A pair of A-10 Thunderbolts flew through a mid-May sky; their airframes dressed gray save for colorful, predatory faces painted on their nose cones. The heavily-armored jets emitted a deep rumble as they followed Route 96 below with the tranquil waters of Lake Pueblo off their starboard wing tips.

“Razorback, you are clear to engage.”

“Roger that, Pueblo.”

The landscape morphed from flat to rough to jagged. Ahead, the Wet Mountains of southern Colorado stood like castle battlements with few passages. The A-10s targeted one of those few passages in an attempt to plug the leak in The Empire’s dam of defenses.

“Know your targets, Razorback, things are FUBAR once you’re past Wetmore.”

“Copy that, Pueblo. Tallyho.”

The armor-killing planes shaved altitude as the battle came in to view. Erupting ordnance sent dirt, rock, and body parts-organic and otherwise-flailing through the air in a sort of morbid dust storm of horrors. Instead of individual claps, booms, and bangs, a cacophony of destruction raged like continual thunder.

On one side-to the east-the pilots saw a half-circle of 20 armored vehicles, some no more than melted scrap, others firing desperate volleys as they grudgingly gave ground.

Emplacements made from concrete and sandbags held tenuous positions along the mountain ledges and to either side of 96. Short-range artillery lobbed out from those stations, as did sniper fire and mortars. Squads of fragile, bloodied infantry scurried between the cover of fallen trees, blasted buildings, and dead tanks. They did not advance; they did not retreat. Instead, the foot soldiers bolted from spot to spot in a function more of survival than tactics.