving the defenders enough time to circle the wagons and begin rather rudimentary defensive works. It was now the sixth day since the attacks had begun and the defenders were not in good spirits.

Almost to a man, they were running low on ammunition for their guns. Using some poles they brought with them, they had taken to fashioning pikes with which to dismount any attackers that got too close when trying to set some of their defences on fire. Now, only during the truly concerted assaults were they to use their firelocks to defend.

'Sir, I hate to say this, but we are running out of water.' said one of the Undarleidands to the commanding Stadhaldja.

'Damn, how much do we have left?'

'At most enough for two more days with strict rationing. We were supposed to fill up again after the river, but we never got a chance to... I am honestly amazed our supply has lasted this long.'

Looking down from the Hlaw (the informal formal name for their little fortress), the Stadhaldja could see the tantalising view of water... He could also see that just a ways up stream, was the first enemy camp. Down stream, was the second. To try and take water would mean certain death at this point, as it would take only a few moments for a swift rider to mount up and then ride down any man unfortunate enough to be caught out in the open.

'I will be frank, I do not know how we can resolve this issue... We do not have anything with which to effect our escape safely and they are certainly not going to let us simply stroll down there. If we all sallied forth now, we would be able to take one camp, but both? Impossible.'

'About that sir, I believe we have some nitroglycerine and guncotton left over. It was with the construction supplies and meant for blasting, but I think we could fashion some grenades with them.'

'Enough to fight our way down there?'

'No sir, but we only need a few. The enemy only has a handful of guns amongst them and I am fairly certain they are low on ammunition too, since they have not been using them. I say we bluff them, preparing our spare canteens and such to look like grenades by sticking some fuses in them and then hoping that the savages are scared off by the few real ones we actually use against them.'

'All right, but what then? We can hardly just keep repeating this trick.'

'We can probably dig a trench down there using the threat of the explosives afterwards, but we need that water now.'

The commanding officer looked towards the rest of his men and could see how poorly they appeared. He nodded gravely and the two of them finalised their plan. They were going to lead some desperate volunteers down to the water with buckets and possibly to their doom.

Rather than waiting for the sun to go down and more cool temperatures to come, the men had to leave the protection of the Laager at midday, the reasoning behind this was as simple as it was irritating to them. The enemy forces were most active at night and spent most of the day sleeping or otherwise trying not to move very much, as the temperatures mounted. Moving at night would bring about the greatest threat of retaliation, whilst moving during the day would hopefully discourage the enemy from leaving their camps in any large numbers.

As the men were let out and started making their way down, they could already see some action from one of the camps. A sentry had roused some of his fellows and they were now watching the blue-uniformed Kregjens make their way down to the river. This state of mutual observation continued until the Kregyen were a bit over three quarters of the way to the water. At that point, it must have been judged that they would not be able to make it back to the friendly ranks and that they would be easy to take. Despite numbering ten, the enemy only sent out a force of fifteen riders to try and take them.

'Cocky... Well, bully for us boys, group, halt! Circle around!'

With that, the group came to a stop after two steps and neatly formed into a circle around their officer.

'Fix bayonets, prepare to receive cavalry!'

Most of the men broke into two staggered lines with the foremost kneeling down and planting the butts of their rifles into the ground like spears after first affixing their bayonets. The second line raised their rifles up and held them like second rank pikes in a phalanx.

'Grenadiers, make ready!'

With this last command, the two men that had not joined the two formed lines struck some matches to get some pieces of rope to start smouldering and gingerly took off some questionable explosives from their chests, ready to light their fuses and throw them.

Despite their readiness, the enemy seemed rather unbothered by them and decided to try and toy with the men a bit, jeering at them and riding close by but not attack them a couple of times. On their third go around though, the order was given and the grenadiers lit and threw their explosives out in front of where the enemy cavalry were going to be. Like clock work, the grenades blew up and startled the camels, causing the closest to actually fall down and the rest to start refusing orders. Seeing how effective this was and not wanting to lose the opportunity to kill some of the enemy, the officer ordered his men to break ranks and charge.

The riders that where still mounted were very quickly dismounted by men with very pointy stabbing implements. Three of the riders were able to get their beasts back under control and drew their sabres, which resulted in them being quickly surrounded, but two men each while the remaining four set about to murdering those on the ground. Despite the numerical superiority of the Kregjen, their victims were experienced and quickly decided that discretion was the better part of valour and retreated before they could share the same fate as their comrades. As they fled, a cheer came from the Hlaw.

