Part 31: Interview 16 - “Cutting It Fine” (Or, “Some Tragic And Completely Avoidable Sacrifices”)

Interview 16 - “Cutting It Fine” (Or, “Some Tragic And Completely Avoidable Sacrifices”)

Welcome, Commander my dude. We'll be finishing off this battle to capture the giant missile silo today.

Alright, here we go. Remind me where we were?



Olaf had noticed that there were only seven days left, and he's not captured any of the properties necessary for success yet.

Ah yes. Time for a push against the enemy forces, then - there's quite a few to clear out, especially in the southern chokepoint there.

Indeed. First, Anatoly in the artillery destroys that tank - this opens up Ingo's route forward, which is rather important, as we will see.



Anna and Kira, still joint, begin attacking the enemy forces, hoping to open up a chink in their armour.

And if they find one, Fenya or Zlata can take full advantage.



And they do! That's Felix/Fenya, right?

Yes. They're going to be taking on the enemy medium tank, since it wouldn't be safe for anyone else to do that.



Ignat, with the upper area clear, moves in on the enemy rockets to weaken them a bit.



Meanwhile, Ivan begins capturing another property. The rockets are weakened so they shouldn't do too much damage despite him being in range.



And Gavril does the same in the property below him. Well, there's only... six left to get. In seven days?

It really is a bit tight, isn't it?



Anyway, this is how Olaf's turn shapes up. Dipshit next.



As we've established, Dipshit has no ground troops so he can only help by killing things. Thankfully, Ingo is very good at killing things.

Ugh, Dipshit, what is wrong with you?

Something wrong?



Ingo attacked the missiles. But he was already safely out of the missiles' range, and they weren't threatening anyone else, whereas the rockets have their aim squarely on Ivan. It would have been better to attack and destroy the rockets before taking on the missiles.



Yyyyup. Because now Ivan's gonna take an unnecessary hit.



Thankfully, that's the only thing Flak does with his turn. So it wasn't too bad.

Bleh. I suppose.



Ignat begins going after the rockets, since they will kill Ivan next turn.



Meanwhile, looks like Fenya and Felix are wrecking house as usual.

Pretty much. And once this enemy medium tank is toast...



Diana can come in and crush this anti-air with the force of her womanly rage.

her what

You wouldn't get it.



Finally, Zlata can do some heavy damage to this medium tank, but she can't quite snag the kill on it. Thankfully, there's help at hand.



Eva is able to use her rockets to reduce the medium tank to dust. With that, almost all of the threats in the central area have been cleared.

Yeah, that was pretty clean. Not perfect, but I can't expect perfection from Olaf.



Anna/Kira do some chip damage to this tank, but they can't quite kill it. Still, being surrounded by two medium tanks, two tanks and some rockets... safe to say, that tank won't survive much longer.



Anton, the other infantry unit, begins capturing down south. There's really not much time left.



Oh, that mech only has 4HP. They'll be capturing that property for a while...

That's Alina, she was injured during the escape from the battle copter barrage earlier, if you recall. It'll take her 5 days to capture that property, which is still within the time limit.

We'd better hope so.



Ludmilla drops off Nika, who will be capturing some buildings up north.



And finally, somebody has actually captured something! Gavril, well done. Proud of you.



It's now Dipshit's turn, and there's only one thing he actually needs to do.

BOMB DAT ROCKET



Well, yes, but actually no. Alfonse elects to take care of the rockets.



Oh, nice, and that frees up Ingo to take care of the missiles. You've begrudgingly earned my respect, Dipshit.

Does that mean you're going to stop calling him Dipshit?

Ha ha ha ha ha ha no.



...Alright then. Either way, pretty much every enemy threat has been neutralised in some way or another. Now it's just a rush to capture all these buildings in the next couple of days.



You can tell the enemies have been neutralised since Flak doesn't do anything on his turn.

Well, that's good. Now for a big capturepalooza!



Alina is... certainly doing her best.



