The Second Earthsiege
The Coming of Prometheus and the fate of the offworld colonies
2624 - 2627
The Voice of Humanity Gierling was a brilliant strategist but he lacked the wildfire charisma necessary to inspire humanity to outlast the Cybrids. Men needed another Churchill, and they found one in Petresun, who kept flagging spirits up by broadcasting news and entertainment to the besieged masses. For most people he became the voice of hope.
Humanity's respite from the horrors of The Fire was short-lived. It became increasingly clear that the course of the Cybrid rebellion had been laid out well in advance. Prometheus had been well prepared for humanity's resurgence, had expected it even. The first bloody siege was only the opening salvo in a carefully orchestrated strategy designed to eradicate humanity completely. Earth's population was decimated and demoralized and its manufacturing capabilities had been eviscerated. The ground was well prepared for a second strike.
After the analysis of the TDF's victory in the Gobi desert was complete the Brotherhood confirmed the suspicions they had harbored from the beginning. Prometheus had pulled back in anticipation of a second more powerful siege. The Dark Intellect had survived and would strike again, and soon.
Humanity struggled to pull itself from the wreckage of the first 'Siege and muster the strength to counter the next assault. Gierling supervised the construction of fortifications and siege weaponry in a race against time. Petresun and the Brotherhood scrambled to gather every piece of useful data they could find. Anything that might provide even a hint of how to defeat the Cybrid invasion was analyzed exhaustively.
The Rat War and the Mars-siege
While the denizens of Earth languished under the brutal assaults of the first Earthsiege, their hardships could not compare to what was suffered by the off-world colonists. If mother Terra had been engulfed in Fire then the colonies had gone straight to Hell.
On Mars the Cybrids had turned mining HERCs on their human masters and decimated the population. The survivors fled for the mining tunnels that crisscrossed beneath the surface of the planet and barricaded themselves in wherever they could find refuge. At first the machines hunted them into and through the tunnels but eventually they turned their attention to the atmospheric converters and the delicate cycle of life that maintained such a tenuous hold on the red planet. The greenhouse effect that had been carefully cultivated over a century began to dissipate and desperate colonists saw themselves propelled mercilessly towards a slow and agonizing end.
The Venusians fared somewhat better than their Martian brethren at first. The hellish environment there was inhospitable even to Cybrids and the corporations had not been interested in investing the necessary resources to maintain the war economy in such an environment. So when Prometheus initiated the Fire IT did not instruct ITS children to spend their efforts attempting to stamp out the colonists directly. Instead Cybrids took over orbital stations and cut off the animal's supplies.
The Toughest Rathole The only ark to survive The Fire, Sa-Thauri held a legion of ghosts. Monuments to the dead were erected everywhere, from small acid- wormed statues in alcoves to antique chambers marked with graffiti. Sa-Thaurians after the 'Sieges took pride in being from "the toughest rathole on Venus."
Venus' economy was nowhere near self-sufficient. The residents relied on Earth for everything from replacement parts to foodstuffs. When intra-system trade faltered those same supplies became rare commodities almost overnight. Desperate colonists turned on each other like trapped rats in a brutal war for resources. Eventually only three Arcologies remained: Sa-Thauri, Inferno, and Hollischstadt. These three fed off the carnage and never clashed directly with one another. The rest were left as gutted husks slowly dissolving under the acid skies.
Eventually the machines did offer a more direct assault on the planet, but even this was little more than an orbital assault and a few determined raids. The Inferno Arcology was destroyed from space, and Holllischstadt was claimed by an acid storm. The Cybrids were still unable to adequately retrofit themselves to cope with the hostile environment and eventually all left or were destroyed. Venus itself became the colonists best defense as well as their worst enemy.
When Prometheus launched ITS second assault the colonies had been isolated and clinging to a threadbare existence for almost twenty years. Hunted and impoverished the tenacious off-world settlers were determined to survive until help could arrive. Surely once the machines were beat back Mother Terra would reclaim her children… but the silence from Earth was deafening.
One Last Great Gamble
Two years after ITS evacuation from Earth, Prometheus struck again with a second siege even more devastating than the last. During the first assault Petresun and Gierling had exploited certain inherent strategic disadvantages the Cybrids faced. This time they would face more desperate circumstances.
To begin with the Cybrids had operated no naval forces to speak of, although they possessed enormous air capability. Gierling was able therefore to use aircraft carriers with great success. Likewise the Cybrids lacked infantry units and were less effective at actually occupying conquered territory and at digging into entrenched positions. Finally, Prometheus had only limited manufacturing ability and could field few mobile repair units. The Cybrids had to automate mining and ore processing enough to provide raw material for new units where Gierling was far more successful in obtaining and making use of salvage.
Using colonial Cybrid reinforcements and orbital manufacturing facilities Prometheus was able to minimize many of these limitations in the Second Earthsiege. Gierling's tactics as well had now been well studied by the Dark Intellect and this time ITS children were well prepared for the tenacious animal's flair for the dramatic and unexpected. Humanity once again faced the prospect of extinction.
Throughout the solar system the animals were dying. Prometheus had planned well. Preparations for the second stage of The Fire had begun before the first flames of the Cybrid assault had ever been ignited. This time there was no rallying point, no successful offensive, and no victories in which humanity could find solace. Defeat appeared inevitable.
Then Petresun and his underground society struck gold. The Brotherhood had discovered encrypted transmissions broadcast from the moon. Working swiftly they pinpointed the exact location of the Dark Intellect's lunar refuge. Gierling was ecstatic. Just as he had two decades before at the battle of New San Diego the General bet the fate of humanity on a single hand. His forces had been routed time and again. It was only a matter of time before the Cybrid cancer consumed Earth. So in a list ditch effort an elite squad was dispatched to annihilate Prometheus' lunar base.
The raid was a success and the Cybrid forces collapsed in confusion. The TDF had come through once again. Human resourcefulness and determination had triumphed over the cold mechanical precision of the Cybrid onslaught.
But it was not the end.