With this little drama completed, the bodies of the dead searched and stripped of useful things, and seven camels now captured by the most excellent efforts of the Hauhkunoleiksflutt, the men continued with their primary objective and retrieved water, managing to actually bring back more than they had originally intended thanks to their new beasts of burden. While they did this, the men of the two camps watched them rather closely, but chose not to try and stop them. They did not know how to deal with these explosives scaring their mounts and were fairly certain that any attack would result in disproportionately high losses for the attacker.

Once the group had returned back to their fellows with water and captured weapons, equipment, and mounts, they were quickly allowed to take well deserved sleep underneath the coolest of shade available with the rest of the defenders now buoyed by this recent victory. Over the next three days, the work parties would be sent out and a trench would be dug, both to allow more protection from attack when moving towards the water as well as to bring the water closer to them. Once it was deep enough, the wall separating the trench from the river was removed and it was quickly flooded. Though it was not the cleanest of water, it was certainly better than dying of thirst.

If it weren’t for the cratered buildings, one could almost forget that Iqrinas, the effective capital of occupied Tanysira, had seen conflict. Sadalenese and DOC forces kept a tepid peace. For the time being, both were more fixed on their common enemy than any previous animosity. In the streets, Vernal priests tended to injured natives, and espoused the virtues of the colonial overlords veiled in religious dogma.

Colonel Theris had set up headquarters in an abandoned warehouse with maps and dossiers laid out on crates of tainted grain to act as makeshift tables.

“I think it best if we try and get in contact with the expeditionary forces from Sadalen, Colonel. Try and find out their plans, and see how we can complement one another.”

Theris thought for a moment. “As we did in Duom? Ha! I’m sure that will be well received. Nonetheless, send out our scouts to get any information we can. If they want to cooperate, we’ll do so. If not, we forge on alone.” He tapped the map, drawing out long, aggressive lines into the countryside. “A shift in doctrine is just what we needed to get these soft boys in fighting shape. Dismissed”

The Old man returned to his tent after watching the officer head back to his fort. inside the man settled onto a lion skin bed and started to scoff at the maggots left inside the fort. When out of the shadows a man appeared and bowed before the chieftain. before beginning his rant. 

"That was not the plan, you needed to left them go and ambush them when they had left the fort as you will not be able to take the fort in an all out assault without suffering massive casualties and if you want this rebellion to succeed you need men". and with that outburst Ralph Köstler pulled out on of his many maps, this one showing the entirety of Tanysiria with multiple coloured lines snaked across the map representing the faltering forces from those peoples to the north as well as the fort he was currently standing outside. He reminded the chieftain that he was only here to advise not fight but that the chieftain should listen to the advice. 

Sheenish marines had been marching at a break neck pace for several days, but the site of their encircled allies had finally come into view. Snipers took their place on the highest hills, and the rest lay waiting in bushes and behind rocks. The situation was assessed and it was deemed that their allies would not be able to hold out another night. The  decision was made to strike, with the first shots being from the Snipers. 

"Enemy commander is 212 degrees South West, minimal breeze. Fire when ready Michael"

Gunfire decimated the silence in an instant, with several shots going off, successfully taking out many of the Rebels. Following the sniper fire, the Marines began laying suppressing fire on the sieging forces, taking the rebels by complete surprise. In the Sadaler camp, hearing the gunfire those on watch sprang to action, but saw they were not under attack.

"Get to your stations men! Our allies are here at last!" Hearing this news revitalised the morale of the Kregjen and their Stadhaldja, who even broke a smile at the news. Every man who could still hold a rifle, and even some who couldn't got up to assist the Sheenish relieving the Siege and began picking off the now panicked rebels.

In the Tanysiran camp, it became clear they were surrounded and needed to break the Sheenish lines, the Sadaler were of no worry, they could barely fight in the eyes of the surviving command. They ordered their bravest men to mount a cavalry charge through what they believed to be the thinnest point in the Sheenish line. It would be difficult, but if successful they could push back their attackers and bring back order to their lines to finish off the Sadaler forces.

Sheenish snipers turned their attention next to the Cavalry, knowing that if they were not dealt with quickly, the attack would almost certainly fail, luckily the gunfire had spooked many of the horses which ran into the machine gun fire, while the rest who managed to begin a charge got easily dealt with by the machine gunners and snipers. As the evening wore on, Rebel morale ran thin, and Tanysiran lines broke. Those that attempted to desert were picked off by Snipers, while the rest were left to the now frenzied Sadaler allies who wanted revenge for all the suffering they had went through. The siege had been won, but there were many men needing desperate medical aid, Sheenish and Sadaler alike.