Ivan is a bit more successful though.



"I simply will not tolerate you any longer." Fenya says, turning her cannon's sights on the enemy tank in front of her.

"I mean, uh, he didn't do anything to us, except... sit on the city we need to capture? We could just ask him politely to move..." murmurs Felix, but his request falls on deaf ears as Fenya unleashes an immense bazooka blast that destroys the tank in a single shot. Fenya shakes the hair out of her face, and opens up her transceiver comms.

"Perfect as always. The way forward is clear, so I expect all infantry and mech troops to make their way here at their earliest convenience."

"Who died and made her the boss?" murmurs Alina to Eva.

Eva shrugs. "I mean, technically Dimitri had to leave the battle, so..."

"Alright, bad example. Still, it's nice to be fighting with your group again." Alina says, keeping her eyes trained on Eva. She tries to prevent herself from blushing. Play it cool, Alina. Play it cool. She won't like you if you come on too strong.

"I'm glad you stayed on too! We're a fun bunch." Eva replies. "Anyway, let's talk more after the battle. We must focus if we're to win this."

"R-right!" Alina says, focussing her efforts once more on capturing the property she's close to.



Oh, Anton's gone to capture a different thing?

It'd be quicker for Anton to go capture that property to the west...



...whilst Gavril takes care of the property he was in the middle of capturing. Efficiency is key.

Oh, true.

However, there is one last incredibly critical problem to deal with.



Ooh. Shit. That can fire on the Blue Moon troops endlessly, and since there's a million Neotanks between us and it, we can't really go kill it, either.

Indeed. Ranged units do rather well in pipe-infested maps, I feel.



Oh, no, I completely agree. But there must be a solution...

And there is. Take a look at the map - Eva's moved south. After another turn or two, she'll be able to deliver rockety justice to the confounded Black Hole troops.



Dipshit uses his CO Power, mostly because he has nothing better to do.



Well that was exciting. It must've healed Lucy, at least. Speaking of, how is Lucy?

...um.



She's running out of fuel fast. If Olaf doesn't clear this map soon, she'll fall out of the sky.

But surely Michael could just refuel her. He's sat right there and he's not doing anything.

Oh, I don't deny that this is an entirely avoidable sacrifice. But Dipshit sort of... forgot Michael was there?



Oh god Lucy no.



As expected, Flak's rockets fire on Anton, weakening him immensely.

Come on, Eva! Everyone's depending on you!





Another capture down. We're slowly getting there.



Anton flees out of the rockets' range. We must eradicate them before he can continue capturing things.



Pfft. Good to see Alina's still hanging in there. Bit by bit.



Correct. Nika is also beginning her capturing efforts, whilst Ivan gets dropped off ready to capture the last northern building next turn.



If Olaf can take out those rockets quickly enough, they might still pull out a victory here...



Down south, though Lucy can hold off most of the enemy troops, the mechs can simply walk over mountains. As such, Alder goes to head them off, and do some damage to them. He doesn't quite get a kill, unfortunately.



Olaf are you kidding me.

Looks like Lucy isn't the only avoidable sacrifice on this map. This was just a rather amateur mistake, frankly.

If I'd been there, this map would have been over by now, my god.



Still. The troops converge on the last few buildings, but Eva needs another turn before she's close enough to start firing on the enemy rockets.



Andy can't do anything, so he skips his turn.

He could REFUEL LUCY BEFORE SHE CRASHES



If this is his third god damn-



HIS THIRD GODDAMN SUPER CO POWER are you serious

Commander, do you need a time-out and a herbal tea?

I am just fucking peachy, thank you.



To absolutely nobody's surprise, the rockets go for Alder, and...



Alas, Alder, we barely knew ye. I mean, literally, we just met you on this map. Poor guy.

It was a rather silly mistake, and it cost Alder his life. But hey - the battle continues.



Let's just get this over with. Preferably before Lucy crashes.



Well, with how slowly Alina is capturing this city... it could be tight.



Nika's captured her property, though. We're getting there.



And Olaf's turn comes to a close with our pal Eva right in the range of the enemy rockets. I really hope they don't target her.



"H-hey, I don't wanna worry anyone," Lucy says, glancing with some concern at her fuel readings on her dashboard. "But I can't keep this up forever. Are we close to capturing all the cities?"

The group aren't sure whether to be honest or to lie to her.

"Ye-" begins Ingo, but Eva cuts in.

"Not really. It's gonna be a gamble, but there's a chance we can have these last few properties captured in the next few days. So, Lucy, how good are you at gambling?"

Lucy grins. "I'm a pro poker player, you know. Eva, I believe in the Blue Moon troops: do your best!"

"Oh, we will." Eva replies. "Alright, everyone, Lucy is depending on us. Let's do this!"

"Yes ma'am!" replies Zlata.



This mech has reached the airport, but it's not really important. Any one of the remaining anti-airs could delete him if they really need to.



Unfortunately, the enemy rockets target Eva. She's brought down to 5HP, which is... not ideal.

It's bullshit is what it is.



She is able to bring the enemy rockets down to a similar amount of HP with her next attack, though.



With the rockets weakened, Gavril is going to try sneakily capture this property whilst they're distracted. Anton is healing up on the property Gavril just captured.

I mean, they're probably gonna go for Gavril. Enemies prioritise infantry mid-capture over, like, their own families.



Pfft. Alina really has been working hard just capturing this one property. I respect it.



Correct. And since her capturing up north was so quick, Nika's been taken down to the last property. Still in rocket range, but she'll be fine if it attacks her.



Valeria bullies this mech before he can capture the airport. The last thing we want is Flak to produce some bombers or something.



So close to success... but not many days left, and not much fuel left on Lucy. Urgh, I hate this.



The important thing is that they win the battle. If Lucy has to fall here, then at least she'll have contributed to the victory in a large way.

But, but... but it's Lucy. She can't die!



hey look they went for Gavril, what a surprise

Yes, you predicted it correctly, my dude. Well done. What do you want, a medal?



I mean, if you're offering.

Sigh.



She did it.

Alina captured a property! It took 5 days but we're very proud of her.



Ivan also captures one... only those two left now.



Nika makes a start on her property.



And now Eva can attack the rockets. At such low HP, they're basically a non-issue now. Phew.



Indeed, we're very close to finishing this map on time. Not much longer to go...



Oh god, oh god. Come on, Lucy, Eva... come on, everyone...



It all depends on these next few turns.



...Thankfully, my dude, you don't need to worry.



They did it! Oh, my god, I can't believe it. They actually pulled this nightmare of a map off!

Correct. As you said, it wasn't perfect, but... they did well, considering it was Olaf and Dipshit.

If we could’ve launched this missile, we would’ve blown ‘em all to bits!

When you say "'em all", he means like half the world, right? Look at the size of that fucking silo.

It is ridiculously large. Some may say unnecessarily large.

Yes! We’ve captured them all! That neutralizes the missile silo!

Wahoo! We won!

Right! We did it! Of course, I could’ve done it myself. What are your plans now, whelp? If you like, I will let you continue to battle here in Blue Moon…

Whelp is a rather accurate term to describe Andy, come to think of it.

Eh. I still prefer Dipshit.

I’m gonna head back to Orange Star for now.

Hm? You’re leaving already?

I’ll be back as soon as everyone at home’s ready to go!

Oh, is that so? Well then, see you aga… No, wait! There’s no need for you to come again.



Gotta admit, I'm impressed that was a S rank considering how long it took.



Olaf also remembers that he had quite a lot of help. Good for him.



With that, the map is over. Next, we'll be joining Colin for his final mission before the final battle of Blue Moon begins in earnest.

Ah, more fun with Moneybags McGee, that should be interesting. Alright, well, guess I'll see you next time, Ruin.

Indeed, Commander.

***

Part 16 Additional