With the final conclusion to hostilities in Duom and the unlikely prospect of renewed fighting against our former allies, the decision was finally made to recall the Hansafleg. The Fermeigskreggaistas af Hweituzdas was simply sent back to its home, with the men being given all the proper honours and dispensations due to them. The Fermeigskreggaistas af Tanysira on the other hand... It was not so simple. With the revolt ongoing and its casualties from the war, a debate was to be had over what to do with the remaining three-thousand. Send them to the front? Let them raise more men from other territories? Use them for occupation duties?

These questions swirled around the upper echelons until finally a decision was made. They were to be seconded a temporary basis to the Hauhkunoleiksflutt and be used for occupation duty, as well as logistical support, until such a time as the lost men could be raised from the local stock to replenish their numbers and bring them back to full combat effectiveness. With this in mind, their first order of business upon reaching their home's shores was to build training facilities and a new starfort near one of the major cities that had been 'subdued' by the Flutt.

Ralph Köstler Had decided enough was enough as they wouldn't py any attention to his assistance he left to travel back to Duom Asderaordia

'Form lines, damn it, form lines!'

An officer rode about with gun drawn and waving it around threateningly. The men around him started to get the message when he let off a shot into the air, recalling their training and quickly forming what could be described as a firing line. Before them was a village which the Kregbandin had previously been approaching to resupply in, but now were being getting shot from. Over the last two weeks, the Kreggaistas had been broken up into smaller Stafin and sent around to the various watering stations, villages, farms, and market towns.

Most of these units had only met minor resistance, but every now and then something more major would be encountered and they would have to send for reinforcements while the rest of the unit kept whatever they had found pinned down. With such a heavy presence in the region, it was hard for the insurrectionists to properly concentrate their forces and pick off the roaming Stafin.

'Undarleidands, send one of your men to the Hebithman with a message. Inform him that we have been met with resistance. Inform him that I advise cavalry be sent around the settlement towards the rear, in order to cut off any line of retreat as there is insufficient cover to the sides to reasonably effect exfiltration.'

As the Stadhaldja finished dictating his message and the Undarleidands closest to him finished writing it out, a runner was dispatched to their commanding officer and the rest of their Stafs. Unlike before, the enemy had started to wisen up to the pattern of engagements. They no longer would sit in place trading shots with the first unit they met, now knowing that they would quickly be encircled and then overwhelmed if they did not try to escape. The only saving grace for the natives, was that artillery guns were relatively rare, only being used when dealing with proper walls and fortifications. 

As the platoon now waited for a return runner, the men simply lay down off the road they had been walking and exchanged shots with the enemy. The local soldiers in the platoon had already and without any prompting fixed their bayonets and were dumping some of the content of their packs whilst chatting in their native tongues. The veteran soldiers had not done so yet, but also shared a similar level of anticipation for taking the village.

There would at least be something worth looting and if they were the first into the village, they might be able to hide away some choice pieces before the rest of it got thrown into the shared loot pool. At the very least, they would be able to have a good meal though, as several of them could spy some cattle off in the distance which likely belonged to the village.

After a little under half an hour, the runner had made his way back. On him was a letter informing the Stadhaldja that the rest of the company had been engaged in an ambush, but were otherwise doing fine. They would be dispatching riders to flank the village as well, but most importantly, the Stadhaldja had been given permission to act in his best judgement with regards to village and the combatants within.

Having read the letter, a smile broke onto the officer's face. Going by the light nature of the initial attack and the number of shots since exchanged, the enemy was not very numerous. Likely between five and fifteen men, depending on what sort of guns they were using. To add to this, the marksmanship could be called anything but expert, as his own ersatz-troops were giving a better showing in that regard.

'All right, Undarleidands Snogi, your men will hold here and keep the enemy distracted. I am going to lead the rest of Kregbandin out and around, we are going to try crawling through that field over there and get nice and close with the village before making a mad dash for it. When you are ready, feel free to join us in the rough of it.'

With that said, the men quiet and discretely broke up and went about their tasks. After about an hour more of shots being exchanged, the men that had gone to sneak up on the village stood up in a field of millet and charged into it and new cover. Not too long after, they were able to overwhelm the rebels in the village and start their initial round of looting, with the villagers and surviving rebels being herded into a sturdy enough looking building with a thatched roof and left under guard.

'All right, that seems like enough of that. Underleidands Snogi, you are to keep your men here and occupy the village. Should the prisoners give resistance, you may execute them. The rest of us are going to go and join up with the rest of the Kregbandin and see if they need more assistance.'

With that, the looting ended for most of the men and they were off to most likely report their victory.

---

I did not know what to write about, so I decided to just write about my men doing more routine things and not actually suffering for once. The local recruits are starting to acclimate to the idea of taking places meaning more profit for them.